Congratulations - you have successfully kicked the shit out of the strawman that “required” specifically means “required by law”. Meanwhile, the context strongly suggests what was meant was “required to be able to produce scholarly writing to a sufficiently high standard”, which is a perfectly common usage of the word and not a harbinger of the downfall of Western civilization as you appear to believe.
After two years, it’s one the few abilities that I have faith in them about.
Uh-oh, nobody tell Bo that high level government positions require fluency with written English. I don’t think we can find the relevant statutes. :smack:
My point stands: there is no requirement for a judge to write anything other than the bare “guilty” or “not guilty” or “the court finds in favor of ———”. None. Every judge could just stop doing it, make their declarations and move on. And that would be how the system works now.
The word require has meanings and none of them apply to judges writing down their reasoning in reaching decisions.
I’m pretty sure that an “English only” law or rule for “high level government positions” would be unconstitutional, although I have little regard for the current SCOTUS’s ability to accurately rule on such a matter.
Ever hear of case law? Any time judges render a ruling (as opposed to presiding over a jury trial) they have to explain the reasoning behind the ruling. That way the appellate court has something to go on if the case is appealed. Even jury trials require something more than, “The jury said so.” I can’t imagine even the most partisan Bush appointee looking on a decision “Kuz hes [del]quilty[/del] guilty!!!” written in crayon with anything but disdain.
That’s a bit overboard. For some rulings, a trial judge has to lay out “findings of fact and conclusions of law.” For others, nothing is* required* more than “granted” or “denied.” Even appellate judges are not required to state their reasoning, but it’s pretty much established procedure in every case (although “non published” memorandum opinions sometimes just say something like “we didn’t find any significant issues, judgement affirmed.”)
I think Snowboarder Bo has been possessed by the spirit of Bricker.
August 1, 2019
Individual 1 spoke on the phone with Putin yesterday to get his marching orders for the week offer US help with Russian wildfires. Apparently the Russians have been really good at raking their forests, unlike evil California, and therefore they are deserving of assistance.
That’s because one place is a bastion of communists who hate America, and the other place is Russia.
A lot of Anglo-American law is based on stare decisis (standing on that which has been decided) – judiciously applying the ratio (the reasons for the decision) of previous case(s) to present cases. Without judges giving reasons, a lot of the law that we now have would never have come to be in the first place and would be severely limited in its ability to change in the future other than statutorily.
A lot of appellate law is based on the appellate judge reviewing the lower judge’s reasoning that resulted in the order being appealed. Without reasons, that would be pretty hard to do, which in turn would make consistency in the law more difficult.
From what I can see, Anglo-American law is mostly on side with judges usually being expected to provide reasons that set forth the reasonableness of the decision. Up here in Soviet Kanukistan, insufficient reasons are usually pretty easy grounds for appeal, not because reasons are required, but instead because without solid reasons there is nothing to indicate why the decision is sound.
The flip side of the coin – not giving reasons – includes the need to git-er-done without going all Officer Obie over the most simple and obvious cases. For example, “Plate shall pass by a devise of houshold goods.” (Lillicott v. Compton 1708) does not need a couple of hundred paragraphs to clearly set out the whats the whys. If we were to go back further to the middle ages, we’d come across the courts and the Crown being inextricably intertwined while at the same time each to some degree competing for greater advantage while at the same time both wanting to ensure that their respective authorities were obeyed, which made it expedient for courts to give their decisions without reasons rather than having to always justify, justify justify, justice.
Today in Anglo-American law, for the most part it’s usually best to have the bears’ porridge temperature just right, where the trick is to have sufficient reasons, but bears’ den doors remain open for the most part to both no reasons and to reasons that are a very long, as best needs be.
Anyway, if you’re into this sort of stuff, have a boo at Mathilde Cohen’s “When Judges Have Reasons Not to Give Reasons: A Comparative Law Approach.” https://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&httpsredir=1&article=4449&context=wlulr
He’d better have some more that money. The fucking moron is tweeting about China tariffs again. :rolleyes:
The Headline: 9 in 10 counties that voted for Trump have received subsidies to fight the trade war
“The flow goes something like this. President Trump, eager to take a hard line against China’s trade practices, enacts new tariffs on products imported from China. The costs of those new tariffs are generally borne by the people buying the products — that is, American consumers and companies. China engages with the fight, imposing tariffs of its own. Those tariffs apply heavily to agricultural products such as soybeans, reducing demand for the crops and therefore cutting sales.
Farmers aren’t happy about this. So Trump implements a program, the Market Facilitation Program, which compensates those farmers for their losses. (The program’s website at the Department of Agriculture website says that the subsidies it provides go to those affected by “unjustified foreign retaliatory tariffs,” which is a fairly subjective use of “unjustified.”) Trump, despite his rhetoric about handouts from the Democrats, hails the program and its $16 billion price tag.
“Farmers are starting to do great again!” he tweeted last month.”
OK, so Il Douche is going to compensate all the farmers who lose money on their exports to China. I don’t even know how much money that is. Luckily, the totally non-partisan Dept of Ag can give him a figure. Most likely, someone is going to bitch about it, say that number doesn’t have the right amount of zeros. Then all he has to do is instruct the banking community to cooperate, lending generous amounts of money for next years planting of crops that are going to soar in value, make up all the losses, and then some. Bankers are widely beloved for their patriotism and generosity, that’s just bound to work! Yessir, nothing but blue skies and sunshine ahead!
Me? Tequila and bongwater, why do you ask?
Definitely not; that lying douchebag’s spirit would be rejected like something that gets rejected quickly and forcefully.
I’m trying to show that relying on traditions, expectations, honor, custom are fucking stupid with the people in control of our country right now. They don’t like those traditions, customs, etc. and are determined to do away with them. FFS, after what happened to Merrick Garland, it’s hard to believe there are people who still expect the GOP to do anything that’s expected.
Wise up, people. They have no honor and no shame; they aren’t gonna do anything that they don’t think overwhelmingly benefits themselves. The past few years are over-stuffed with events that defy norms and customs; they aren’t about to slow down or stop now.
For instance, have a look at this article about John Ratcliffe’s nomination to be the next Director of National Intelligence.
Normally he would never be nominated, if nominated one could expect that he would not be confirmed. In our modern world of today, tho, it’s almost a certainty that he will be confirmed.
Stop relying on custom, tradition, previous norms, etc. to determine how you assess what is happening or likely to happen today. Those rules don’t apply at the moment.
So there goes the notion of a traditional family, when it doesn’t suit the GOP goals; another custom flushed down the toilet.
Here’s how I see this playing out: Many of these red state welfare queens yuk it up for now. “Hur Hur, we are definitely not the marks this time. Things are finally as they should be- liberals have to get up and go to work every day, and we just hang out and collect billions off of them in exchange for nothing. No point farming when there is no foreign market anymore, but we farmers are absolutely essential because, gotta eat, right?” And it does continue like this, for awhile. Cue the grievance of the Old Confederacy which boiled down to, “We would rather rebel and kill our countymen than do this work ourselves!”
Thing is, it is actually the farms that are essential, and not really the farmers. And without foreign markets, the farms aren’t actually essential anymore, either. And anyway, the aquifers are getting used up, and it could take decades or longer of leaving them alone for them to recharge.
The debt grows. And grows. The interest payments eat into the purchasing power of the US, even while borrowing $1T a year. Climate change takes stronger root. Destabilizing policies of the present result in destabilization in the future. The currently seemingly placid global economy hits a speed bump, or more likely a crisis.
At last! The conservative dream is achieved! It is simply no. longer. possible to provide public funding for a whole raft of programs, and golden, glorious CUTS are the only solution.
Hooray! All those freeloading senior citizens finally have to choose between getting a job, the bums, or dining on cat food in tents on sidewalks and in alleys for the rest of their golden years. Medicare goes out the window, no more sucking on that teat, you parasites. The massive medical industry implodes without Medicare, requiring more cuts because the economy just shrank again.
What else to cut? Um, these “farmers” are more like parasitic squatters, yanno? They don’t actually do anything except mooch off of the rest of us. Why didn’t we see what welfare queens they were before? Why in the everlasting name of Jesus Herbert Walker Christ don’t they get real, productive jobs? Seriously, wtf?
And they are cut off. And they go bankrupt. And the oligarchs buy all their land, and it is all very similar to the Soviet communalism land grab only it’s cool, because it is Capitalism.
The End.
“If you want to take something, you must first allow it to be given.” Tao Te Ching 36
Pretty much nailed it, Try2B. Just like the housing bubble bursting a decade ago; y’all didn’t think that was an accident, did you? It was a test run.
Well thanks, Snowboarder Bo. Also, you’ve received a complimentary submission in Try2B’s Choose My Next Signature contest. 
I didn’t really ask the question I guess. Thought it was not exactly an accident, but a consequence of greed run amok. Got a link or a story about that?
Will Hurd (R-TX) is retiring, becoming the 6th Republican representative to announce this in the past two weeks… and the third from Texas.
This leaves one African-American Republican in Congress (House + Senate).
Another rat leaves the ship he helped to sink.