I was driving up to San Francisco yesterday, and today I’m at the Foresight Vision Weekend. There was a session on longevity (including cryonics) this morning, and now there’s a panel on blockchain and it’s potential applications. One of the panelists says that one app he’s woring is with a company that wants gas stations in space. I’ll have to talk to him later.
Category Archives: Law
The Steinle Case
I’ve wondered from the beginning why the prosecution was so stupid as to attempt to convict him of first-degree murder. They never had a case (and probably not even for a manslaughter charge, though they could maybe get him for negligent or reckless homicide, but I’m not familiar with CA law about that).
Anyway, Sarah Rumpf explains the ways they screwed up. And as many have noted, the real issue was that he should never have been in the country to do this
The Flynn Plea
Andy McCarthy writes that (despite media hysteria this morning), there’s still no “there” there, at least with regard to “collusion with the Russians” (which isn’t a crime).
The CFPB
Iain Murray writes that it’s unconstitutional, and should be abolished.
He’s right.
Linda Tripp
Her thoughts on the reassessing of Bill Clinton by the Democrats. She was the only person in that whole sorry episode who told the truth.
But the Democrats still refuse to admit that it wasn’t about the sex, or sexual harassment, or sexual assault. It was about the corruption, and obstruction of justice to prevent an innocent woman he’d sexually harassed from getting a fair trial.
Net Neutrality
Those protesting the decision are going after the wrong targets:
Fifteen years ago, when I started blogging, it was common to hear that “the internet interprets censorship as damage and routes around it.” You don’t hear that so often anymore, because it’s not true. China has proven very effective at censoring the internet, and as market power has consolidated in the tech industry, so have private firms.
Meanwhile, our experience of the internet is increasingly controlled by a handful of firms, most especially Google and Facebook. The argument for regulating these companies as public utilities is arguably at least as strong as the argument for thus regulating ISPs, and very possibly much stronger; while cable monopolies may have local dominance, none of them has the ability that Google and Facebook have to unilaterally shape what Americans see, hear, and read.
In other words, we already live in the walled garden that activists worry about, and the walls are getting higher every day. Is this a problem? I think it is.
Yes, it is.
The Administrative State
Gorsuch may be poised to deal it a huge blow, beyond what Scalia would have. Let’s hope.
Scientific Norms
…are threatened by a litigious climate. It’s almost as though some “scientists” would rather sue people than discuss science. [Paywalled]
[Update a couple minutes later]
Here‘s a non-paywalled link.
The Obama/Clinton Crimes And Corruption
Sessions is considering appointing a second special counsel to (finally) actually investigate them:
The list of matters he wanted probed was wide ranging but included the FBI’s handling of the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server while she was secretary of state, various dealings of the Clinton Foundation and several matters connected to the purchase of the Canadian mining company Uranium One by Russia’s nuclear energy agency. Goodlatte took particular aim at former FBI director James B. Comey, asking for the second special counsel to evaluate the leaks he directed about his conversations with President Trump, among other things.
I hope so.
Ignorance Of The Law
It is unjust for it not to be an excuse:
If the government cannot even count all of the criminal laws it has enacted, how on earth can citizens be expected to obey them?
Good question.