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
The Supreme Court doesn't redraw districts, and the redrawing of districts isn't a taking away of rights.
You're stretching really, really hard to connect dots that just don't support your conclusion.
That's not a claim I made.
I wish 8 in 10 Americans would just stop voting for crappy candidates.
Don't want old people in Congress? Fine. Don't vote for them.
Keep in mind that the US government throws around those words because it appeals to the support base of the administration.
Iran isn't going to be able to educate the folks the administration is speaking to with that sort of talk.
@TechConnectify funny timing again! SO often you come out with videos that JUST HAPPEN to match some purchase I'd just made and wanted to explain to others.
The coincidences are freaky.
I just recently acquired a hybrid with such a drivetrain and was explaining Atkinson cycles and small batteries to non-technical friends.
And boom, you came out with a longform video with all the data.
@pseyfert could have asked permission.
Whether the other driver gets the message plus acquiesces to the request is a different matter.
@ELS no, not at all.
Shelby County was largely about much broader concepts of federal-state interaction in the US that apply outside of anything involving voting rights.
"The Federal Government does not, however, have a general right to review and veto state enactments before they go into effect" is a statement with broad applicability.
If you read the Court's opinion, that's not AT ALL the logic they expressed in their ruling, either that one or this one.
They based their rulings on what laws said, not whether racism was or was not over.
It's up to lawmakers to gauge whether racism is or is not over and write laws accordingly. The SCOTUS can not and does not write rulings based on that.
It's more like the clock decries being called a broken lamp.
So much of this heated criticism is based on claims against the court that just aren't correct, often exactly backwards.
The funny thing is that politico itself isn't innocent of this. The outfit being called out for misrepresenting the Court is participating in reporting about the Court calling out agencies like them who are at fault?
We should at least recognize that conflict of interests, as it's a pretty significant problem in the US these days.
What specific doctrines and rules do you think they invented and ignored?
The SCOTUS rulings go through the long histories of rules and doctrines they're applying, and far from sidelining lawmakers the rulings have put them front and center, citing lawmakers directly.
The Supreme Court did not take away the rights of Black voters. Rather it supported the VRA as our democratic institutions passed it.
Don't like what the VRA says? GREAT! That's why we have lawmakers to make better law. We should stop reelecting the congresspeople who failed to improve the law.
The Brennan Center can also write about the world being flat. So what? We can read the opinion for ourselves to see what it did, and we can see for ourselves that any such outfit putting out such nonsense seems to be just trying to claim headlines and/or score political points.
After all, that's reasonable marketing for them.
Look at what the SCOTUS ruling actually said, not what some thinktank tells you they said.
I think they're reading too much into this, drawing too much of a grand plan when a simpler explanation suffices.
Certain politicians are simply benefiting, politically and legally, from Israel being at war.
There's no reason to go farther than that.
Seems like if they were after violent repression of soft feelings for humans they'd be getting on with it more broadly by now...
volkris
boosted
[Josh Blackman] The KBJ Delay in Callais https://reason.com/volokh/2026/05/05/the-kbj-delay-in-callais/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon
If that was the case then the probably wouldn't have ruled against racial manipulation of the vote.
But we can all see for ourselves that the claim was accurate. It's right there in black and white, and even the new filing proves it to be accurate.
The appellants had not expressed an intent. They had requested an opportunity, itself pretty bizarre. I'm sorry if those appellants in a major case messed up the process, but that's why this should be taken seriously.
At best the NAACP screwed up here. Hold them accountable for botching the process. But more realistically, this was a political stunt. They knew they were losing and wanted to grab headlines.
You're right that the Supreme Court does not fix legislative branch issues. Beyond that, I'm afraid you've fallen for "extremist, activist" narratives that are debunked by the record of the US judicial system, if not basic civics itself.
No, it is complete nonsense to say SCOTUS dealt a blow to the VRA, and any outfit saying such a thing is either lying or amazingly ignorant as to what the ruling, and the act, actually said.
Read the opinion. It lays out that it was reinforcing the VRA, supporting it on its terms, not dealing a blow to it.
This ruling came about BECAUSE of the VRA, as court after court observed.
The SCOTUS ruling said the opposite. It flatly rejected voting policy targeting race, such as Jim Crow laws.
The ruling added an additional lock to the Jim Crow cage.
The problem is, the SCOTUS doesn't have the authority to make the final decision. That's up to the executive branch following legislative branch statute.
This is something legislators had years to address, but they failed. We need to stop reelecting the legislators that keep dropping the ball.
We can't look to the courts to fix legislative branch issues.
One issue with that perspective is that the SCOTUS ruling flat out allows Democrats to put their fingers on the scales for their own electoral favor.
The Court's ruling is that you can't tilt the scales based on race, but Democrats are still able to tilt it for party reasons.
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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