What is Key to Feminism?

For John, BLUF:  zthe suthor asks some of the hard questions about responsibility.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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The Hill to Die On

From The Chhicago Boyz, by Sgt. Mom, 20 June 2022.

Here is the lede plus one:

I swear, I have never been able to understand how the loud and proud Capital-F official feminists made the ready availability of abortion the hill (for the pre-born fetal humans, mostly) to die on.  Yes, I’ve pondered this in blogposts many a time.  The 19th century suffragettes certainly were what we would now cast as pro-life, and so was a modern iteration, IIRC.  (I used to get their newsletter.)  Why that one single aspect, out of all the others which would have a bearing on the lives of females; extended maternal leave and benefits, quality childcare … practically any other concern other than that of abortion on demand at any stage of pregnancy could be a rallying ground for those affecting an intense interest in matters of a particularly female orientation.  This, when birth control in so many forms (and for male and female alike) is readily and economically available.  This is not the 19th century anymore, not even the first half of the 20th.  Truly, it is a mystery why this particular cause and no other animates the radical fem-fringe.  I can only surmise that many of the radical and early feminists had abortions, felt horrifically guilty about it all and wished to drag other women into that particular hell with them as a matter of solidarity.

I am myself old enough to have known other women – my peers, mostly – who did for a variety of reasons, decide to take that route.  I understood that they had reasons they felt were valid and I sympathized without approval.  A woman who is pregnant and for whatever reasons, emphatically does not want to be – has a problem, a problem for which all the solutions are painful.  I did not judge then – but did feel the weight of their decision to go with whatever they felt to be the least painful.  No matter how you slice it, with abortion, you are cutting off a potential life – a viable heartbeat, little fingers and toes, a tiny face with eyelashes and a decided character, even in the womb.  So I have always approved of and supported those various enterprises which reached out a helping hand to the inconveniently-pregnant; anyone or any office which offered medical help, moral and actual support and encouragement to a woman who was inconveniently pregnant.  That was putting good intentions where they mattered; into actions which would offer an alternative to abortion.

A part of the power of pregnancy is the responsibility to be responsible.  The idea that abortion is a form of birth control does not appeal to me.  It is right up there with Eugenics as a wrong reason for abortion.

Is the purpose of Feminism to keep women in the workplace and not pregnant?  How will that work out in the long run?

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

The Little People Suffered

For John, BLUF:  The sanctimonious Enviromentalists and climate change advocaates claim the sky is falling, but they have no real plan for helping the vast majority of the People in this "crisis".  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Elitist environmentalists hate the working class

From The New York Post, by Law Professor Glenn H. Reynolds, 26 June 2022, 7:12 pm.

Here is the lede plus two:

As the United States faces skyrocketing oil, gas and electricity prices, the obvious solution is to drill for more oil and gas and build more generating plants.  Naturally, that’s off the table because the people who are being hurt most aren’t the ones who set the agenda.

High prices hurt everyone to a degree, but they’re hardest on the working classes.  Most Americans drive to work, and even in most places with mass transit there are far more jobs within a 30-minute drive than there are within a 30-minute bus or train ride.  Cars also make it easier to take kids to school, shop for groceries in a wider variety of places and stay in touch with family and friends.

With gas prices having more than doubled since January 2021, the cost of doing all these things has also more than doubled.  For a family that’s stretched tight already, twice as much money for gas means less money for other things, like food, clothing or education.  (And it doesn’t help that prices for those things are also skyrocketing.)

People who respond to complaints about the high price of gas at the pump by saying buy an Electric Vehicle are out of touch with the Average American, who can't afford an Electric Vehicle, if one were available.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Big Brother Watching

For John, BLUF:  The referenced Blog Post is complicated by the legal argot, but the question is, will our "devices" feed data on us and our activities to Big Tech or Government Minders?  This relates to the Chinese Government's Social Credit System (The Link is to a Wikipedia White Wash of the topic).  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Will Your "Smart" Devices and AI Apps Have a Legal Duty to Report on You?

From The Volokh Comspiracy, by Professor Eugene Volokh, 18 June 2022, 1:30 PM.

Here is the lede plus three:

I just ran across an interesting article, "Should AI Psychotherapy App Marketers Have a Tarasoff Duty?," which answers the question in its title "yes":  Just as human psychotherapists in most states have a legal obligation to warn potential victims of a patient if the patient says something that suggests a plan to harm the victim (that's the Tarasoff duty, so named after a 1976 California Supreme Court case), so AI programs being used by the patient must do the same.

It's a legally plausible argument—given that the duty has been recognized as a matter of state common law, a court could plausibly interpret it as applying to AI psychotherapists as well as to other psychotherapists—but it seems to me to highlight a broader question:

To what extent will various "smart" products, whether apps or cars or Alexas or various Internet-of-Things devices, be mandated to monitor and report potentially dangerous behavior by their users (or even by their ostensible "owners")?

To be sure, the Tarasoff duty is somewhat unusual in being a duty that is triggered even in the absence of the defendant's affirmative contribution to the harm.  Normally, a psychotherapist wouldn't have a duty to prevent harm caused by his patient, just as you don't have a duty to prevent harm caused by your friends or adult family members; Tarasoff was a considerable step beyond the traditional tort law rules, though one that many states have indeed taken.  Indeed, I'm skeptical about Tarasoff, though most judges that have considered the matter don't share my skepticism.

I fear the Woke mobwill say yes, your devices must report you.

This is not good for the First Amendment Rights of those in the United States.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Crimes were Committed

For John, BLUF:  We, as humans, have been breaking the rules since Eve spoke to that Serpent.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Texas Woman Pleads Guilty to 26 Counts of Voter Fraud in ‘Vote-Harvesting’ Operation

From Epoch Times, by Reporter Gary Bai, 20 June 2022.

Here is the lede plus three:

A Texas woman on June 16 pleaded guilty to 26 counts of voter fraud committed during a local water board election in 2018.

Monica Mendez, 36, of Port Lavaca ran a “vote-harvesting operation on behalf of a subsidized housing corporation in order to influence the outcome of a utility board election,” the Texas Attorney General’s (AG) office said in a statement on Friday.  The election in question was the 2018 Victoria County Water Control and Improvement District 1 Election in Bloomington, Texas.

Mendez pleaded guilty to 26 felony counts of voter fraud, including three counts of illegal voting, eight counts of election fraud, seven counts of assisting a voter to submit a ballot by mail, and eight counts of unlawful possession of a mail ballot, the office said.

Victoria County District Judge Eli Garza sentenced Mendez to five years of deferred adjudication probation.

My point in posting this?  Yes, Virginia, there is Voter Fraud.

I expct that during the COVID Pandemic of 2020, with State Legislatures passing laws to provide accommodatoins and Courts ruling so as to provide accommodations, some Voter fraud did creap in, not withstnading the Democrats, in a Trumpian manner, declaring the 2020 Election was perfect.

That is not to say that President Biden didn't win the Electoral College.  He did win the Electoral College.  He is our president.  Thznk you un-enrolled voters.

Regards  —  Cliff

The Administrative State

For John, BLUF:  The question of the place of Givernmental Bureaucrats in our scheme of Government is an important one.  It is becoming a topic of debate out in the public square.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Who Should Regulate?

Here is the sub-headline:

The question of whether federal agencies or the courts should have the right to interpret legislation may seem technical, but it significantly affects the power of the government.

From The New York Review of Books, by Professor Cass R. Sunstein, May 26, 2022 issue.

Reviewed:

The Chevron Doctrine:  Its Rise and Fall, and the Future of the Administrative State
by Thomas W. Merrill
Harvard University Press, 355 pp., $35.00

Here is the lede plus three:

Does the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have the authority to impose a mask mandate on people who travel on planes, trains, and buses? In April a federal district court in Florida offered a clear answer: Absolutely not. The court gave an exceedingly narrow reading to the CDC’s powers under laws enacted by Congress. In the process, it sent an unmistakable signal: some conservative judges will not allow federal agencies to protect public safety and health unless Congress has unambiguously given them the authority to do so.

That signal is ominous. In a period of congressional deadlock, federal agencies often have to take the lead in responding to urgent social problems. During the Covid-19 pandemic, many of the nation’s most important decisions about vaccinations, air travel, masks, social distancing, and more have been made by White House officials, the CDC, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Policy responses to climate change have also primarily come from the White House, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and other agencies.

Because public policy is often made by administrative agencies, it can shift dramatically from one administration to another. Whether we are speaking about public health, civil rights, clean air, health care, food safety, tobacco, or immigration, fundamental policy judgments might well depend less on Congress than on who wins the presidency.

The administrative state has been with us since the founding. But much of modern government can be traced to the 1930s, when in response to the Great Depression Franklin Roosevelt created a host of new agencies, including the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Communications Commission, and the Social Security Administration. These agencies exercise a great deal of discretion, and they affect the lives of millions of Americans every day. (They also have international influence.) They were born in a period of enthusiasm for technical expertise: Roosevelt and his New Dealers believed in the rule of law, but they did not believe in the rule of courts; they wanted to give authority to specialists.

Later in the article Professor Sunstein gives a look at the issue:

Justice Brett Kavanaugh describes the [Chevron] doctrine as “nothing more than a judicially orchestrated shift of power from Congress to the Executive Branch.”

And this is one of things that worries me about our Government.  We elect people to the Houose of Representatives and Senate, and we elect a President, but the Bureaucrats selfpropogate, under little supervision from the other branches of the Government (Judicial and Legislative).  It is the Admijnitrative State.  To quote the Wikipedia article:

Dr. Michael Greve, a law professor at George Mason University School of Law, defines the current implemented administrative state of the United States as, “a power once known as 'prerogative'—that is, the power to make binding rules without law, outside the law, or against the law, exercised by someone other than an elected legislature,"

You may find the idea of a technocentric government as good, based on the idea that the technocrats know what they are doing.  However, technocrats have brought us such things as eugenics and the Tuskegee Experiment.  Dependiing on the experts to deide what is good for the rest of us may be good with airline pilots, but semms antithetical to a Democratic or Republican form of Government.  When and where do the People decide?

If you thought Dr Anthony Fauci was supurb conducing the US response to the COVID, you might favor the Administrative State.  On the other hand, if you have been dubious of our overall response, if yoou wonder if Governor Ron DeSantis did a better job that Governor Andrew Cuomo in helping their state through the crisis, you might be opposed to the Administrative State.

I worry that the People, the Voters, might never get a voice in this debaate.

Regards  —  Cliff

Free Julian Assange

For John, BLUF:  We should not be using the long arm of Government Police Powers to intimidate folks who hold opposing views.  The ACLU and the Democratic Party used to know this.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Glenn Greenwald asks why Marjorie Taylor Greene is saying this and AOC, Bernie, and their ilk are not.

From Althouse, by Law Professor Ann Althouse, 18 June 2022.

Here is the Twitter Message set:

Glenn Greenwald
@ggreenwald
Leave aside whatever views you have of MTG.  Just put them in a corner for a second.  OK, have we done that?

Now: think about the indisputable fact that not AOC, Bernie or a single Squad member could or would say most of what is in this thread, let alone in this tone, and ask why:

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸
@RepMTG
If we really care about the 1st Amendment then we should care about Julian Assange.

Freedom of Press is the protection of the ability to expose the truth and publish it.

This should always be protected and this freedom should always be handled with the most respect.

There are two points here.  The first is that it should be an embarrassment to Liberals in the Democratic Paarty tht no one is speaking out for Mr Julian Assange.

The second point is that the First Amendment needs to be protecteed, and that includes the right of publications to be wrong.  Disinformation, Ms Nina Jankowitz not withstanding, is not outside the protection of the First Amendment.  Otherwise, we would have The New York Times taken down for using the term "Trump Big Lie" to describe the outcome of the 2020 Elections...Oh, wait, that is the other side view.  I believe that in the case of the November 2022 Elections we will see some backlash to the labling of "opinions" as disinformation.♠

Hat tip to Ann Althouse.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  I believe Mr Trump was incorrect regarding the 2020 Presidential Election.  However I believe those who label his views "The Big Lie" are giving us a "Trumpian-like" view that the Election was perfect and nothing was wrong.  That is blatant dis-, mis- and mal-information.  This is not up for Government policiing.

Ban AC in DC

For John, BLUF:  Yes, this is from almost six years ago, but the concept is still waiting to be tested.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Glenn Reynolds:  Ban AC for DC

Here is the sub-headline:

If our rulers think global warming is a crisis, let them be a good example for the rest of us.

From USA Today, by Law Professor Glenn Harlan Reynolds, 11 July 2016, 3:43 PM.

Here is the lede plus one:

Everyone talks about global warming, but nobody does anything about it.  At least, the people who talk about saving the planet the most seem to have the biggest carbon footprint.  But I have some ideas for fixing that.

In this, I’m inspired by Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Tex., who noticed something peculiar recently.  It seems that EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, who spends a lot of time telling Americans that they need to drive less, fly less, and in general reduce their consumption of fossil fuels, also flies home to see her family in Boston "almost every weekend"; the head of the Clean Air Division, Janet McCabe, does the same, but she heads to Indianapolis.  In air mileage alone, the Daily Caller News Foundation estimates that McCarthy surpasses the carbon footprint of an ordinary American.  Smith has introduced a bill that wouldn't target the EPA honchos’ personal travel, though:  It provides, simply, that “None of the funds made available by this Act may be used to pay the cost of any officer or employee of the Environmental Protection Agency for official travel by airplane.”

The author lays out a four point plan to help fight climate change and the middle two focus on our Nation's Capitol:

Obama makes a great point about setting the thermostat at 72 degrees.  We should ban air conditioning in federal buildings.  We won two world wars without air conditioning our federal employees.  Nothing in their performance over the last 50 or 60 years suggests that A/C has improved things.  Besides, The Washington Post informs us that A/C is sexist, and that Europeans think it’s stupid.

In fact, we should probably ban air conditioning in the entire District of Columbia, to ensure that members of Congress, etc. won’t congregate in lobbyists’ air-conditioned offices.

I like the idea.  I think things might actually be better if Congress decamped for the Summer and the Bureaucracy spent less time in their offices.♠

Back before Air Conditioning Washington was an enviornmental swamp, with stinky Summer weather, especially around August.  People avoided it.  Today Organizations want to move to DC.  Raytheon is the lates example, wanting to move its Corporate Headquarters to Washington.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Thanks to the US Taxpayers I spent three and a half years in Naples, Italy, at a NATO Headquarters.  There was no air conditioning, except for the 24 Hour a Day Command Post and the SCIF (No windows to open to let air circulate).  So, for the Summer, instead of 8 to 5, we worked 7:30 AM to 1 PM.  I have stayed past 1 and almost put my eye out falling asleep at my desk, while trying to write (before computers).  And, I think we were more creative and productive than our Central European Colleagues..