volkris @volkris@qoto.org
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
@jackhutton expand the Court and they'll just take even longer to negotiate and settle on an opinion.
But no, the key is for us to do a better job of putting the Court in context and remembering that the whole role of the Court in the US system is for them to take their time issuing opinions that are coherent and durable.
If you need speed, look to the other two branches which are set up to be responses to the needs of the moment.
The Court's decisions won't change American society. Without action from others they're mere argument.
@old_hippie it doesn't really change anything, though: prosecutors would be making their case either way, including proving the bribery charge, whether the defendants claim pure innocence or gratuity in the alternative.
Either way, prosecutors have to bring their proof.
@Nigel_Purchase Sounds like one of those cases where the headline is very misleading but tries to hedge in the word "basically" so the author can say, "Well, we didn't say it REALLY did that."
No, the SCOTUS didn't legalize bribery, and in fact its opinion hinged largely on the argument that BECAUSE bribery is illegal and a big deal, that can explain why Congress set the legislation this way.
The Court's opinion emphasizes that bribery is illegal, contrary to what so many headlines are saying.
@bigheadtales No, they didn't cut down that law, and this is critical to understand.
Wrong branch of government.
*Congress* cut down the law decades ago, and if it needs to be put back up the Congress can act again to reverse its lawmaking.
You're not framing what the law actually says. Here's a link to it.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/666
So, since the law that Congress passed doesn't apply to the situation before the Court, the Court didn't strike down that which wasn't in the law at all.
@bigheadtales of course I did read the dissent, but the dissent isn't what the Court said.
What the Court said is in the majority opinion that the Court accepted, not in the dissent that didn't carry the day.
Jackson's dissent got a bunch wrong, which is why it didn't become the position of the Court. But either way, it was rejected as the position of the Court, and if we want to know what the Court said, that's the wrong place to look.
@jemmesedi right, because it was a very different set of circumstances as they were reviewing a lower court action that was clearly out of bounds.
It's way easier to tackle such a misbehaving lower court than to grapple with these questions of procedure.
@bigheadtales again, not what the Court said as the opinion went through the system set up specifically because bribery is NOT ok.
The law has been on the books for decades. If Congress believes they got the law wrong before and it needs to include stricter federal oversight, it's up to the democratic process to sort that out, not the courts.
Again, if you want to oppose them, or even participate in the democratic process from an informed perspective, then yes, it seems you DO need someone to point out how the gaps in your understanding of the world.
@alwillis yes, LOOKS.
These headlines are misreporting what happened. They LOOK bad, but what can you do? The opinion is public, so anyone interested can go see what they said for themselves.
But if people are going to believe these headlines despite the Court itself saying the exact opposite, well, I don't know what more can be done to get past the looks.
@alan so again, I'm not saying I have THE right answer because I don't think there is A right answer, only tradeoffs.
For me personally, though, it's exactly that elevation of faction that I'd object to.
I want to talk about how how this candidate is doing their job regardless of faction; I don't want to build faction into the system, as we have enough issues with that as it is.
In fact, I'd say the present state of the US House is exactly the trainwreck that happens when folks focus on what factions deserve instead of each member working for their own individual constituents.
@BohemianPeasant but that points squarely to the problem that's going around today, where the Court respected the law written by the democratic process, but instead of holding lawmakers to account for engaging democracy well, everyone's yelling at the Court for saying, yes, democracy matters a lot.
And so we'll fail to hold our congresspeople accountable for not reforming laws.
It's a bizarre picture, but in the end, we have to have better civics education and current events reporting exactly so people know how their government works.
Because right now, this is a GREAT example of elected officials escaping accountability.
@petergleick sometimes the reason an argument winds up in dissent is because it's legitimately not a good argument.
So we can read the law that Congress passed. We don't have to go read the losing opinion when we can read the actual law with our own eyes:
@bigheadtales yep, now read the part about bribery, since that's what you were talking about:
"Importantly, because bribery can corrupt the official act, Congress treats bribery as a far more serious offense than gratuities. For example, if a federal official accepts a bribe, federal bribery law provides for a 15-year maximum prison sentence."
Not only does the SCOTUS insist that bribery is a crime, but bribery being a particularly significant crime was core to their ruling.
They ruled that in part BECAUSE bribery is criminal, the 1986 revisions to the law take that into account.
@mhjohnson jawboneing is just a informal term for what the administration was doing with encouraging the stories they wanted to get out.
@bigheadtales I linked to the Supreme Court take on what the Supreme Court said.
And according to the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court said the opposite of what you're quoting here.
I don't know who you're listening to, but they're telling you wrong as you can read for yourself directly from the Court.
@AmericanScream sure it made economic sense. How do I know? Because it resulted in economic activity that left all parties better off.
Just like any other monetary transaction.
@Dhmspector I showed you the question that's before the court.
It doesn't matter one wit what you think his lawyers said in the district court, that's not the question before this court.
@AmericanScream prove the rule?
No the exception disproves what you said!
Maybe YOU can't really use crypto for anything day to day, but be careful about projecting your own personal experiences on everybody else and making assumptions based on that.
In the end you're not going to convince anybody of your perspective when it requires us to ignore our own experiences that don't line up with what you're saying.
You just end up sounding uninformed.
@petergleick well it's more that regardless of whether the justices are OK with it or not, that's the law that Congress passed a while back.
And if we want the law to change we need to stop reelecting congresspeople who maintain this status quo.
@uzi careful: sometimes those buy local, know your customer campaigns are themselves examples of corporatism.
Sometimes the best solutions benefit from efficiencies of scale, but others put their fingers on the... scale... to prop up less effective groups.
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
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