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The Dow closed at 39,511 yesterday.
- Presidential Immunity? Let's see how the papers are handling it:
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- Hey, I am not even remotely smart enough to try and understand yesterday's ruling. And, quite frankly, no one is. Only time will tell. But it gets my attention when the dissent starts off like this. Trump got more than he asked for?:
- But for now, the very vague rules appear to be as follows:
- #1 There is absolute immunity for "core official acts" - but who knows what acts are "core."
- And even if you can identify a "core" act, things get complicated. Certainly a "core act" is firing and removing department heads within the executive branch. But does the president have absolute immunity to fire them if the method he wants to use is, say, murder? You laugh, but Justice Jackson actually mentioned this is a dissenting footnote:
- #2 As far as "official acts" that aren't "core", there is a presumption that the acts are legal and absolute immunity will apply. This seems like a very, very big deal, and is what everyone is freaking out about.
- What constitutes an "official act" that isn't "core"? That's the million dollar question. We didn't even get one example.
- How does the prosecutor overcome that "presumption" of immunity? The court did answer that and it might be the most troubling thing of all: The prosecutor would, "at a minimum", have to prove that criminalizing the act “would pose no dangers of intrusion on the authority and functions of the Executive Branch.” That seems impossible to meet. And if not met, any murky "official act", core or not, is immune from prosecution.
- #3 And the weirdest part is that a new evidence rule was invented. Under the ruling, any evidence related to official actions for which Trump is immune cannot be used as evidence of another crime. I honestly have no idea how that works.
- Sotomayor had an ending to her dissent to end all dissents:
- Let's not forget that Justices Alito (who flies the American flag upside down) and Thomas (whose wife was a big player in the Insurrection) did not recuse themselves.
- Is everyone overreacting? The Speaker of the House told us all on Fox News last night to calm down. This did not calm us down:
- For the life of me I don't understand the charge of murder. I want to see the indictment. Big prediction: There is absolutely no chance these guys get convicted of that.
- We had the equivalent of a Nazi rally outside the prison where Steve Bannon surrendered to yesterday. And, yes, that Marjorie Taylor Greene by his side.
- The hurricane has gone from category 4 to a cat 5 with 165 mph winds. I bet the cruise lines are having fits.
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- I saw this headline but found out the story is more interesting. The State of Texas improperly collected sales tax from an unnamed major corporation and now certain cities, where the tax was originally collected, now have to give it back. Lancaster got crushed when it was "smacked with a $30 million adjustment . . . .[t]hat wiped out its entire sales tax revenue share in February." (I don't know who the corporation is, and the state apparently doesn't have to tell us.)
- This national article correctly points out the rural conservative Republicans aren't pleased with the push for school vouchers. That will be the next war in the Texas legislature and Wise County just elected a state rep who is all-in for vouchers.
- Overshadowed by the presidential immunity case is that silly Texas social media case, involving a law which mandated what the private companies can post, got sent back down. This is from the official syllabus, but that's quite the smackdown of the 5th Circuit:
- LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act sixty years ago today, and a great many people are still upset about it.
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