Why aren't these guys in jail? Seriously. I mean, I know the theory of the rule of law and all, but even our widely-acclaimed greatest president suspended habeas corpus when insurgent seditionists tried to overthrow the Union.
I suspect that this is extremely dry humor, but for others that read this, Trump pardoned both Bannon and Stone
it's still unfathomable that trump was "allowed" (I know it was "legal", don't point that out) to pardon his literal partners-in-crime. He basically has already self-pardoned himself by proxy by allowing these traitors to walk free.
Ford pardoned Nixon.
Bush Jr pardoned Scooter Libby.
Governor Abbott pardoned a pedophile for shooting a black girl's white boyfriend
Why is this even remotely surprising?
the difference being that ford wasn't involved in Nixon's taping. etc. etc.
this is direct involvement, which makes it stink more.
We messed up when we allowed Ford's pardon of Nixon before he was convicted. We should only allow pardons after the person was convicted. That created all kinds of paradoxes:
creating a blanket pardon "from any crime that we don't know yet about"
possible pocket pardon, where a president could pardon themselves secretly
hiring thugs on president benefit and giving pardon right before leaving office. They know they can do anything and will receive a blanket pardon. If president had to wait for conviction then there was no guarantee he would be there to pardon them. So it would make whole escapade more risky
total immunity which trump is arguing about would be even less likely if there was no blanket and pocket pardon and he had to wait until being convicted before being able to be pardoned
The only restrictions on presidential pardons are on convicted impeachment and the requirement that it must be a federal crime. Yes, Trump can even pardon himself from the federal documents, insurrection, and election fraud cases if he takes office again.
We should never have allowed a pardon before a conviction. What Ford did for Nixon created all kinds of paradoxes.
Carter did it with draft dodgers too, but I agree.
Well that balances the damage lol
I'm not sure if I'm joking. In any case, the writ of habeas corpus is the legal tool that a court can theoretically use to compel the appearance of a prisoner before it. It is the legal doctrine that underlies the right to trial, and I say "theoretically" because courts rarely need to issue one; it's just standard procedure to bring people to court to face charges.
By suspending it, Abraham Lincoln could detain those people he deemed dangerous seditionists indefinitely, because the detainees would have to go to court to challenge their detention, and there was no way to get to court. The effect of suspending it again is that it wouldn't matter that Baboon (autocorrect and I'm leaving it) and Stone were pardoned, or that there were even criminal charges.
Lincoln did it, George W. Bush did it. Barack Obama did it. The Constitution contains a clause which allows it to be suspended due to rebellion or threats to public safety. It's a dangerous thing to allow a president to do, but the MAGA danger might be greater.
Worth noting that, historically speaking, if a state official wanted to punish someone without going through the court system he could always just turn the prisoner over to a lynch mob.
So while suspending habeaus corpus is a danger to democracy, it is not a singular method by which mayors, governors, or Presidents have disposed of political opponents.
In other words the US is neither a state of law nor is it a democracy as separation of power can be overturned whenever the president feels like it.
Emergency powers are in most constitutions because people generally understand that during war things have to operate a little differently. You can't allow the enemy, who is attacking you physically, to go and publish propaganda that attacks you rhetorically and turns the populace's loyalty towards the other side. The problem we have now is the constant use of emergency powers. That needs to be shut down. Emergency powers should be limited to a certain timeframe, and reviewed by congress after that. Not these multi decade states of emergency.
I have to say, "you've been unpardoned" would be a great line.
Throughout human history, laws have never stopped conservatism. Jails have never stopped conservatism. Pacifism has never stopped conservatism. Only force has ever stopped conservatism. Only force.
Careful or you'll get called a tankie
People get called that when they're pretending to be far left while urging everyone to take the exact actions the Repubs want them to take.
Is this code for "people who aren't voting for Joe Biden"?
that would be people who are essentially voting for trump, so yeah, why not.
Tankie is the pro-authoritarian left. The Stalinists essentially. The ones who think it's appropriate to send in the tanks to quell a socialist or communist uprising because it has a tint of democracy in it, which may cause their strong leader to lose dictatorial power.
It's code for "antifascist" "leftists" who are urging people to do the exact same things that the Republican party wants them to do.
urging people to do the exact same things
Specifically, which things?
If you're upset about being called a tankie, you could cross-reference what you are urging people to do with what the Republican party wants people to do. And then stop that.
In general I would recommend being antifascist in a way that isn't the exact same actions as overt fascism with the only difference being the rhetoric justifying the actions.
What am I urging people to do?
Fuck if I know. You're whining about being called a tankie. I can explain why that happens in general. You'll have to figure the rest out on your own. Maybe if you do some reading and educate yourself you can get there.
Tankies are literal authoritarians. People say they're "authoritarian communists," which ignores they're mostly Maoists or Stalinists, both of whom were closer to fascism than the left. It sort of ignores the basic premise of communism or even socialism to have a single authoritarian ruler. Kind of like how the Nazis called themselves socialists. I guess they were a workers' party to start, but I don't think you can reasonably conflate their ideology with the tenets of socialism.
The Nazis only used the label socialists to deceive the working class. They said so plenty of times when meeting with the industrialists whose bidding they were doing. They never were a workers party and they knew that it was only in name to be more palatable. This deception now has been replaced with "owning the libs" and whatever the local version of neoliberal, conservative or fascist ideology you have around the world.
No, you don't understand. The problem is that those people haven't had enough time to bring upon real communism. Real communism hasn't been reached yet. They want to let the Maos and Stalins of the world have enough time to reach communism. Things will surely be different with the next guy.
Trump is just Stalin and mai with less power.
There is no difference between authoritarianism at either end of the spectrum.
The issue with authoritarianism isn't "communism or fascism" it's a symptom of shitty PEOPLE NOT TYPE OF GOVERNMENT.
STalin wasn't a shithead BECAUSE he was commumist, but in spite of it.
I was being pedantic. There is no such thing as Stalinism, that article is a joke. Stalin was just a Marxist Leninist.
That's certainly a take
Tankies these days are conservatives wrapped in an authoritarian shell. Instead of just being supportive of their own authoritarian government they try to destabilize other governments for their gain.
As in my other reply, the Constitution allows the suspension of habeas corpus in cases of rebellion or threats to public safety, and without that writ, charges and sentences are irrelevant.
The Supreme Court has held that the Constitution contains a right to habeas corpus in Boumedine v. Bush. The Lincoln thing was never fully litigated and was probably unconstitutional.
The Constitution doesn't empower the court to interpret the constitution. If the executive chose to ignore the court it would be perfectly legal.
Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137 (1803), was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court that established the principle of judicial review, meaning that American courts have the power to strike down laws and statutes they find to violate the Constitution of the United States. Decided in 1803, Marbury is regarded as the single most important decision in American constitutional law.
Yes, the supreme Court gave itself that power. To that end the other branches could justifiably choose to not find that to be valid.
Roger Stone's been to jail a number of times. He really doesn't care because he knows he'll get pardoned. Also he's basically a mafia don, so I imagine he gets a lot of respect in prison from republicans.
In what capacity does he resemble the mafia? He’s a snake. These guys want to desperately be associated with the mafia but they’re just con men. The Mafia were intelligent criminals.
Everyone needs to remember this guy shaking hands with world leaders during his years in office. In every single picture he is smiling like a pig in shit. It is only after the indictment photo he is attempting to rebrand himself as some sort of tough guy criminal instead of a slimy, smug con artist.
He was going to face a trial and likely prison, but trump pardoned him and the rest.
Huh? Why would anyone with power go to jail in an oligarchy? Unless you upset the more powerful oligarch.
I wonder if they're actually dumb enough to try the false electors scheme twice in a row?
They got caught are being convicted right now for doing it in 2020, and everybody is expecting it now.
Whatever the result they’re going to keep trying again. Why wouldn’t they when there are virtually no consequences? Fascists don’t give a damn about what election results say, they’re always going to try to gain power by any means necessary.
Well that's what I mean.
There are so far very severe consequences. Lawyers have been disbarred, dozens of people have been charged, the trials are ongoing right now and more charges are occurring from more agencies. there are a whole lot of legal consequences which is why i am wondering if they're going to do it again.
They don't care about election results, but they do care about legal consequences.
They only care about the legal consequences that affect THEM. There's always another idiot lawyer ready to get disbarred.
Right, that's the nice part about legal consequences for them. They care about those legal consequences.
The trials are being sandbagged by republican judges, nobody is actually getting punished for trying to steal the election. They're gonna do it again.
That's happening more with The classified documents case, not with the fake electors.
Good news, The fake elector charges and trials are actually going through without a hitch, have a lot of defendants informing on co-defendants. Several defendants have already pled guilty, participants are being arrested, more charges are coming, there's actually a lot going on with this case.
What about the one in DC run by Judge Chutkan that's on indefinite hold thanks to the Supreme Court?
What about the one in Georgia that is on indefinite hold thanks to the Georgia Supreme Court?
Those seem pretty hitched to me.
As far as I'm aware, the supreme Court we're not indefinite.
The supreme Court is a piece of s*** don't get me wrong, but I'm pretty sure that trial is still going on.
And Trump's lawyer admitted that "private acts of a sitting president are not entitled to immunity".
Yeah, so that's going well.
Georgia, that one is currently on hold, but it doesn't negate all of the other ongoing cases against him and none of the charges are going away.
But who is the defendant in the fake electors trial? This isn't one where Trump himself is on the docket, right?
It would be strange if he wasn't eventually charged since he was definitely part of the plot.
This is a case that goes across eight states with dozens of defendants, some have already pled guilty, many are working with the prosecutors to provide testimony against peer and higher co-defendants.
Trump hasn't been charged yet, but people are still getting charged for the fake electors scheme every month, and since he was on the phone with these people convincing them to forge and mail in the documents, I can't see why he wouldn't be charged.
It's being investigated right now as to how to charge Trump, since he was personally involved in this scheme.
He'll probably be one of the last people charged.
Especially now that he was already convicted once and it isn't taboo or anything to charge him with felonies.
There are so many defendants, this was such a huge conspiracy that most of the trial still haven't started, and several defendants haven't been arraigned.
But it's going forward!
Uh... If you don't want your election stolen, you, uh, you gotta vote. Vote so hard they can't steal it. Make your friends vote. Make your friends' friends vote.
Because if we don't win this year, we don't get to have any more elections. No more voting. We're getting rid of it because your don't vote good.
I, uh, have voted in every election I've been eligible to vote in.
I'm pretty sure they'll do increasingly farcical votes for some time after.
That's basically Texas and Florida right now
You sound like a MAGA moron. Also encouraging people not to vote, and encouraging people to not vote for Biden elsewhere in the thread. Sus.
They will. And they'll take it to the Supreme Court, where they'll just install Trump as the winner of the election. Mark my words.
Humbug. I take cynicism lightly.
They didn't get past mailing in the forged documents last time, and they have a worse chance this time.
They'd have to do something different, like state legislatures passing laws that say they don't have to listen to appointed electors.
That's already failed, but that's the tack I think they'll try to refine, since they're approaching it so poorly right now and direct forgeries don't work
I would think that failure just exposes points of improvement. They failed before, but now they know how to succeed. :(
I think that's just distant fatalism.
It's not like they can forge the documents better this time.
They'll have to try completely different, like changing State legislatures to somehow ignore election results or claim that the state can use their own electors.
Most of the people who forged the documents or participated in the conspiracy the last time are going to be pretty busy in trial or testifying in trials.
Dozens of people, anyone significantly involved in the fake electors scheme is facing charges or will be facing charges soon, many of them have already pled guilty.
I hope you're right!
yeah. I doubt they would do that unless there was a precedence set for a court to determine a presidential election.
There is.
Bush v Gore
That was technically a procedure to allow or disallow a recount of a specific vote in a specific district in Florida. And yes, the Supreme Court will be ruling on those again.
Gore vs Bush...
If it works then you get to convict the other side for being fake.
Sure. But there are less idiotic and more effective ways to try to seize power.
Literally forging documents and sending them in two institutions that verify documents is pretty dumb.
Resulting in legal consequences already.
You're still assuming those bodies operate in good faith. Democrats must win the house and senate to ensure that.
Nope, I'm not assuming these bodies operate in good faith.
I'm taking what happened before into account and the outrage and legal culpability for a large scale, lazy conspiracy, and making a prediction based on that.
They are dumb enough to try a bunch of other stuff, including violence, again though.
them? double down?! surely not.
Who is being convicted? It sounds like nobody's been convicted yet, so they're wiling to try it again. Also who cares if some false elector goes to jail? Not Trump. Not the dirty ratfucker.
Well, as a personal conspirator in this game, dumps is certainly liable.
He's been indicted in Georgia. And by the doj, so dumps will have to fight those charges of conspiracy.
This is such a huge case investigated by so many agencies that everyone isn't even charged yet 4 years later.
So the convictions will take time, but at least eight people, including chesebro and other planning-level agents, have actively been working with every investigation testify to the involvement of the others.
The trials and convictions are still ongoing, but a few trials have finished.
I only know about the ones that have pled guilty and are informing on others. But none of this is halted or not happening, it's just that the trials and sentencing are still going on.
No. Instead they're gonna have state legislature throw out the results of the election. Which they can probably do, Constitutionally-speaking.
The State legislature pick the electors. Just because they all use a popular vote to do it doesn't mean they can't change the law in between the voting in November and the actual election in December.
Ha, I've answered that two or three times to other people here!
I agree that changing or interpreting the law to pick stricty conservative electors is their next strategy， but I don't think it's going to be as simple or successful as they imagine.
Sort of like how they didn't realize sending in forged documents was very likely to fail.
Forged documents are illegal. Changing laws regarding how electors are selected isn't.
Heck - way back in 2000 the Supreme Court hinted at the tactic in the majority opinion in Bush v Gore, saying that the Florida legislature probably could have just selected electors directly after the vote.
Actually, a lot of the fake electors tried to use the defense that there's no specific law against fake elector documents.
Colorado just signed a law that says fake electors are illegal.
Landscape's a lot turnier then it looks
How would he know? Trump isn't supposed to talk with felons.
Get those mirrors out of his living spaces.
That's only if he gets away with probation. Due to him talking with felons all day every day and the fact that he's publicly shown ALL of the contempt (in both the colloquial and legal sense of the word) of the court and continues to do so, that's unlikely in spite of the kid gloves he's being treated with.
My guess is he gets community service and I hope it involves picking up thrash while wearing a jumpsuit that matches his skin.
I can't wait for Fox News. "PRESIDENT TRUMP is picking up trash! He has to bend down and PICK UP TRASH! He is being treated more unfairly than ANY AMERICAN has EVER BEEN TREATED in the HISTORY OF THIS COUNTRY!"
I hate to burst your bubble, but Trump's not going to be picking up trash. He will either get house arrest, or community service. Community service will likely consist of recording public service announcements. This is how celebrities are typically treated.
His security is actually a valid concern for the court, which must be considered. It's impossible to guarantee his security while picking up trash on the side of the highway - since anyone could stop and shoot. Likewise, it is impossible to guarantee his security in prison without solitary confinement.
Of course, it is possible that one day he may get to run his own prison like Pablo Escobar, but I think house arrest is more likely. He'll love it. Sitting on his ass in Mar a Lago, doing virtual campaign events, watching the news and shitposting all day.
Solidarity confinement sounds good.
No access to a mobile phone or another person forced to listen to him moan, would drive him absolutely bonkers.
I'm a Republican that does their own Research and even though the election hasn't happened yet I ALREADY KNOW TRUMP LOST UNFAIRLY because of Sleepy Joe Biden being UNFAIR!
This is exactly how I feel so your comment is one hundred percent correct.
What's the name of your face book research group?
My emotions validate my worldview!
The Republicans get away with so much despicable action and each time the Dems get pants by the audacity of the attempt. That's how we are here now.
The conservatives will try absolutely anything, up to and including armed insurrection. Now with AR15s, and probably with bumpstocks fitted.
Don't think that it could never happen. The MAGA element love being underestimated.
So, I work in a gun store(part time), if you think bump stocks are unethical, look up(or don’t) a binary trigger. Those, as far as I know, have never been banned, and are far more effective when it comes to trying to attempt to increase fire rate.
To be honest, a lot of gun legislation is really ineffective. The amount of loopholes etc, are kinda insane. If we’re going to talk about gun legislation, it needs to be a helluva lot more than a part ban on “assault style” firearms, until then, it’s just pandering for votes imo.
(Please don’t assume I am a crazy arsenal wielding person. I actually don’t own any firearms at this moment despite my part time occupation.)
I actually looked up the legalisation one time. Congress described a machine gun and gave all the definitions that were forbidden to alter it to make it automatic fire. It was pretty comprehensive, particularly given that it was written in the 80s. However this supreme court said that the magic words 'bump stock' wasn't in the legalisation. Words that didn't even exist until 2003, or thereabouts. The court ignored the legislative text completely.
And I don't believe that you are a gun nut at all. You seem perfectly reasonable and make a good point.
However this supreme court said that the magic words ‘bump stock’ wasn’t in the legalisation.
A bump stock doesn't make a gun automatic fire, therefore a prohibition on modifications to make a gun automatic fire does not include it. It's a basic "the law says what it says, you don't get to add things you don't like and call them close enough" argument. It's not about the words "bump stock", but that the law prohibits modifications to make a gun automatic and a bump stock does not make a gun automatic, it merely makes a method for firing a semiautomatic gun faster easier to achieve.
Bump firing is basically using the recoil from a shot to bounce your finger off the trigger and then pull the trigger again, which increases the rate of fire. It's even less accurate than automatic fire (because of the way the gun has to literally bounce around), and not quite as fast (but pretty close). You can do it without a bump stock, but it's easier to achieve, more accurate and more comfortable to do with one. The fact that when bump firing you only fire a single round for each function of the trigger makes it not automatic by definition.
The binary triggers mentioned earlier in the thread are basically triggers that will fire both when the trigger is pulled and when it is released, which hypothetically doubles the firing rate of a semiautomatic weapon by not requiring you to release the trigger and pull it again to fire another round. Binary triggers basically come down to an argument of what counts as an "function of the trigger" and whether both pulling and releasing the trigger can count as separate functions of the trigger - if they can then it's not automatic, if they cannot then it is.
So much twaddle and dancing around definitions. You could definitely qualify for a spot on Trump's Supreme Court.
All they are a modification to turn a semiautomatic gun into a full automatic weapon. That's it. All the intricate dribble into the contrary doesn't change that. Water is wet, sky blue, and modifications allowing automatic fire are machine guns.
All they are a modification to turn a semiautomatic gun into a full automatic weapon.
They don't though. And I went into great detail as to what exactly they do and how it works to explain why they don't do that.
An automatic weapon fires more than once per operation of the trigger by definition. Any gun that fires once per operation of the trigger is not automatic by definition.
A bump stock doesn't change that, it makes it easier and more accurate to bump.fire, which is basically using the recoil to bounce your finger off the trigger and back onto it to pull it faster than you otherwise would.
With practice you can bump fire with a regular stock, that doesn't mean all semiautomatic weapons are actually automatic.
Like the binary trigger thing - eventually that will be challenged in the courts and the argument won't be over whether or not the words binary trigger are in the law, but whether or not lifting your finger off the trigger counts as a second operation of the trigger or as part of the previous one because that is what would determine if it fires one or two shots per operation of the trigger and thus whether or not it's legally automatic and whether or not it is controlled as an automatic weapon.
The law doesn't say what you wish it said, and it isn't exactly vague.
You went into a ton of detail, thank you. But it is meaningless under the original definition of the act.
"The term shall also include the frame or receiver of any such weapon, any part designed and intended solely and exclusively, or combination of parts designed and intended, for use in converting a weapon into a machinegun, and any combination of parts from which a machinegun can be assembled if such parts are in the possession or under the control of a person."
A bump stock modifies the frame of the gun which converts it into a fully automatic weapon. Don't just get stuck on the trigger part of the action. The act covers everything, you just can't cherry pick a single clause and ignore everything else. Otherwise they just might make you into one of Trump's Supreme Court justices.
No, it doesn't. That's what I'm getting at. Look at how they define a machine gun in the act. It requires that the gun fire more than once per operation of the trigger (this is also what it means for a firearm to be automatic). A bump stock facilitates operating the trigger again more quickly, but does not fire more then once per operation of the trigger.
You're not looking at the definition used in the law but deciding that anything that lets you shoot faster counts.
However this supreme court said that the magic words 'bump stock' wasn't in the legalisation. Words that didn't even exist until 2003, or thereabouts. The court ignored the legislative text completely.
This is the text of the NFA that has defined what is a machine gun since 1934:
The term “machine gun” means any weapon which shoots, is designed to shoot, or can be readily restored to shoot, automatically more than one shot, without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger. The term shall also include the frame or receiver of any such weapon, any part designed and intended solely and exclusively, or combination of parts designed and intended, for use in converting a weapon into a machinegun, and any combination of parts from which a machinegun can be assembled if such parts are in the possession or under the control of a person.
I'm not a fan of this SCOTUS, but the bump stock ruling was inline with decades of jurisprudence on the topic and the final opinion was fairly unsurprising as a result. It was honestly less of a gun law ruling and more of an executive regulatory procedure one.
A bump stock does not function by a single action of the trigger and does not meet the statutory definition as a result. The ATF rule banning them got struck down because Congress hadn't authorized the ATF to regulate machine guns beyond that specific statutory definition.
Bump stocks are no more a machine gun than a Gatling gun is under the definition that has existed for nearly a century, and the legal status of the latter has been extremely clear for a very, very long time.
If the goal is to treat them as a regulated item, then Congress needs to pass legislation with language that covers them because saying it was already there is simply incorrect. There is a specificity to the language of the NFA that doesn't cover any number of mechanisms. It's been a deficiency of the law since 1934.
If you want to fix that, that first requires understanding exactly what needs fixing.
That excellent quote of the text you provided spells out that any modifications to a gun that allows any more than a single shot is to be prohibited. A court that is very big on textual meaning, as it purports to be, would readily agree, unless bias is in the driver's seat.
This conservative supreme court despised regulatory agencies . For decades the US government has relied upon such agencies as subject experts and has allowed them to regulate their areas. This court just wants to reverse this common sense and established way of doing things. I might remind you that the bump stock thing wasn't a democrat initiative, but a bipartisan Trump one.
That excellent quote of the text you provided spells out that any modifications to a gun that allows any more than a single shot is to be prohibited.
Incorrect.
It prohibits any conversion to a machine gun. The previous sentence has just defined a machine gun. The "by a single function of the trigger" language is what's critical to this case and you're completely ignoring it. When reading laws, you use words however they're explicitly defined if a definition is provided, not how you think they should be defined or would be used in common speech.
Like I said, Gatling guns are pretty highly analogous. They produce what most people would consider automatic fire. They've also consistently been ruled to not meet the definition of a machine gun going back to at least the 1950s because they don't meet that single function of the trigger requirement.
The solution is to change the text of the law.
However, many states do restrict this. Like mine thankfully. Crank operated firearms, like a Gatling gun, is legal though however federally. Which, yes, scratches the surface of my issues with gun legislation. Don’t get me started on short barreled rifles vs “pistol”.
For a non-american, non-knowledgeable on gun person, I've seen the bump stock discussion a few times this week.
Why is it a discussion? What difference does a bumpstock do?
While many in the US have one or more gun, I would argue most were unaware of bump stocks until the 2017 Las Vegas Shooting. TL;DR, a bump stock uses the recoil of the rifle as a “spring” to help pull the trigger over and over again - effectively behaving like a “machine gun.” As already stated, it does not meet the US legal definition of a machine gun because you’re still firing one round per trigger pull. The bump stock basically makes the trigger pull automatic.
As for why it’s a big debate, read the wiki article. One guy killed A LOT of people pretty quickly using this device to greatly increase his rate of fire. It was a public eye opener for much of the country. So much so, that even Donald f’ing Trump came to the realization that something should be don. He didn’t even really get much push back on it from the right or the NRA. That’s how sobering the massacre was. That said, it happened long enough ago that it’s memory probably isn’t powerful enough for anyone to change the law to ban them and similar mechanisms (see: the binary trigger elsewhere in the comments). If they tried banning them today, the NRA and conservatives would fight it tooth and nail.
Thanks for the context and explanation. It is appreciated.
A bump stock does not function by a single action of the trigger and does not meet the statutory definition as a result. The ATF rule banning them got struck down because Congress hadn’t authorized the ATF to regulate machine guns beyond that specific statutory definition.
They had several cases along these lines involving several agencies, and I feel like people don't understand the underlying legal idea - rule making power belongs to Congress. Federal agencies under the executive branch that have rule making powers receive those powers by Congress delegating it to them in a limited fashion through legislation. Those powers extend only so far as the passed legislation delegates them and no further. Even in cases where it seems like it would be useful, or the name of the agency suggests it would be something in their sphere of influence.
They had several cases along these lines involving several agencies, and I feel like people don’t understand the underlying legal idea - rule making power belongs to Congress. Federal agencies under the executive branch that have rule making powers receive those powers by Congress delegating it to them in a limited fashion through legislation.
Nitpick: rule making power does belong to executive agencies (at least until this SCOTUS decides to reverse Chevron deference). Law-making power resides solely with Congress.
What this means, as you suggest, is that Congress sets up statutory bounds within law, then the responsible executive agencies create rules interpreting them and defining how they'll be enforced. Where cases like this one go wrong is when the agency oversteps the bounds of the law as passed by Congress. At that point, the agency has engaged in creating new law rather than rules, which is why the courts swat them down.
I agree with your overall gist, just feel that's an important distinction to understand the situation.
…so who is going to break the news to all the gun nuts using non-binary triggers?
I tend to agree. There's already too many firearms out there (more guns than people) so it won't be all that effective in the short term.
But I think it's more of a thing that will take generations for there to be a change. And yeah it's pandering for votes, but it's also about opening up conversation, which is a step in the direction of a cultural change. A cultural shift away from buying guns for paranoid reasons about protection from "those people" back towards guns being used for hobbies like hunting and target shooting won't be easy to accomplish. But gotta start somewhere.
I just wish if they try something again that we annihilate them all from above like those drone videos. Bump stocks my ass, just turn them into dust. Nothing of value will be lost.
I honestly sometimes think that the democrats (at least some) think like this but are in the closet, other times I think their non-action to the republicans shit actions are just part of the overall plan.
Just be aware that our military is here to protect the constitution.
Meal team 6 ain't about that life. Not even their Dale Gribbliest. It's going to be a horrible mistake. Fool me once...
I guess my point is not that they'll necessarily be successful, it's more that a great many good people won't go home to their families that night.
They weren't successful last time and the Republican Congress welcomed the traitor-in-chief back to DC last week as a hero.
If that's what it takes to remind these inbreds they lost for another hundred years then so be it.
Are they good people if they're taking part in an armed insurrection? What do they think will happen going against the government like that? The government will drop soap bubbles on them? I mean come on how low IQ are they now? I've heard we have gay bombs maybe we have straight bombs we can drop on them because they like the orange man a little too much.
I'm not calling the insurrectionists good people, I'm calling the defenders of the constitution who might catch an AR 15 round good people.
I'm of the opinion they aren't all bad people, just easily mislead and taken advantage of. These people honestly think they are on the right side of history.
I think they'd be more afraid of the gay bombs
Democrats like to bitch about Republicans but their platforms are 95% the same. The real enemy is leftists, and they'll take Trump for 4 terms before they ever give an inch to the left.
their platforms are 95% the same.
Economically, yes, but socially, no. That social part matters quite a bit.
The US is a corporatocracy and business cares nothing about social matters. Their lobbying efforts fund both sides to ensure that the economic laws meet big business goals no matter who wins.
Ehhhhh it matters less than dems want us to think. Social policy doesn't matter if nobody can make endsmeat. The social policy of dems is just the other wing of our singular corporate party providing the illusion of choice.
Christofascism or fascism with a pride flag, either way we funnel more of our wealth to the 1% and further disenfranchise everybody else.
I agree that both sides are just funneling money into wall street and dont care about the average person, but what do you mean by fasciam with a pride flag? The right has been actively undermining freedoms for 8+ years now. At least 8 years in plain view. What has "the left" even done to resemble any kind of fascism in your eyes?
I used quotes there because i feel its important to keep it clear that the american left in main stage politics is much closer to a center, right leaning party on a grander scale.
Democrats are working on half the shit they claim to be protecting us from as we speak. Your first mistake is seeing Democrats as "left" even with quotes. Democrats are mid right to the Republicans far right.
By "fascism with a pride flag" I mean they're pushing a lot of the policies they said we have to vote D to prevent, and their blue MAGA accepts and defends it because apparently fascism is perfectly fine so long as we pay lip service to gays.
(To be clear, I'm super ongoing with lgbtqia rights, but democrats are already wishy washy on trans rights and will go after gays soon enough so long as we keep rewarding them for sprinting further right.)
Did you read the second point i made? I quite literally said that the dems are center right. Anyways, i havent heard of dems authoring or pushing fascist legislation. I have heard of and live through the dems doing fuck all about it though, so my point of view is that i have 2 options. Fascists that push money to wall street, and do-nothings that push money to wall street. If its my only option ill take it. But fuck biden.
fascism with a pride flag
Wait, what? I've never heard anyone claim that those are in in way similar before. That's a new one for me.
My point is that democrat voters are rewarding D politicians for pushing and enacting the very fascist legislation they claim to be protecting us from - because apparently fascism is fine so long as they pay lip service to the lgbtqia community.
I get fundraising texts occasionally. I don't know why. But the one that came on the heels of the conviction had a section of fine print declaring what the money was for. It included a "recount challenge fund". This is in the open.
Well, given how broke the Republican Party is they're probably still paying off the lawyers from their failed challenges from 2020. But they're also planning on doing it again.
This shit is going on and yet there’s STILL people whining and suggesting no one vote.
It blows my mind.
Stone and a significant portion of those people are on the same side. A larger amount are useful idiots who prefer to moralize about what should be instead of doing the base amount to prevent more of the harm they profess to care about.
I'm not going to advocate violence for this guy, but can we bring back the pillory or something? Him and Steve Bannon both.
I wouldn't call locking them in a kneeled position while people throw rotten food at them "violent," necessarily.
But I'd love to see it happen anyway.
Unfortunately, Roger Stone would probably get off on it.
Once they are already in the position it wouldn’t be too hard to move them to the guillotine.
Duh.
It’s astounding to me that a second January sixth isn’t at the top of people’s minds this go round.
Not because it’ll be successful (although there’s always a chance) but because we already have elected officials who believe that trump won the 2020 election and there will only be more this time around.
What’s the long term effect of legitimizing disbelief in a functioning democracy? America never was one, but what does it mean when there’s double or triple digit numbers of elected officials who publicly say so?
The usual explanation for distrust in government has nothing to do with people recognizing reality and changing their views based on it but instead blames that change on lack of bread and circuses, no basics of life and no distraction from reality.
We certainly don’t have the basics of life, but the distraction machine is running like a champ slaps hood you could fit like seven more dissociative technologies in this sucker!
What combination of lack of basic necessities and distractions are driving people’s belief (true or false!) that the election was stolen and that our fake democracy is actually fake?
The only good news is that if they try to storm the Capitol again, they're not going to have Trump and his "acting" Secretary of Defense giving them cover this time.
Bro looks like he's a decrepit dollar store ken doll
When I get old I am just going to look old.
Same, though my hand already look old because my joints are all fucked up lmao. Almost 27 and I have old lady hands
have you considered learning to play Canasta
Of course the orange turd is going to challenge it, this shouldn't surprise anyone. He wasn't even given a slap on the wrist for inciting a mob to try to overthrow the government. Why wouldn't he try again?
Stone is just a useful idiot which also shouldn't surprise anyone.
Man, the ballots aren't even printed yet and they're already planning their "Nuh-uh!!!!!!!" for when they lose. Truly, this is the strength and fortitude you expect out of your fascist leaders. Very strong and confident.
Jesus fuck and I thought don jr. had a coke problem... This dude's whole body is bouncing all over the place with every word he says.
If there were a cartoon definition of slimeball, this would be included.
Like a cocaine-themed Batman villain.
This was 4 years ago?
Why does trump and his cronies look all weird and creepy
Because they are.
The dark magic they dabble in has its cost.
“That may not be necessary,” Stone continued. “There are technical, legal steps we have to take to try to have a more honest election.”
Fixed it: “That may not be necessary,” Stone continued. “There are technical, legal steps we have to take to try to have the appearance of a more honest election.”
Stone noted during the conversation that the Trump campaign is attempting to change state voting laws and plans to immediately file a number of lawsuits seeking to change the results should the former president lose again, as Trump allies did in Michigan and several other states in 2020.
This is looking grim. We might have to actually fight on this one. Sigh…
By Jan 2025 the only outcomes are Trump has won without conflict or the election is a contested mess and congress is deadlocked on certification and they will have moved to the vote by state in the house. In which case trump will be elected.
Stone: The lights are on, but no one's home.
That thumbnail is terrifying. Genuinely thought it was a dude wearing a roger stone mask wtf
Stone looks like the bad guy from Star Trek: Generations on a prosperity gospel infomercial trying to sell you on a scam.
It looks like he's wearing a rubber mask. It's unsettling.
It's Botox+surgery+concealer, right?
I don't know if anyone else has pointed this out, in this photo especially, Roger Stone looks like a caricature of Mr. Burns from The Simpsons.
Roger Stone looks like a caricature of Mr. Burns from The Simpsons.
Who is himself a caricature of an old and evil rich man. If the shoe fits..
Btw, remember when he showed up to the inauguration looking like a literal Batman villain?
wow, posh spice let herself go
IIRC, Mr. Burns was meant to be a caricature of specifically Rupert Murdoch.
I say if Ebeneezer Scrooge were a real person and alive today, that is exactly what he would look like.
I guess I gotta appreciate that these people are so incompetent.
Same, but it’s also troubling because it suggests how easy all this underhanded shit must be for the bad actors with half a brain that know how to shut the fuck up and quietly enjoy their ill-gotten gains.
The "person" doesn't look human at all....
haunted vent dummy
Also caught on tape: "Pardon me."
I am shocked... SHOCKED I tell you!
i'm pretty sure that historians will look back on this and agree that a wholesale slaughter of conservatives would have been the best course of action.
Same thing happened with Bannon before the 2020 election. It won't make a difference to the cult
The jailcells gonna be crowded with all the reservations these criminals are laying out
Why aren't these guys in jail? Seriously. I mean, I know the theory of the rule of law and all, but even our widely-acclaimed greatest president suspended habeas corpus when insurgent seditionists tried to overthrow the Union.
I suspect that this is extremely dry humor, but for others that read this, Trump pardoned both Bannon and Stone
it's still unfathomable that trump was "allowed" (I know it was "legal", don't point that out) to pardon his literal partners-in-crime. He basically has already self-pardoned himself by proxy by allowing these traitors to walk free.
Ford pardoned Nixon.
Bush Jr pardoned Scooter Libby.
Governor Abbott pardoned a pedophile for shooting a black girl's white boyfriend
Why is this even remotely surprising?
the difference being that ford wasn't involved in Nixon's taping. etc. etc.
this is direct involvement, which makes it stink more.
We messed up when we allowed Ford's pardon of Nixon before he was convicted. We should only allow pardons after the person was convicted. That created all kinds of paradoxes:
The only restrictions on presidential pardons are on convicted impeachment and the requirement that it must be a federal crime. Yes, Trump can even pardon himself from the federal documents, insurrection, and election fraud cases if he takes office again.
https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artII-S2-C1-3-1/ALDE_00013316/
We should never have allowed a pardon before a conviction. What Ford did for Nixon created all kinds of paradoxes.
Carter did it with draft dodgers too, but I agree.
Well that balances the damage lol
I'm not sure if I'm joking. In any case, the writ of habeas corpus is the legal tool that a court can theoretically use to compel the appearance of a prisoner before it. It is the legal doctrine that underlies the right to trial, and I say "theoretically" because courts rarely need to issue one; it's just standard procedure to bring people to court to face charges.
By suspending it, Abraham Lincoln could detain those people he deemed dangerous seditionists indefinitely, because the detainees would have to go to court to challenge their detention, and there was no way to get to court. The effect of suspending it again is that it wouldn't matter that Baboon (autocorrect and I'm leaving it) and Stone were pardoned, or that there were even criminal charges.
Lincoln did it, George W. Bush did it. Barack Obama did it. The Constitution contains a clause which allows it to be suspended due to rebellion or threats to public safety. It's a dangerous thing to allow a president to do, but the MAGA danger might be greater.
Worth noting that, historically speaking, if a state official wanted to punish someone without going through the court system he could always just turn the prisoner over to a lynch mob.
So while suspending habeaus corpus is a danger to democracy, it is not a singular method by which mayors, governors, or Presidents have disposed of political opponents.
In other words the US is neither a state of law nor is it a democracy as separation of power can be overturned whenever the president feels like it.
Emergency powers are in most constitutions because people generally understand that during war things have to operate a little differently. You can't allow the enemy, who is attacking you physically, to go and publish propaganda that attacks you rhetorically and turns the populace's loyalty towards the other side. The problem we have now is the constant use of emergency powers. That needs to be shut down. Emergency powers should be limited to a certain timeframe, and reviewed by congress after that. Not these multi decade states of emergency.
I have to say, "you've been unpardoned" would be a great line.
Throughout human history, laws have never stopped conservatism. Jails have never stopped conservatism. Pacifism has never stopped conservatism. Only force has ever stopped conservatism. Only force.
Careful or you'll get called a tankie
People get called that when they're pretending to be far left while urging everyone to take the exact actions the Repubs want them to take.
Is this code for "people who aren't voting for Joe Biden"?
that would be people who are essentially voting for trump, so yeah, why not.
Tankie is the pro-authoritarian left. The Stalinists essentially. The ones who think it's appropriate to send in the tanks to quell a socialist or communist uprising because it has a tint of democracy in it, which may cause their strong leader to lose dictatorial power.
It's code for "antifascist" "leftists" who are urging people to do the exact same things that the Republican party wants them to do.
Specifically, which things?
If you're upset about being called a tankie, you could cross-reference what you are urging people to do with what the Republican party wants people to do. And then stop that.
In general I would recommend being antifascist in a way that isn't the exact same actions as overt fascism with the only difference being the rhetoric justifying the actions.
What am I urging people to do?
Fuck if I know. You're whining about being called a tankie. I can explain why that happens in general. You'll have to figure the rest out on your own. Maybe if you do some reading and educate yourself you can get there.
Tankies are literal authoritarians. People say they're "authoritarian communists," which ignores they're mostly Maoists or Stalinists, both of whom were closer to fascism than the left. It sort of ignores the basic premise of communism or even socialism to have a single authoritarian ruler. Kind of like how the Nazis called themselves socialists. I guess they were a workers' party to start, but I don't think you can reasonably conflate their ideology with the tenets of socialism.
The Nazis only used the label socialists to deceive the working class. They said so plenty of times when meeting with the industrialists whose bidding they were doing. They never were a workers party and they knew that it was only in name to be more palatable. This deception now has been replaced with "owning the libs" and whatever the local version of neoliberal, conservative or fascist ideology you have around the world.
No, you don't understand. The problem is that those people haven't had enough time to bring upon real communism. Real communism hasn't been reached yet. They want to let the Maos and Stalins of the world have enough time to reach communism. Things will surely be different with the next guy.
Trump is just Stalin and mai with less power.
There is no difference between authoritarianism at either end of the spectrum.
The issue with authoritarianism isn't "communism or fascism" it's a symptom of shitty PEOPLE NOT TYPE OF GOVERNMENT.
STalin wasn't a shithead BECAUSE he was commumist, but in spite of it.
What’s Stalinism 🤔
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalinism
I was being pedantic. There is no such thing as Stalinism, that article is a joke. Stalin was just a Marxist Leninist.
That's certainly a take
Tankies these days are conservatives wrapped in an authoritarian shell. Instead of just being supportive of their own authoritarian government they try to destabilize other governments for their gain.
That's not what being a tankie is lol
Because Trump pardoned him.
https://www.npr.org/2020/12/23/949820820/trump-pardons-roger-stone-paul-manafort-and-charles-kushner
As in my other reply, the Constitution allows the suspension of habeas corpus in cases of rebellion or threats to public safety, and without that writ, charges and sentences are irrelevant.
The Supreme Court has held that the Constitution contains a right to habeas corpus in Boumedine v. Bush. The Lincoln thing was never fully litigated and was probably unconstitutional.
The Constitution doesn't empower the court to interpret the constitution. If the executive chose to ignore the court it would be perfectly legal.
Well that's an even older decision:
Yes, the supreme Court gave itself that power. To that end the other branches could justifiably choose to not find that to be valid.
Roger Stone's been to jail a number of times. He really doesn't care because he knows he'll get pardoned. Also he's basically a mafia don, so I imagine he gets a lot of respect in prison from republicans.
In what capacity does he resemble the mafia? He’s a snake. These guys want to desperately be associated with the mafia but they’re just con men. The Mafia were intelligent criminals.
Everyone needs to remember this guy shaking hands with world leaders during his years in office. In every single picture he is smiling like a pig in shit. It is only after the indictment photo he is attempting to rebrand himself as some sort of tough guy criminal instead of a slimy, smug con artist.
He was going to face a trial and likely prison, but trump pardoned him and the rest.
Huh? Why would anyone with power go to jail in an oligarchy? Unless you upset the more powerful oligarch.
I wonder if they're actually dumb enough to try the false electors scheme twice in a row?
They got caught are being convicted right now for doing it in 2020, and everybody is expecting it now.
Whatever the result they’re going to keep trying again. Why wouldn’t they when there are virtually no consequences? Fascists don’t give a damn about what election results say, they’re always going to try to gain power by any means necessary.
Well that's what I mean.
There are so far very severe consequences. Lawyers have been disbarred, dozens of people have been charged, the trials are ongoing right now and more charges are occurring from more agencies. there are a whole lot of legal consequences which is why i am wondering if they're going to do it again.
They don't care about election results, but they do care about legal consequences.
They only care about the legal consequences that affect THEM. There's always another idiot lawyer ready to get disbarred.
Right, that's the nice part about legal consequences for them. They care about those legal consequences.
The trials are being sandbagged by republican judges, nobody is actually getting punished for trying to steal the election. They're gonna do it again.
That's happening more with The classified documents case, not with the fake electors.
Good news, The fake elector charges and trials are actually going through without a hitch, have a lot of defendants informing on co-defendants. Several defendants have already pled guilty, participants are being arrested, more charges are coming, there's actually a lot going on with this case.
What about the one in DC run by Judge Chutkan that's on indefinite hold thanks to the Supreme Court?
What about the one in Georgia that is on indefinite hold thanks to the Georgia Supreme Court?
Those seem pretty hitched to me.
As far as I'm aware, the supreme Court we're not indefinite.
The supreme Court is a piece of s*** don't get me wrong, but I'm pretty sure that trial is still going on.
And Trump's lawyer admitted that "private acts of a sitting president are not entitled to immunity".
Yeah, so that's going well.
Georgia, that one is currently on hold, but it doesn't negate all of the other ongoing cases against him and none of the charges are going away.
But who is the defendant in the fake electors trial? This isn't one where Trump himself is on the docket, right?
It would be strange if he wasn't eventually charged since he was definitely part of the plot.
This is a case that goes across eight states with dozens of defendants, some have already pled guilty, many are working with the prosecutors to provide testimony against peer and higher co-defendants.
Trump hasn't been charged yet, but people are still getting charged for the fake electors scheme every month, and since he was on the phone with these people convincing them to forge and mail in the documents, I can't see why he wouldn't be charged.
It's being investigated right now as to how to charge Trump, since he was personally involved in this scheme.
He'll probably be one of the last people charged.
Especially now that he was already convicted once and it isn't taboo or anything to charge him with felonies.
There are so many defendants, this was such a huge conspiracy that most of the trial still haven't started, and several defendants haven't been arraigned.
But it's going forward!
Uh... If you don't want your election stolen, you, uh, you gotta vote. Vote so hard they can't steal it. Make your friends vote. Make your friends' friends vote.
Because if we don't win this year, we don't get to have any more elections. No more voting. We're getting rid of it because your don't vote good.
I, uh, have voted in every election I've been eligible to vote in.
I'm pretty sure they'll do increasingly farcical votes for some time after.
That's basically Texas and Florida right now
You sound like a MAGA moron. Also encouraging people not to vote, and encouraging people to not vote for Biden elsewhere in the thread. Sus.
They will. And they'll take it to the Supreme Court, where they'll just install Trump as the winner of the election. Mark my words.
Humbug. I take cynicism lightly.
They didn't get past mailing in the forged documents last time, and they have a worse chance this time.
They'd have to do something different, like state legislatures passing laws that say they don't have to listen to appointed electors.
That's already failed, but that's the tack I think they'll try to refine, since they're approaching it so poorly right now and direct forgeries don't work
I would think that failure just exposes points of improvement. They failed before, but now they know how to succeed. :(
I think that's just distant fatalism.
It's not like they can forge the documents better this time.
They'll have to try completely different, like changing State legislatures to somehow ignore election results or claim that the state can use their own electors.
Most of the people who forged the documents or participated in the conspiracy the last time are going to be pretty busy in trial or testifying in trials.
Dozens of people, anyone significantly involved in the fake electors scheme is facing charges or will be facing charges soon, many of them have already pled guilty.
I hope you're right!
yeah. I doubt they would do that unless there was a precedence set for a court to determine a presidential election.
There is. Bush v Gore
That was technically a procedure to allow or disallow a recount of a specific vote in a specific district in Florida. And yes, the Supreme Court will be ruling on those again.
Gore vs Bush...
If it works then you get to convict the other side for being fake.
Sure. But there are less idiotic and more effective ways to try to seize power.
Literally forging documents and sending them in two institutions that verify documents is pretty dumb.
Resulting in legal consequences already.
You're still assuming those bodies operate in good faith. Democrats must win the house and senate to ensure that.
Nope, I'm not assuming these bodies operate in good faith.
I'm taking what happened before into account and the outrage and legal culpability for a large scale, lazy conspiracy, and making a prediction based on that.
They are dumb enough to try a bunch of other stuff, including violence, again though.
them? double down?! surely not.
Who is being convicted? It sounds like nobody's been convicted yet, so they're wiling to try it again. Also who cares if some false elector goes to jail? Not Trump. Not the dirty ratfucker.
Well, as a personal conspirator in this game, dumps is certainly liable.
He's been indicted in Georgia. And by the doj, so dumps will have to fight those charges of conspiracy.
This is such a huge case investigated by so many agencies that everyone isn't even charged yet 4 years later.
So the convictions will take time, but at least eight people, including chesebro and other planning-level agents, have actively been working with every investigation testify to the involvement of the others.
The trials and convictions are still ongoing, but a few trials have finished.
I only know about the ones that have pled guilty and are informing on others. But none of this is halted or not happening, it's just that the trials and sentencing are still going on.
No. Instead they're gonna have state legislature throw out the results of the election. Which they can probably do, Constitutionally-speaking.
The State legislature pick the electors. Just because they all use a popular vote to do it doesn't mean they can't change the law in between the voting in November and the actual election in December.
Ha, I've answered that two or three times to other people here!
I agree that changing or interpreting the law to pick stricty conservative electors is their next strategy， but I don't think it's going to be as simple or successful as they imagine.
Sort of like how they didn't realize sending in forged documents was very likely to fail.
Forged documents are illegal. Changing laws regarding how electors are selected isn't.
Heck - way back in 2000 the Supreme Court hinted at the tactic in the majority opinion in Bush v Gore, saying that the Florida legislature probably could have just selected electors directly after the vote.
Actually, a lot of the fake electors tried to use the defense that there's no specific law against fake elector documents.
Colorado just signed a law that says fake electors are illegal.
Landscape's a lot turnier then it looks
How would he know? Trump isn't supposed to talk with felons.
Get those mirrors out of his living spaces.
That's only if he gets away with probation. Due to him talking with felons all day every day and the fact that he's publicly shown ALL of the contempt (in both the colloquial and legal sense of the word) of the court and continues to do so, that's unlikely in spite of the kid gloves he's being treated with.
My guess is he gets community service and I hope it involves picking up thrash while wearing a jumpsuit that matches his skin.
I can't wait for Fox News. "PRESIDENT TRUMP is picking up trash! He has to bend down and PICK UP TRASH! He is being treated more unfairly than ANY AMERICAN has EVER BEEN TREATED in the HISTORY OF THIS COUNTRY!"
I hate to burst your bubble, but Trump's not going to be picking up trash. He will either get house arrest, or community service. Community service will likely consist of recording public service announcements. This is how celebrities are typically treated.
His security is actually a valid concern for the court, which must be considered. It's impossible to guarantee his security while picking up trash on the side of the highway - since anyone could stop and shoot. Likewise, it is impossible to guarantee his security in prison without solitary confinement.
Of course, it is possible that one day he may get to run his own prison like Pablo Escobar, but I think house arrest is more likely. He'll love it. Sitting on his ass in Mar a Lago, doing virtual campaign events, watching the news and shitposting all day.
Solidarity confinement sounds good.
No access to a mobile phone or another person forced to listen to him moan, would drive him absolutely bonkers.
I'm a Republican that does their own Research and even though the election hasn't happened yet I ALREADY KNOW TRUMP LOST UNFAIRLY because of Sleepy Joe Biden being UNFAIR!
This is exactly how I feel so your comment is one hundred percent correct.
What's the name of your face book research group?
My emotions validate my worldview!
The Republicans get away with so much despicable action and each time the Dems get pants by the audacity of the attempt. That's how we are here now.
The conservatives will try absolutely anything, up to and including armed insurrection. Now with AR15s, and probably with bumpstocks fitted.
Don't think that it could never happen. The MAGA element love being underestimated.
So, I work in a gun store(part time), if you think bump stocks are unethical, look up(or don’t) a binary trigger. Those, as far as I know, have never been banned, and are far more effective when it comes to trying to attempt to increase fire rate.
To be honest, a lot of gun legislation is really ineffective. The amount of loopholes etc, are kinda insane. If we’re going to talk about gun legislation, it needs to be a helluva lot more than a part ban on “assault style” firearms, until then, it’s just pandering for votes imo.
(Please don’t assume I am a crazy arsenal wielding person. I actually don’t own any firearms at this moment despite my part time occupation.)
I actually looked up the legalisation one time. Congress described a machine gun and gave all the definitions that were forbidden to alter it to make it automatic fire. It was pretty comprehensive, particularly given that it was written in the 80s. However this supreme court said that the magic words 'bump stock' wasn't in the legalisation. Words that didn't even exist until 2003, or thereabouts. The court ignored the legislative text completely.
And I don't believe that you are a gun nut at all. You seem perfectly reasonable and make a good point.
A bump stock doesn't make a gun automatic fire, therefore a prohibition on modifications to make a gun automatic fire does not include it. It's a basic "the law says what it says, you don't get to add things you don't like and call them close enough" argument. It's not about the words "bump stock", but that the law prohibits modifications to make a gun automatic and a bump stock does not make a gun automatic, it merely makes a method for firing a semiautomatic gun faster easier to achieve.
Bump firing is basically using the recoil from a shot to bounce your finger off the trigger and then pull the trigger again, which increases the rate of fire. It's even less accurate than automatic fire (because of the way the gun has to literally bounce around), and not quite as fast (but pretty close). You can do it without a bump stock, but it's easier to achieve, more accurate and more comfortable to do with one. The fact that when bump firing you only fire a single round for each function of the trigger makes it not automatic by definition.
The binary triggers mentioned earlier in the thread are basically triggers that will fire both when the trigger is pulled and when it is released, which hypothetically doubles the firing rate of a semiautomatic weapon by not requiring you to release the trigger and pull it again to fire another round. Binary triggers basically come down to an argument of what counts as an "function of the trigger" and whether both pulling and releasing the trigger can count as separate functions of the trigger - if they can then it's not automatic, if they cannot then it is.
So much twaddle and dancing around definitions. You could definitely qualify for a spot on Trump's Supreme Court.
All they are a modification to turn a semiautomatic gun into a full automatic weapon. That's it. All the intricate dribble into the contrary doesn't change that. Water is wet, sky blue, and modifications allowing automatic fire are machine guns.
They don't though. And I went into great detail as to what exactly they do and how it works to explain why they don't do that.
An automatic weapon fires more than once per operation of the trigger by definition. Any gun that fires once per operation of the trigger is not automatic by definition.
A bump stock doesn't change that, it makes it easier and more accurate to bump.fire, which is basically using the recoil to bounce your finger off the trigger and back onto it to pull it faster than you otherwise would.
With practice you can bump fire with a regular stock, that doesn't mean all semiautomatic weapons are actually automatic.
Like the binary trigger thing - eventually that will be challenged in the courts and the argument won't be over whether or not the words binary trigger are in the law, but whether or not lifting your finger off the trigger counts as a second operation of the trigger or as part of the previous one because that is what would determine if it fires one or two shots per operation of the trigger and thus whether or not it's legally automatic and whether or not it is controlled as an automatic weapon.
The law doesn't say what you wish it said, and it isn't exactly vague.
You went into a ton of detail, thank you. But it is meaningless under the original definition of the act.
"The term shall also include the frame or receiver of any such weapon, any part designed and intended solely and exclusively, or combination of parts designed and intended, for use in converting a weapon into a machinegun, and any combination of parts from which a machinegun can be assembled if such parts are in the possession or under the control of a person."
A bump stock modifies the frame of the gun which converts it into a fully automatic weapon. Don't just get stuck on the trigger part of the action. The act covers everything, you just can't cherry pick a single clause and ignore everything else. Otherwise they just might make you into one of Trump's Supreme Court justices.
No, it doesn't. That's what I'm getting at. Look at how they define a machine gun in the act. It requires that the gun fire more than once per operation of the trigger (this is also what it means for a firearm to be automatic). A bump stock facilitates operating the trigger again more quickly, but does not fire more then once per operation of the trigger.
You're not looking at the definition used in the law but deciding that anything that lets you shoot faster counts.
This is the text of the NFA that has defined what is a machine gun since 1934:
I'm not a fan of this SCOTUS, but the bump stock ruling was inline with decades of jurisprudence on the topic and the final opinion was fairly unsurprising as a result. It was honestly less of a gun law ruling and more of an executive regulatory procedure one.
A bump stock does not function by a single action of the trigger and does not meet the statutory definition as a result. The ATF rule banning them got struck down because Congress hadn't authorized the ATF to regulate machine guns beyond that specific statutory definition.
Bump stocks are no more a machine gun than a Gatling gun is under the definition that has existed for nearly a century, and the legal status of the latter has been extremely clear for a very, very long time.
If the goal is to treat them as a regulated item, then Congress needs to pass legislation with language that covers them because saying it was already there is simply incorrect. There is a specificity to the language of the NFA that doesn't cover any number of mechanisms. It's been a deficiency of the law since 1934.
If you want to fix that, that first requires understanding exactly what needs fixing.
That excellent quote of the text you provided spells out that any modifications to a gun that allows any more than a single shot is to be prohibited. A court that is very big on textual meaning, as it purports to be, would readily agree, unless bias is in the driver's seat.
This conservative supreme court despised regulatory agencies . For decades the US government has relied upon such agencies as subject experts and has allowed them to regulate their areas. This court just wants to reverse this common sense and established way of doing things. I might remind you that the bump stock thing wasn't a democrat initiative, but a bipartisan Trump one.
Incorrect.
It prohibits any conversion to a machine gun. The previous sentence has just defined a machine gun. The "by a single function of the trigger" language is what's critical to this case and you're completely ignoring it. When reading laws, you use words however they're explicitly defined if a definition is provided, not how you think they should be defined or would be used in common speech.
Like I said, Gatling guns are pretty highly analogous. They produce what most people would consider automatic fire. They've also consistently been ruled to not meet the definition of a machine gun going back to at least the 1950s because they don't meet that single function of the trigger requirement.
The solution is to change the text of the law.
However, many states do restrict this. Like mine thankfully. Crank operated firearms, like a Gatling gun, is legal though however federally. Which, yes, scratches the surface of my issues with gun legislation. Don’t get me started on short barreled rifles vs “pistol”.
For a non-american, non-knowledgeable on gun person, I've seen the bump stock discussion a few times this week.
Why is it a discussion? What difference does a bumpstock do?
While many in the US have one or more gun, I would argue most were unaware of bump stocks until the 2017 Las Vegas Shooting. TL;DR, a bump stock uses the recoil of the rifle as a “spring” to help pull the trigger over and over again - effectively behaving like a “machine gun.” As already stated, it does not meet the US legal definition of a machine gun because you’re still firing one round per trigger pull. The bump stock basically makes the trigger pull automatic.
As for why it’s a big debate, read the wiki article. One guy killed A LOT of people pretty quickly using this device to greatly increase his rate of fire. It was a public eye opener for much of the country. So much so, that even Donald f’ing Trump came to the realization that something should be don. He didn’t even really get much push back on it from the right or the NRA. That’s how sobering the massacre was. That said, it happened long enough ago that it’s memory probably isn’t powerful enough for anyone to change the law to ban them and similar mechanisms (see: the binary trigger elsewhere in the comments). If they tried banning them today, the NRA and conservatives would fight it tooth and nail.
Thanks for the context and explanation. It is appreciated.
They had several cases along these lines involving several agencies, and I feel like people don't understand the underlying legal idea - rule making power belongs to Congress. Federal agencies under the executive branch that have rule making powers receive those powers by Congress delegating it to them in a limited fashion through legislation. Those powers extend only so far as the passed legislation delegates them and no further. Even in cases where it seems like it would be useful, or the name of the agency suggests it would be something in their sphere of influence.
Nitpick: rule making power does belong to executive agencies (at least until this SCOTUS decides to reverse Chevron deference). Law-making power resides solely with Congress.
What this means, as you suggest, is that Congress sets up statutory bounds within law, then the responsible executive agencies create rules interpreting them and defining how they'll be enforced. Where cases like this one go wrong is when the agency oversteps the bounds of the law as passed by Congress. At that point, the agency has engaged in creating new law rather than rules, which is why the courts swat them down.
I agree with your overall gist, just feel that's an important distinction to understand the situation.
…so who is going to break the news to all the gun nuts using non-binary triggers?
I tend to agree. There's already too many firearms out there (more guns than people) so it won't be all that effective in the short term.
But I think it's more of a thing that will take generations for there to be a change. And yeah it's pandering for votes, but it's also about opening up conversation, which is a step in the direction of a cultural change. A cultural shift away from buying guns for paranoid reasons about protection from "those people" back towards guns being used for hobbies like hunting and target shooting won't be easy to accomplish. But gotta start somewhere.
I just wish if they try something again that we annihilate them all from above like those drone videos. Bump stocks my ass, just turn them into dust. Nothing of value will be lost.
I honestly sometimes think that the democrats (at least some) think like this but are in the closet, other times I think their non-action to the republicans shit actions are just part of the overall plan.
Just be aware that our military is here to protect the constitution.
Meal team 6 ain't about that life. Not even their Dale Gribbliest. It's going to be a horrible mistake. Fool me once...
I guess my point is not that they'll necessarily be successful, it's more that a great many good people won't go home to their families that night.
They weren't successful last time and the Republican Congress welcomed the traitor-in-chief back to DC last week as a hero.
If that's what it takes to remind these inbreds they lost for another hundred years then so be it.
Are they good people if they're taking part in an armed insurrection? What do they think will happen going against the government like that? The government will drop soap bubbles on them? I mean come on how low IQ are they now? I've heard we have gay bombs maybe we have straight bombs we can drop on them because they like the orange man a little too much.
I'm not calling the insurrectionists good people, I'm calling the defenders of the constitution who might catch an AR 15 round good people.
I'm of the opinion they aren't all bad people, just easily mislead and taken advantage of. These people honestly think they are on the right side of history.
I think they'd be more afraid of the gay bombs
Democrats like to bitch about Republicans but their platforms are 95% the same. The real enemy is leftists, and they'll take Trump for 4 terms before they ever give an inch to the left.
Economically, yes, but socially, no. That social part matters quite a bit.
Social policies have only been made to matter to create an illusion of two parties. In 1973 Republican and Democratic voters were equally likely to say abortion should be legal.
The US is a corporatocracy and business cares nothing about social matters. Their lobbying efforts fund both sides to ensure that the economic laws meet big business goals no matter who wins.
Ehhhhh it matters less than dems want us to think. Social policy doesn't matter if nobody can make endsmeat. The social policy of dems is just the other wing of our singular corporate party providing the illusion of choice.
Christofascism or fascism with a pride flag, either way we funnel more of our wealth to the 1% and further disenfranchise everybody else.
I agree that both sides are just funneling money into wall street and dont care about the average person, but what do you mean by fasciam with a pride flag? The right has been actively undermining freedoms for 8+ years now. At least 8 years in plain view. What has "the left" even done to resemble any kind of fascism in your eyes?
I used quotes there because i feel its important to keep it clear that the american left in main stage politics is much closer to a center, right leaning party on a grander scale.
Democrats are working on half the shit they claim to be protecting us from as we speak. Your first mistake is seeing Democrats as "left" even with quotes. Democrats are mid right to the Republicans far right.
By "fascism with a pride flag" I mean they're pushing a lot of the policies they said we have to vote D to prevent, and their blue MAGA accepts and defends it because apparently fascism is perfectly fine so long as we pay lip service to gays.
(To be clear, I'm super ongoing with lgbtqia rights, but democrats are already wishy washy on trans rights and will go after gays soon enough so long as we keep rewarding them for sprinting further right.)
Did you read the second point i made? I quite literally said that the dems are center right. Anyways, i havent heard of dems authoring or pushing fascist legislation. I have heard of and live through the dems doing fuck all about it though, so my point of view is that i have 2 options. Fascists that push money to wall street, and do-nothings that push money to wall street. If its my only option ill take it. But fuck biden.
Wait, what? I've never heard anyone claim that those are in in way similar before. That's a new one for me.
My point is that democrat voters are rewarding D politicians for pushing and enacting the very fascist legislation they claim to be protecting us from - because apparently fascism is fine so long as they pay lip service to the lgbtqia community.
I disagree with the accuracy of what you just said, but 100% agree with your sentiments.
I get fundraising texts occasionally. I don't know why. But the one that came on the heels of the conviction had a section of fine print declaring what the money was for. It included a "recount challenge fund". This is in the open.
Well, given how broke the Republican Party is they're probably still paying off the lawyers from their failed challenges from 2020. But they're also planning on doing it again.
This shit is going on and yet there’s STILL people whining and suggesting no one vote.
It blows my mind.
Stone and a significant portion of those people are on the same side. A larger amount are useful idiots who prefer to moralize about what should be instead of doing the base amount to prevent more of the harm they profess to care about.
I'm not going to advocate violence for this guy, but can we bring back the pillory or something? Him and Steve Bannon both.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillory
I wouldn't call locking them in a kneeled position while people throw rotten food at them "violent," necessarily.
But I'd love to see it happen anyway.
Unfortunately, Roger Stone would probably get off on it.
Once they are already in the position it wouldn’t be too hard to move them to the guillotine.
Duh.
It’s astounding to me that a second January sixth isn’t at the top of people’s minds this go round.
Not because it’ll be successful (although there’s always a chance) but because we already have elected officials who believe that trump won the 2020 election and there will only be more this time around.
What’s the long term effect of legitimizing disbelief in a functioning democracy? America never was one, but what does it mean when there’s double or triple digit numbers of elected officials who publicly say so?
The usual explanation for distrust in government has nothing to do with people recognizing reality and changing their views based on it but instead blames that change on lack of bread and circuses, no basics of life and no distraction from reality.
We certainly don’t have the basics of life, but the distraction machine is running like a champ slaps hood you could fit like seven more dissociative technologies in this sucker!
What combination of lack of basic necessities and distractions are driving people’s belief (true or false!) that the election was stolen and that our fake democracy is actually fake?
The only good news is that if they try to storm the Capitol again, they're not going to have Trump and his "acting" Secretary of Defense giving them cover this time.
Those troops are going to be loaded for bear.
Bro looks like he's a decrepit dollar store ken doll
When I get old I am just going to look old.
Same, though my hand already look old because my joints are all fucked up lmao. Almost 27 and I have old lady hands
have you considered learning to play Canasta
Of course the orange turd is going to challenge it, this shouldn't surprise anyone. He wasn't even given a slap on the wrist for inciting a mob to try to overthrow the government. Why wouldn't he try again?
Stone is just a useful idiot which also shouldn't surprise anyone.
Man, the ballots aren't even printed yet and they're already planning their "Nuh-uh!!!!!!!" for when they lose. Truly, this is the strength and fortitude you expect out of your fascist leaders. Very strong and confident.
Yeah it was bad (full video also out there)
Jesus fuck and I thought don jr. had a coke problem... This dude's whole body is bouncing all over the place with every word he says.
If there were a cartoon definition of slimeball, this would be included.
Like a cocaine-themed Batman villain.
This was 4 years ago?
Why does trump and his cronies look all weird and creepy
Because they are.
The dark magic they dabble in has its cost.
Fixed it: “That may not be necessary,” Stone continued. “There are technical, legal steps we have to take to try to have the appearance of a more honest election.”
This is looking grim. We might have to actually fight on this one. Sigh…
It's the newest ARG, a Get Out / The Purge crossover where half the population pretends laws don't exist and the other half has to try to keep their democratic institutions! Hijinks will ensue in this surreal tragicomedy Asshole Reality Game, brought to you by Koch Brothers ©!
By Jan 2025 the only outcomes are Trump has won without conflict or the election is a contested mess and congress is deadlocked on certification and they will have moved to the vote by state in the house. In which case trump will be elected.
Stone: The lights are on, but no one's home.
That thumbnail is terrifying. Genuinely thought it was a dude wearing a roger stone mask wtf
Stone looks like the bad guy from Star Trek: Generations on a prosperity gospel infomercial trying to sell you on a scam.
It looks like he's wearing a rubber mask. It's unsettling.
It's Botox+surgery+concealer, right?
I don't know if anyone else has pointed this out, in this photo especially, Roger Stone looks like a caricature of Mr. Burns from The Simpsons.
Who is himself a caricature of an old and evil rich man. If the shoe fits..
Btw, remember when he showed up to the inauguration looking like a literal Batman villain?
wow, posh spice let herself go
IIRC, Mr. Burns was meant to be a caricature of specifically Rupert Murdoch.
I say if Ebeneezer Scrooge were a real person and alive today, that is exactly what he would look like.
I guess I gotta appreciate that these people are so incompetent.
Same, but it’s also troubling because it suggests how easy all this underhanded shit must be for the bad actors with half a brain that know how to shut the fuck up and quietly enjoy their ill-gotten gains.
The "person" doesn't look human at all....
haunted vent dummy
Also caught on tape: "Pardon me."
I am shocked... SHOCKED I tell you!
i'm pretty sure that historians will look back on this and agree that a wholesale slaughter of conservatives would have been the best course of action.
Same thing happened with Bannon before the 2020 election. It won't make a difference to the cult
The jailcells gonna be crowded with all the reservations these criminals are laying out
It's been 4 years. How's that working out so far?
Rather blandly
Stodger Rone