One of us is reading this wrong

There was a Supreme Court ruling recently that disabled people can sue their state gov't over access to courthouses. AP reporting via NY Times:

The [5-4] majority ruled that access to courts and the services they provide is a basic right, and the act properly gives private citizens such as [George] Lane the power to sue for damages if a state fails to live up to that promise.

The decision means Lane can return to a lower court in Tennessee, where he sought up to $100,000 in damages.

2 days later...Brian Doherty speaking on it in a Reason.com article:

The case turned on the definition and application of the words "proportional and congruent." Precedent had it that Congress has the power to abrogate the state's 11th Amendment right not to be sued if it does so in protection of 14th Amendment rights to equal treatment under the law, but only if the laws it passes to do so are "proportional and congruent" to the right allegedly violated. (emphasis mine)

11th Amendment:

"The judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by citizens of another state, or by citizens or subjects of any foreign state."

"citizens of another state"...Was George Lane a citizen of a state other than Tennessee?

Unless the interpretation has been changed from what it says to include citizens of the state being sued (for which I'd like to hear a reason*), this sounds like, though I worry about the specific reasoning used to reach the conclusion, they got the gist right. Far as I know the man was a resident of Tennessee, and this is only being applied (for now) to a gov't institution. If applied to the homes and businesses of private citizens then there's a problem, since private citizens can pretty much exclude whoever for whatever reason, intentional or not, and as such can't be expected to accomodate people they might not even associate with -- a wheelchair ramp for a private fitness club when they don't plan on having programs designed for the disabled, for example.

Has it really from day one been "citizens can't sue a state gov't, period"? Or is that something brought about later? This sounds like if it were the case then a LOT of past rulings are invalid, simply because they involved a state.

(* - IMO if citizens can't even sue their own state gov't then that suggests a barrier of emergency unaccountability if the normal routes of expressing public opinion are neutered by other rules or procedures, whether unintentionally or deliberate. If this process is being abused then deal with it, truly frivilous lawsuits can be thrown out, it just takes judges w/ the stones to do it.)

If you're one of those griping about gas prices that buys into Kerry's yelling about the Strategic Reserve, it's time to smell the coffee. 'Tis all psychological, wouldn't do a thing.

Why is it assumed that the job of the government is to constantly run around meddling with prices anyway? What is this, a giant Wal-Mart? Obviously the costs are up for a reason (psst, importing oil from a region that functions like one of Dante's circles of hell is kinda difficult...), the griping is just the tendency of relatively confortable humans to expect the world handed to them on a silver platter.

You know what would really help in the long run?

....lower crude prices don't necessarily translate into lower gas prices, or at least to the same degree. Even though the price of crude is the largest single component in the price of gas, it's only 43 percent, with the rest coming from the refining process and distribution costs. In fact, one of the long-term problems helping to inflate gas prices is the lack of domestic refining capacity--it's been decades since a new refinery was built, and refineries are currently running at 96 percent capacity, leaving little room for an increase in the flow of gas to the pump. "All in all," wrote the Petroleum Industry Research Foundation last year, "the impact of the SPR fill by itself on oil prices is measured in nickels and dimes per barrel, not dollars, and no more than about 1 cent a gallon to consumers."

That's right, those things that make people scream "not in my backyard!!". Yet another symptom of public sentiment being yanked in all directions to avoid biting the bullet.

And now, another installment of....Conservatives vs Bush

Bob Novak, speaking on a demonstration of displeasure at an American Conservative Union event:

During George W. Bush's keynote address to the 40th anniversary black-tie banquet of the American Conservative Union (ACU) last week, diners rose repeatedly to applaud the president's remarks. But one man kept his seat through the 40-minute oration. It was no liberal interloper but conservative stalwart Donald Devine.

As ACU vice chairman, Devine was privileged to be part of a pre-dinner head-table reception with President Bush. However, Devine chose not to shake hands with the president. Furthermore, he is one of about 20 percent of Republicans that polls classify as not committed to voting for Bush's re-election.

The conventional wisdom portrays the latest Zogby Poll's 81 percent of Republican voters committed to Bush as reflecting extraordinary loyalty to the president by the GOP base. Actually, when nearly one out of five Republicans cannot flatly say they support Bush, that could spell defeat in a closely contested election. When Don Devine is among those one out of five, it signifies that the president's record does not please all conservatives.

The #2 at the ACU, basically telling Bush to shove it. Ouch...

A useful load of sh*t...

Randomly spotted, found interesting:

EVANSTON, Ill., May 18 (UPI) -- NASA-funded scientists are developing a new generation of fuel cells that derive their power from organic waste.

The fuel cells, called membrane microbial fuel cells, obtain electrons by pulling them off hydrogen atoms. On a long space mission, such as a two-year trip to Mars, those electrons could be derived from the solid waste produced by the crew.

I don't claim to be an expert on everything. This situation in India, for example, puzzles me. Anyone who focuses on this type of situation, holla, I'd like to learn.

Everyone needs a departure...

Radley Balko's recent post on regulation of....porn, reminded me of a recurring ponderance of mine:

Filming porn (paying people to have sex on camera) is legal. Prostitution is illegal. Therefore, don't you theoretically have a loophole where you can legally screw a hooker as long as you film it and sell copies of the tape?

Rousseau, and a thought on our dilemma

This quote appeared in a discussion elsewhere:

"Sovereignty cannot be represented for the same reason it cannot be alienated. It consists essentially in the general will, and the general will does not allow of being represented. It is either itself or something else; there is nothing in between. The deputies of the people, therefore, neither are nor can be its representatives; they are merely its agents. They cannot conclude anything definitively. Any law that the populace has not ratified in person is null; it is not a law at all. The English people believes itself to be free. It is greatly mistaken; it is free only during the election of members of Parliament. Once they are elected, the populace is enslaved; it is nothing. The use the English people makes of that freedom in the brief moments of its liberty certainly warrants their losing it." -Jean Jacques Rousseau

I've shared this sentiment myself in a way about the US, though obviously he would've disagreed sharply with my preferred solution. Representation the way we see it assumes that a few people who allegedly know so much more than average will simply do what the masses that voted for them wanted: "I want you to be smarter than me, but do what I would do"


If their point is to make decisions, then we have the conflict of trusting them even when they oppose their constituents, even though they quite possibly could be acting for themselves and not the public at all, yet giving them enough room that they aren't rendered puppets to random whims, which would defeat the purpose. But even before that, how is it really determined who fills these spots? What standards are we looking for? There's underlying social & philosophical questions behind every vote, yet for the most part we don't bother to consider them. If I could sit down w/ people prior to election day and engage them in a discussion of what they want their vote to mean, I would.

On the other hand, if they're to represent in the truest of manners, then there's another problem: this means, again, that we have to learn to think more critically. Total representation in a land of ignorance & superstition eventually eats itself. Though, if it were possible to raise ourselves to the point where this would work fairly well, then we could just cut out the middlemen and decide everything by referendum: I don't see that happening.


It seems this type of thing would be less of a problem if the constitutional limits on federal power were recognized. My personal interpretation has been that the state & local level were to be incubators of variety, and the federal level was solely to defend it, w/ no regard to what the populace chose to do with it (within reason, of course). Though now that's much easier said than done.


BTW: On this part of the quote, "Any law that the populace has not ratified in person is null; it is not a law at all."

IMO it goes even beyond the initial interpretation. Any law that is conceived without public input is not only illegitimate in the sense that it's imposed unilaterally, but also because its enforcement can be twisted and voided for certain people at any time. When you don't understand a law, you can't know when the point of that law has been violated. It turns into a system where laws only apply to people who don't know the code. This is why I personally cringe at the idea of lawyers becoming politicians.