[Ashes]

amphibian, on 24 June 2015 - 08:09 PM, said:

Briar King, on 24 June 2015 - 08:06 PM, said:

Yea McCain

He's mostly well liked here

http://fivethirtyeig...-2012-not-2016/

Jindal's approval rating among Louisiana Republicans has fallen 25 points to 54% since 2012. He's slumped badly since then and it's because people are finding out how bad a governor he actually is.

He's not too well liked by republicans over where I'm at, but then again I live in a town where he took a chain saw to the university. I'm kind of surprised with McNeese over there, they don't feel the same. The man can handle an emergency, but outside of that all he has cared about for the last 4 years is running for president or should I say VP.

[HoosierDaddy]

Always love seeing the Constitution applied correctly. It was just a matter of time: equal protection should not be an iffy thing.

[Terez]

HoosierDaddy, on 26 June 2015 - 04:39 PM, said:

Always love seeing the Constitution applied correctly. It was just a matter of time: equal protection should not be an iffy thing.

La résistance.

[HoosierDaddy]

Terez, on 26 June 2015 - 04:48 PM, said:

HoosierDaddy, on 26 June 2015 - 04:39 PM, said:

Always love seeing the Constitution applied correctly. It was just a matter of time: equal protection should not be an iffy thing.

La résistance.

Those same people who resisted integration will still balk at changes, but this is not a wave. It's a tsunami. The SC has spoken.

[Terez]

It turned out to be not very much of a resistance anyway, which is a relief. He's just warning people to wait for our federal judge to lift her stay, which shouldn't be necessary but I imagine they felt they had to do something. Alabama has been making lots of noise about resistance; we'll see how far they go with it. Haven't heard a peep from them but I haven't been following the Alabama news. All our MS elected officials have been whining about the Constitution on Facebook, and their voters have been telling them it's all their fault for not impeaching Obama, or something.

[Ashes]

HoosierDaddy, on 26 June 2015 - 04:52 PM, said:

Terez, on 26 June 2015 - 04:48 PM, said:

HoosierDaddy, on 26 June 2015 - 04:39 PM, said:

Always love seeing the Constitution applied correctly. It was just a matter of time: equal protection should not be an iffy thing.

La résistance.

Those same people who resisted integration will still balk at changes, but this is not a wave. It's a tsunami. The SC has spoken.

Great day! Finally some wonderful people that I love will get the chance to know that their government embraces their rights to be equal Americans under the law and my state will be forced to recognize them for the wonderful caring couples they are. Finally justice prevails.

[Terez]

It's been a really fantastic week for liberals in the US all around. The impending death of the rebel flag, the survival of Obamacare in the SCOTUS challenge, the survival of "disparate impact" in housing discrimination law, and now gay marriage. The last victory is the only one we really expected.

[Maark Abbott]

I can't help but feel that Sheffield Pride today will be something to see. And I'm stuck in the office. Oh well.

Glad to see America's SC making the right call.

[Tsundoku]

Do you think this will be a big problem? It is only an opinion piece but ...

http://www.news.com....4-1227417817028

Why marriage equality could mean a spike in LGBTQI hate crimes
1 HOUR AGO JUNE 27, 2015 4:52PM

OPINION
THE United States Supreme Court has made history, legalising same-sex marriage across all 50 of states.
Though this is undoubtedly a momentous occasion worthy of joy, celebration, and kudos, let’s remember that homophobia — and violent hate crimes against the gay community — are still prevalent in the US. This change may spark more hate, with dire consequences.
Consider the example of France, circa 2013. The nation known for its liberal stance on love legalised same-sex marriage in May of that year, and within days, members of the LGBTQI community were attacked on the streets. Several religious groups were convicted over the violent beatings.
We all know the US has its problems with hate crimes. There are frequent reports of attacks on students at schools and hardworking members of communities being cruelly ostracised in many of America’s southern, conservative states.

Not to mention anything of the nation’s leaderboard status when it comes to LGBTQI suicide figures among teenagers.
Even rainbow-friendly cities like New York and San Francisco have reported several hate crimes against members of the gay community, from benign vandalism of pro-gay murals in California to violent subway attacks in New York.
Just a month ago, New Yorker Bayna-Lehkiem El-Amin allegedly slammed a chair over the heads of a homosexual couple inside a restaurant. Video footage of the attack showed El-Amin hurling homophobic slurs, while stomping on one of his two victims - then audibly cracking a chair over both their heads.
The US has been the world’s biggest superpower, and trendsetter, for decades. Though the tides are changing, as we begin to look to Asia and Europe for what’s hot or not, there’s no denying the power American culture has and its infectious ability to shape the rest of the world. So let’s hope that nations who’ve spent many years simply taking leaves from America’s political playbook (i.e. Australia) decide to take this one on board.
And likewise, let’s hope the US learns from the enforcement mistakes of other nations like France, and endeavours to keep all its citizens safe in the wake of this historic decision.
Congratulations, America.

[Terez]

Hate crimes are often the result of desperation. You could say that Dylann Roof is a prime example of that. It was just a few months ago in North Charleston that Walter Scott was shot in the back while he was running from a cop, and it was all caught on video. Even still, it was kind of amazing that the cop got charged with murder. He was the first in a long string of cop shootings to be charged. A lot of people said that was a turning point, when a lot of vaguely resistant white people started to recognize that black lives might indeed be ended more casually by police than white lives. So Roof was desperate to start a race war, but his actions had the opposite effect. We are having a fierce debate, but it is a very cleansing debate. It's the first time the flag debate has really happened on the Internet, because most regular people just started using it (to talk to people they'd never met before) a few years ago. The Dixie corpus of revisionist history is crumbling bit by bit. Obama said, when eulogizing Clementa Pinckney, "God works in mysterious ways," but there's nothing really mysterious about this.

It's a distinct possibility that terrorism against gays will rise, but what can we do? Race-related terrorism might also rise. Assassinations of police might also rise, because people on both sides are angry. Fortunately the vast majority of us are in the middle and don't support any kind of ideological violence, but you do have a lot of people talking about "Second Amendment remedies".

[Illuyankas]

I think if you don't legislate based on what hate groups might do, then you've lost and the hate has won.

[worry]

http://gawker.com/sc...-egg-1714198342
Is Scalia less than he's cracked up to be?

[amphibian]

Scalia hires very, very good clerks who amplify his judicial reputation and also his tilt towards mass media punditry.

All the Justices hire good clerks, but Scalia's have been of better quality and more devoted to legal contortions required to keep believing the Constitution is a dead document.

[amphibian]

Btw, Thomas will go down as the worst justice in the last eighty or hundred years.

[worry]

All true, but what stood out re: that article was the focus on his writing. I'm no legal scholar or even a particularly good essayist, but my understanding is that style should bolster not replace substance. He has a reputation for being an honest and consistent, if colorfully snarky, conservative legal mind. But if even that's not true, what good is he even as a devil's advocate?

[HoosierDaddy]

worry, on 27 June 2015 - 09:45 PM, said:

All true, but what stood out re: that article was the focus on his writing. I'm no legal scholar or even a particularly good essayist, but my understanding is that style should bolster not replace substance. He has a reputation for being an honest and consistent, if colorfully snarky, conservative legal mind. But if even that's not true, what good is he even as a devil's advocate?

Amongst attorneys he's a bit of a celebrity because he just gunslings his dissents. It doesn't make him impressive or a scholar, it makes him a celebrity and frankly that's not what the Court is for. Any jackass can write a dismissive and sarcastic dissent; he's reaching the level of a troll.

[Morgoth]

His dissent in Obergefell v. Hodges (the gay marriage thing) was embarassing. I can't understand how a supreme court justice can write something like that and not feel like a complete buffoon.

[Illuyankas]

Anyone who can write '24 shows that torture is effective' with a straight face is inherently a walking clump of embarassment anyway. And in case you missed it or forgot, that is a paraphrase, not a joke.

[Silencer]

Illuyankas, on 29 June 2015 - 09:40 AM, said:

Anyone who can write '24 shows that torture is effective' with a straight face is inherently a walking clump of embarassment anyway. And in case you missed it or forgot, that is a paraphrase, not a joke.

Eeegh, that is almost as bad as the mainstay "Lord of the Flies shows..." as seen on every school debate about morality ever. IT IS FICTION. FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIICTION.

[worry]

Neat article from a historical plantation tour guide: http://www.vox.com/2...at-a-plantation