#democracy for sale

[socialjusticeinamerica]

[republicansaredomesticterrorists]

[odinsblog]

This is an illegitimate and deeply corrupt Supreme Court.

“I must respectfully decline your invitation," Roberts wrote in the letter to Dick Durbin (D-Ill), which was released by a spokesperson for the high court.

Durbin responded to the refusal in a statement Tuesday.

“Make no mistake: Supreme Court ethics reform must happen whether the Court participates in the process or not,” Durbin said in the statement.

He also noted that he was surprised that the chief justice had amended his letter with a statement meant to provide “clarity” to the public about how the justices consider ethics issues.

Durbin dismissed the statement as a “recounting of existing legal standards of ethics” and said that Roberts’ suggestion that current law is adequate “ignores the obvious.”

“It is time for Congress to accept its responsibility to establish an enforceable code of ethics for the Supreme Court, the only agency of our government without it,” Durbin said.

👉🏿 https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/25/politics/john-roberts-congress-supreme-court-ethics/index.html

Unsurprisingly, this is not the first time that the malfeasance of SCOTUS has been a problem.

Flashback 2012:

Roberts rejects calls that the justices should be subject to the basic code of ethics that governs all other federal judges and must provide some transparency to their recusal decisions. His argument seems based on the proposition that the justices are good people and able jurists — so they don’t have to be officially bound by a code or explain decisions governing their conduct or recusal.

In Roberts’s view, these good jurists should not have to explain how their decisions conform to the law. Yet the courts’ fundamental legitimacy rests on the notion that judges apply the facts to the law impartially and explain what they have done in reasoned opinions for all to read. Roberts’s position mocks that.

👉🏿 https://www.politico.com/story/2012/01/roberts-to-america-trust-us-071895

[nando161mando]

Democracy for sale

[isawthismeme]

[devastator1775]

I might buy Helldivers 2 with the next Steam Sale....

[odinsblog]

Harlan Crow has been very good to Justice Clarence Thomas, lavishing gifts and other favors on Thomas and his family.

Crow provided $500,000 to allow Thomas' wife to start a Tea Party group, and he once gave Thomas a $19,000 Bible that belonged to Frederick Douglass. He also served on the board of a corporate-aligned think tank called the American Enterprise Institute (AI), which once gave Thomas a $15,000 gift.

As ThinkProgress reported earlier, AEI filed at least three briefs in the Supreme Court after giving Thomas this very expensive gift, and Thomas either sided with AEl or took a position that was much more extreme that AEl's in all three of these cases.

👉🏿 https://archive.thinkprogress.org/second-harlan-crow-connected-group-has-a-perfect-litigation-record-before-justice-thomas-1aaf50c21db8/

The U.S. Supreme Court is for sale. Roberts' lack of monitoring the ethics of his 'justices' is a crime. Thomas needs to be impeached immediately. And that's just the beginning.

[gaertan]

FOR DEMOCRACY

First Helldivers ych done for defragmented-defect on tumblr!  also REMINDER I'm still open for more ych slots!

[blasphemister]

Dating in the old days.

[sharkbait-huhaha]

waking up and remembering that the liberals r no longer in charge of nsw fills me with so much relief. like even tho idk all the ins and outs of politics, it feels like a huge weight has been lifted from my shoulders. its insane

[odinsblog]

HOT TAKE: Conservative Democrats in red states aren’t conservative because “that’s the only way to win in middle America and the South” — they are often conservative because they are well PAID to be conservative

“Together, Sinema and Manchin have caused significant headaches for Democrats over the last two years — first by opposing much of the "Build Back Better" social spending and climate bill and then by opposing Democrats' plans of weakening the Senate's 60-vote filibuster to pass voting rights legislation.

Crow has also made significant contributions to moderate-to-conservative House Democrats.

According to federal campaign finance data, the Texas billionaire has given $16,800 to Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey since 2018, contributing thousands as recently as October 2022.

Gottheimer, a member of the so-called "Unbreakable Nine" of moderate Democrats who insisted on de-linking Build Back Better from the infrastructure bill, has at times been a thorn in the side of his party as well.

And Crow has contributed $12,500 to Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas since 2006. Cuellar, a conservative opponent of abortion rights, faced a strong primary challenge from progressive activist Jessica Cisneros in 2022.

Crow's relationship and lavish vacations with Justice Thomas have raised significant ethics concerns — Thomas never disclosed the flights and yacht trips financed by the GOP megadonor, apparently violating a post-Watergate federal law that requires justices to report gifts.”

👉🏿 https://www.businessinsider.com/sinema-manchin-clarence-thomas-vacations-harlan-crow-megadonor-republican-2023-4

[olivepatio]

There's a ton of shitty things that are also done to people who vote by mail (i.e. college students) I used to be a resident assistant responsible for the well being of the dorm floor I lived on and during voting time we were scrambling. And I don't mean like the political clubs or any kind of activism I mean like finding someone who could legally witness you vote, getting ballots notarized, even the simple issue of paying to mail the ballot back. aka asking college kids on a college campus to own stamps, because the government, unlike Discover and Chase, can't afford a prepaid envelope (really they just want to make this process harder)

Then there's the issue of ensuring the ballot got accepted. A signature can be declared fraudulent very easily and if you ever asked a college kid to sign a piece of paper they will do it 5 different ways (I still do). That's why places like ballotpedia.org that can direct you to your state's ballot status web page are helpful.

But yeah Penzey's spices sells both excellent spices and an excellent newsletter

Buddy, when racist cunts illegally prevented me from registering to vote by just refusing to accept my papers, I PROMISE YOU shitty guilt trip memes about my inability to vote made everything worse.

You know what ACTUALLY helped?

More than every passive aggressive shit for brains on this website telling me I deserve to me racially harassed for not giving Democrats my soul?

A fucking email from a fucking HERBS AND SPICES STORE that unlike you wretched cunts ACTUALLY HAD VOTER REGISTRATION HELPLINES IN IT.

Every time one of you godforsaken freaks tells me to 'get out and vote' like its cutely trivial and didn't take months of desperate phone calls just to register (IF my registration even WORKED THIS TIME).

If you, like me, are struggling with registration or poll access, try contacting your STATE board of elections.

Request that they send you TWO copies of their registration guidelines. Collect any documents listed in them.

Then, contact your LOCAL board. Tell them you would like to register IN PERSON IF POSSIBLE.

Bring your documents and the two copies of the guideline AND a working cell phone.

If you get ANY trouble AT ALL tell the local person you will call the state board to confirm their registration requirements. Be polite, but do not leave. Put the phone on speaker.

Most of the time, the local person who is doing Actual Serious Federal And State Crimes will give up at that point. If not, the person at the state board will generally outrank and overrule the local one.

Make a note of the names of both the local and state official.

Then, and this is the most important part:

CONFIRM YOUR REGISTRATION WAS FILED.

It may take a day or two for your registration to appear.

Unfortunately, if it's been a week, you're going to have to repeat the process.

Take the names you noted previously, and contact the state board again. Report that these people denied you registration on this day, in spite of you providing these documents, then list all the required papers you collected.

The person at the state SHOULD be able to direct you from there, but the process varies hugely by state.

Good luck to you all.

[queenerdloser]

looking through on sale nonfiction books on the barnes and noble website is fucking wild sometimes. there's popular nonfiction history next to movie cookbooks next to celebrity memoirs next to vitrolic conservative putdowns of joe biden next to reflections on the current state of democracy next to religious manifestos next to the most insane thinly veiled prejudiced frothing conservative mishmash you've ever seen in your life

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