law

Chris Knight's avatar

Many years ago, during a particularly dark period of my life,  I wrote a one-scene play.  It was one of a number of works that I felt inspired to create.  Thankfully I seem to have come out of that melancholy for good, but there will forever be a mark on my soul from that time.  I like to think that what I’ve done since has been, for lack of a better term, “happier”.

So, about this play…

It’s a single scene.  Involving a man and a woman.  And they come to have a heated discussion involving another woman.  All throughout the play you’re wondering “who are these people?  What are they talking about?  Does this involve an affair that he’s been caught in?”

Finally, in the last moments of the play, comes the big reveal.  The object of their conversation is a woman who is about to be executed and ...

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That’s pretty much the summary of it all.  I’m quite disappointed, but not surprised at all, at the Supreme Court’s ruling about birthright citizenship.

It’s the third rail of American law: that EVERYONE born on American soil must therefore be an American citizen.  The high court had the opportunity to rectify that assumption.  But that requires a boldness and adherence to the Constitution as written that is all too absent from the halls of government in our era.

As I’ve come to understand it the 14th Amendment applies to people born to those who are already under American jurisdiction, and at the time that was indeed former slaves and their children.  Those born to foreign citizens while in America are subjects of those foreign places.  The amendment is pretty clear on that.

Thomas, Gorsuch, and Alito are correct in this case.  But the politics of the matter was too much ...

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Dear friends and family in the Greensboro, North Carolina area:

It has come to my attention that after an absence of several years, red light cameras are due to be installed again all over the city.  These first appeared circa 2001 and it was soon apparent that they were more a liability than they were an asset.  Well, not an asset to anyone but the city government and the company running the cameras (who got a healthy percentage of each ticket issued).

I could spend all day writing about why the cameras are wrong.  How they violate our rights articulated in the Constitution.  How it also seems that the intersections equipped with the camera have speeded-up the yellow caution lights so that there’s more a chance of running the red light and getting your car’s photo taken.  Volumes have already been published about how bad the cameras are and why....

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It seems that Disney and Lucasfilm did not want to go the distance with Gina Carano.  Disney could have simply let Carano go four and a half years ago after they didn’t like her conservative-leaning commentary on her own social media (why are liberal-leaning actors forgiven for their commentary, huh?).  Instead they had to disparage her personal character by making her out to be someone with hate-filled qualities.  And that’s where Disney/Lucasfilm went wrong.

So Carano sued Disney early last year, and she had Elon Musk among many others in her corner.  And today Disney/Lucasfilm capitulated and settled with Carano out of court.
Not only has Disney backed down, they have also taken a conciliatory stance toward Carano, and furthermore have said that they
...
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Someone asked me what do I think about it now coming out that Barack Obama, in the closing days of his presidency, conspired with several others to sabotage the incoming administration of Donald Trump.  There is a lot of evidence now that this indeed happened and if it did, then a lot of people including Obama deserve to go to jail.

It won’t happen.

I’m old enough to recognize a rigged game when I see it.  And that is what the Trump Administration is facing.  Nobody is going to be arrested.  There may be indictments but they won’t go anywhere.  And even if they did, there is going to never be a “guilty” verdict from a jury from the District of Columbia.  Washington is a company town, practically everyone there is on the payroll of that company.  The corruption has long taken too much root.

There may be some ...

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There is both jubilation and lamentation abounding tonight following Congress’s approval of President Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill”.  Personally, I have some mixed feelings about it.  I’m not going to let the shrill hysteria coming from some quarters persuade me that it’s an entirely bad thing though.

I think the thing I’ve heard most from those opposing the budget is that it’s going to starve “millions” of people.  And that it’s going to deprive many others of necessary medication.

Well, let’s see what someone who has in times past been on government assistance for food, and medicine, and has worked in the public sector as a mental health professional, has to say about the “One Big Beautiful Bill”.  You ready for this?  Because you may not be expecting what I’m about to speak about it.

Okay, here we go…

The public food assistance is horribly abused.  A lot of people ...

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This is a good day to be a sensible American.

This morning the Supreme Court handed down some rulings and I was looking forward to seeing how they would go.  I am not disappointed at all.

Mahmoud v. Taylor is the case out of Maryland involving parents who wanted to opt out of having their children exposed to homosexual material in public school.  The justices went 6 to 3 in favor of the parents.  It’s a magnificent win for parental rights regarding their children.

It should have been a unanimous ruling though.  I’m going to be looking for the minority opinion.  As many would guess the three dissenting justices were Kagan, Sotomayor, and “I don’t know what a woman is” Brown.

And then there is the situation involving the Trump Administration and all of those federal judges who have been hitting the president with nationwide injunctions, effectively keeping ...

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I’ve been occupied with a lot of real-life matters over the course of the past few weeks.  Those have kept me from being “tuned in” to much of the current news.  The last several days though have seen a lot of chatter about Kilmar Abrego Garcia: the “Maryland man” from El Salvador who was sent back to his country of origin last month courtesy of the Trump Administration.  And there is a lot that could be said about this case: from the dubious rationale he used to enter this country, to the possible violations of the Logan Act by the Democratic Party in trying to bring Garcia back to America.

(Say, why isn’t there that kind of concern for the U.S. citizens who have suffered loss and injury and death at the hands of illegal immigrants?  Seems like the Democrats – their elected officials and party leadership especially – ...

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This episode of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood is legendary.  It dates to around 1980-ish and it shows something that had never been seen before and was not seen again anytime after.  It’s the episode where Mister Rogers got mad.

Seriously, he was honked-off.  I mean VERY outraged.  He comes into the house and doesn’t even put on a sweater or change his shoes.  He’s not “Mister Rogers” the friendly neighbor but instead “Fred Rogers” the irate citizen.  Seems that he was given a parking ticket and he thinks that it’s wrong.  His entire demeanor is angry and frustrated.

But a little song and an appearance before the judge later, and all is set right again.  Fred Rogers returns and after properly changing accoutrements the show is back on course.

Here is the episode where Mister Rogers gets upset and goes to traffic court.  It made a significant impact on ...

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Regarding Murthy v. Missouri: the Supreme Court decision yesterday about government coercing social media companies to censor users’ activity based on political content.  SCOTUS decided that the plaintiffs had no standing and dismissed the lawsuit.

This seems like a colossal victory for the government and social media companies.  HOWEVER…

The case was *not* dismissed.  Today’s ruling dealt with the temporary injunction in the case, not the case itself.  The case was REMANDED, back down the legal chain.  It could still come before the high court where the plaintiffs can better frame their arguments with solid evidence of coercion and censorship.

I believe that such a thing is not only possible, it is almost guaranteed to happen.

Twitter, or X as it’s called now, is going to be VERY interesting to watch as it pertains to the case.  When Murthy v. Missouri was first filed it was confronting ...

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