From “Reason Magazine“:

A judge on Wednesday threw out a criminal charge against an Arizona mother who was arrested at a city council meeting for criticizing a public official, calling her arrest “objectively outrageous.”

Maricopa County Judge Gerald Williams dismissed with prejudice the trespassing charge against Rebekah Massie. On August 20, the mayor of Surprise, Arizona, ordered a police officer to arrest Massie during the public comment section of a city council meeting after Massie criticized a proposed pay raise for the city attorney. The mayor claimed she was violating a rule prohibiting complaints against city officials during public comment, and when she refused to stop speaking, he had her forcibly removed and arrested.

“No branch of any federal, state, or local government in this country should ever attempt to control the content of political speech,” Williams wrote in his dismissal order. “In this case, the government did so in a manner that was objectively outrageous.”

At the micro level, I wish the judge had opened a door toward a civil suit on the basis that the mayor had violated the woman’s civil rights.  I would love to see some compensatory and punitive damages here.

At the macro level, it will be interesting to see where legal matters like these go over the next four years.  I’m worried that another Trump administration will not look kindly on the free speech of individuals who are critical of the incoming president.

As I wrote in my recent post, Is America “Back?”, we’re soon to have an FBI director (pictured above) who has sworn to exact revenge against Trump’s enemies.  That doesn’t sound like the America we grew up in.

 

 

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From Bloomberg:

 The House Judiciary Committee said it’s found “substantial evidence of collusion and anticompetitive behavior” by the financial industry to “impose radical ESG goals” on U.S. companies.

An interim report published by the Republican-led committee said “a cartel” of financial firms and climate activists sought to replace Exxon Mobil Corp. board members in 2021 after the company declined to make a series of climate pledges.

How pathetic.  It looks like Congress is lining up to take action against the segment of the financial industry that is concerned that Big Oil is on a quest to bake our planet so as to enhance its profit levels.

I advise those wringing their hands about all this to content themselves with the sad fact that, at this point, it seems extremely unlikely that the United States will lead the world in the direction of environmental sustainability.  We just re-elected a president whose entire support base believes that concern for the health of our planet is for woke sissies, and whose cabinet picks are even more aggressive on the subject than the president-elect himself.

My advice: just relax, have a glass of wine, and hope that the other 95+% of the world’s population does a better job here than we Americans.  They can’t do any worse.

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It looks like the majority of Americans are thrilled to see the ushering in of an administration that features an alcoholic Fox News host running the Pentagon, an anti-vaxxer crackpot supervising our health, a statutory rapist sitting atop U.S. law enforcement, and an FBI director who has sworn to exact revenge against Trump’s enemies.

Rule of law, basic human decency, and common sense used to mean something.  It really wasn’t that long ago.

 

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There is a reason that the United States doesn’t resemble Sweden, and that is it’s harder for billionaires to become multi-billionaires.

Life in America is deeply rooted in corruption, in which rich people buy favorable legislation from Congress.  This type of criminality simply does not exist in countries like Sweden.

While the rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer.  Look around.  Is homelessness getting better or worse?

Voltaire said something like “The enrichment of the few depends on the impoverishment of the many.” We seem to have an implicit understanding of that over here, and it’s perfectly fine with us.

 

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From his Wikipedia page:

Thomas Sowell is an American economist, social philosopher and political commentator. He is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. With widely published commentary and books—and as a guest on TV and radio—he is a well-known voice in the American conservative movement as a prominent black conservative.

Still going strong 94 years old, Sowell has given us plenty of valuable quotes, like the one at left.

Has a certain relevance to the U.S. president-elect, doesn’t it?

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In my recent post: Trump Voters Got Fleeced, But It’s No Big Deal, I pointed out that the MAGA crowd has no interest in calling Trump out on his BS.

This is fundamentally how he won the 2024 election: he has a huge advantage over any Democratic opponent.  You didn’t hear Kamala Harris making ridiculous claims about bringing down grocery prices (while departing the people who pick our crops), improving healthcare (while promising to can Obamacare), etc.

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Yes, Trump lied to the MAGA crowd, but hearing the truth from their hero isn’t a big deal; it never was, and it never will be.

Where the price of eggs will be 12 months from now really doesn’t matter.  If it happens to be lower, Trump will take credit for it, and his supporters will hail him as the greatest president in U.S. history.

In the more likely event that the price isn’t lower, they’ll be onto to something else.

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Which U.S. state will be most profoundly affected if Ontario cuts off power transmission in retaliation of the imposition of tariffs?  A quick look at a map answers that immediately.

The answer is the swing-state of Michigan. which went for Trump in 2024.  It’s unclear how folks will feel when their hero’s policies turn their state cold and dark–in the middle of winter.

This may hurt, but it may be an important lesson.

 

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At left is a quote from 19th Century German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer.

With all this pessimism, I think I would call him more “disturbed” than “insightful.”

Long-time readers know that 2GreenEnergy tries to maintain a certain level of optimism (even after the re-election of Donald Trump) insofar as people who believe that life is hopeless normally wind up in a kind of torpor.  In turn, inactive people don’t do much to change the world.

 

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If you tried to list all the elements of hypocrisy associated with the commandment “Thou shalt not kill,” you’d be busy for a very long time.  War, the death penalty, genocide via bombs or starving out entire populations, refusing women life-saving abortions when their lives will certainly perish if they carry a diseased pregnancy to term…there really is no end.

The reference in the meme here, of course, is to the U.S. health insurance industry, whose greed routinely condemns uncountable Americans to death every year.

That the United States is the only developed country on Earth that allows a for-profit healthcare industry to put its boot on the neck of its citizens like this runs counter to the desires of the vast majority of its people, ca. 70%, who favor universal healthcare.

But the idea that “thou shalt not kill” means exactly zero.

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