Tag: Stupid

バカにつける薬はない

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The above is a Japanese proverb which states, “There is no medicine for stupidity.”

I am referring to North Paulding High School, which I wrote about a few days ago when they suspended students for revealing the complete unpreparedness of the school for dealing with coronavirus transmission.

Well today, North Paulding High is gong online for at least 2 days following a spike in infections:

The Paulding County high school that became infamous for hallways crowded with unmasked students will retreat online for at least a couple days this week after revealing that a half-dozen students and three staffers were diagnosed with COVID-19.

The district said it needs time to disinfect the North Paulding High School building and look for other potentially infected individuals.

“On Monday and Tuesday, the school will be thoroughly cleaned and disinfected, and the district will consult with the Department of Public Health to assess the environment and determine if there (are) any additional close contacts for confirmed cases who have not already been identified,” Paulding Superintendent Brian Otott wrote in a letter to parents Sunday.

Otott said parents will be notified Tuesday evening about whether North Paulding High School will reopen Wednesday.

Parents whose children go to the school might want to get a doctor’s note to keep them out of school for, “Unspecified health issues.”

This goes for members of the sports team in spades.

The only thing that the administration is interested in is passing the buck.

Worst Metaphor Ever

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There are any number of reasons to vote for Joe Biden for President.

OK, that is not true. There ara any number of reasons to vote AGAINST Donald Trump.

I honestly cannot think of a reason to vote for Biden beyond, “Have you seen the other guy?”

That being said, describing this decision as the equivalent of break-up sex is just plain wrong for a number of reasons:

  • Making ANYTHING like sex with Joe Biden is not going to motivate anyone, except, perhaps Jill Biden. (Don’t make me quote Jules from Pulp Fiction) 
  • How often do people have breakup sex anyway?  My experience with my partners is that when they want to say goodbye, they don’t exchange bodily fluids.
  • The central thesis of the argument is that, once Trump is defeated, progressives will be given a pass on not supporting Dems in 2 years.  Na ga na happen.  The Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) will continue to blame every failure on the “left” while treating them like absolute crap.

Please, just stop:

Today I see people whose politics I largely share getting upset about things. Here are Briahna Joy Gray and David Sirota, upset that John Kasich may play a role in the Democratic National Convention. Here is Anand Giridharadas grappling with how to welcome the energy and support of the “Lincoln Project” without ceding power to the very same people who brought us the Iraq War, torture, and predatory mortgages and financial fraud.

The metaphor for how I think that “we” (for a suitably nebulous we) should deal with the 2020 election is “breakup sex”.

Our current relationship with the Democratic Party is intolerable. The people who run the institution do not share our values, at least not in any way that matches the urgency of the catastrophe our world has become. We’ve tried for two Presidential election cycles to reform the party from the inside, using the primary process, and not succeeded, both for reasons fair and foul. Yet the pathology of our first-past-the-post electoral system and the logic of Duverger’s tendency means it would harmful to do the natural thing and form our own political party. Under electoral systems like ours (which it should be among our highest priorities to change) splitting a broad coalition disempowers the entire coalition, handing elections and power to people whose interests and values are so far from our own we would never have been anywhere near a coalition with them. Within the Democratic Party our values are undermined, coopted, sacrificed on the alter of a cynical realism that the well-remunerated realists quietly prefer. If we split from the Democratic Party, we hand power to a coalition that is, at the moment, an unabashedly fascist death cult. Things are tough all over. This is intolerable. We have to find a way out.

I think there is a way out. A fair number of us, described sometimes as “Bernie or bust”, argue that we should withhold our support from the Democratic Party, despite electoral realities, unless they earn our support with candidates and platforms that represent us. Sometimes this is taken a principled stand, to be taken regardless of consequence. But often it is justified in game-theoretical terms: If institutional Democrats know that we are trapped, that we will always hold our noses and vote with them, then we will have no leverage in the party. We have to demonstrate a willingness to accept the short-term risk of spoiling elections in order, over the longer term, to gain bargaining power within the Democratic coalition so that our values and interests actually get represented.

There is a lot to be said for this view, but it is kneecapped when it is put into practice on individualized, atomized terms. Most of us, compelled by the logic of negative partisanship, hold our noses and vote for the “corporate Democrat” who we expect will betray us, but who will probably not murder us like the other guy might. Others vote for Jill Stein or Howie Hawkins, or don’t show up at the polls. The inconsistency dilutes the potential effectiveness of the strategy. If the goal is actually to wield power, our withholding or supplying votes must be a matter of coordinated, collective action rather than individualized expressive choice. We need a union that can credibly threaten to strike, not individuals some of whom rage quit.

So, breakup sex. I think, in this year of our lord 2020, we should actively, enthusiastically, passionately support the Democratic Party and the prototype institutional Democrat who leads its ticket. They always try to convince us that letting the other team win would be the end of the world, but this year the horde of rabid predators is pretty visible while they are crying wolf. As soon as the election has passed, I think we should form a distinct organization that would not be a political party in the sense of participating in our country’s deeply flawed public primary process, but that would, like a political party, sometimes moot its own candidates for public office and help get them placed on ballots (whether as organization representatives or notional independents). Sometimes is an important word in that description. Most of the time, it hopefully would not. The organization would simply endorse the Democratic party candidate, keeping whole the not-Republican coalition. But, if a high (supermajority) threshold of the membership decides that the Democrat would not represent our values effectively, that the risk of spoiling the election is acceptable given whoever the Republican would be and is outweighed by the possibility our better candidate might win, then we would run that candidate and organize on their behalf with energy and unconflicted enthusiasm. Defecting from the Democratic Party, when it makes sense, makes much more sense as a collective rather than individual choice.

No, just no.

It will never be the right time for the  Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) to support the left, and there will never be the right time for the left to hold the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) to account.

That is just how the game works.

The Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) will never respect the left.  Nor will they respect a progressive agenda.

Still, with the primary defeats of faux Democrats like Eliot Engel, Lacy Clay, and Joseph Crowley, and the threat to corporate Democrat Richard Neal in Massachutts, it is entirely possible that they can come to fear their base, as the Republican Party Establishment does.

This should be the goal.

Adding to the List of They Who Must Not Be Named

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Inspired Photoshop Work

When someone passes a certain level of both inhumanity and irrelevance, they end up on my list of They Who Must Not Be Named.

Well, Ellen Degeneris has now crossed that threshold in a sufficiently egregious way that not only is she on they list, but, She also has been memed by The Onion:

Ellen: ‘I Never Intended To Make Staff Feel Unsafe By Wearing A Bloodied Ram Skull And Stalking Them With A Hatchet’

This is a level of screwing the pooch that approaches some sort of twisted dog bordello.

Stupid and an Asshole to His Staff

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PLAYBOOK PM: After we reported that @replouiegohmert was positive, we got an email from a Gohmert aide. pic.twitter.com/x31CSOdkLf

— Jake Sherman (@JakeSherman) July 29, 2020

The big news is that Louie Gohmert has tested positive for Covid-19, and the distinguished gentleman with nothing between his ears but a shock absorber is blaming the few times he wore a mask for catching the disease.

This guy is stupid. Really stupid. Really, really, really, really stupid.

That’s not what matters in Congress.

Hubert Humphrey was generally considered to be one of the smartest men, if not the smartest man, in the Senate during his tenure there, and he was also known to be hamstrung by low quality staff.

In comparison, Teddy Kennedy was known for his ability to recruit and sustain an absolutely first rate staff, and arguably got a lot more done, despite generally not being considered a particularly noteworthy intellect.*

A significant portion of Louie Gohmert’s staff HATE him.

If they didn’t, you would not see leaks like this.

If his staff views him with this level of hostility, he cannot deliver, either on the national level, or in his district.

While this does not make him vulnerable to a Democratic Party challenge in the general election, TX-1 has a PV of R+25, it does mean that an enterprising Republican could successfully challenge him in the primary.

H/t Atrios.

*My father mentioned this in his recollections of discussions with Alaska Senator Ernest Greuning now and again.

Gee, You Think

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The first Governor in the United States has caught Corona Virus.

Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt tested positive 2 weeks after he attended Donald Trump’s campaign rally, though he claims that this is completely unrelated.

Yeah, right.

Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt (R) said on Wednesday that he has tested positive for the coronavirus but feels “fine” and will be isolating.

Stitt is the first governor to announce a coronavirus infection, though other governors have self-quarantined or gotten tested after potential exposure. Stitt, who has resisted recommendations from public health officials throughout the pandemic, said he does not know where he got infected but does not believe his positive result could have stemmed from his attendance at President Trump’s campaign rally in Tulsa on June 20, where the governor was photographed without a mask.

………

Stitt drew fresh criticism as Trump’s rally in Tulsa — the president’s first since the pandemic set in — approached in June. Local health officials warned the indoor event at a 19,000-person arena could cause a dangerous spread of the virus in a county that was already seeing a spike in cases.

As the saying goes, “バカにつける薬はない”.*

*Pronounced in Japanese, “baka ni tsukeru kusuri wanai”, which means, “There is no medicine for stupidity.” Apologies for any inaccuracies in the text, I do not know Japanese.

Gee, You Think?

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The director of the Tulsa health department is saying that Donald Trump’s damp squib of a rally probably led to a surge in Covid-19 cases.

Well, color me completely not surprised:

President Donald Trump’s campaign rally in Tulsa that drew thousands of people in late June, along with large protests that accompanied it, “likely contributed” to a dramatic surge in new coronavirus cases, Tulsa City-County Health Department Director Dr. Bruce Dart said Wednesday.

 Tulsa County reported 261 confirmed new cases on Monday, a one-day record high, and another 206 cases on Tuesday.

 Although the Health Department’s policy is to not publicly identify individual settings where people may have contracted the virus, Dart said those large gatherings “more than likely” contributed to the spike.

 “In the past few days, we’ve seen almost 500 new cases, and we had several large events just over two weeks ago, so I guess we just connect the dots,” Dart said.

As the saying goes, “バカにつける薬はない”.*

*Pronounced in Japanese,”baka ni tsukeru kusuri wanai”, which means, “There is no medicine for stupidity.” Apologies for any inaccuracies in the text, I do not know Japanese.

This is Delicious

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The Ayn Rand Foundation took about $½ million dollars in federal bailout money.

A lot of people criticize this but complaining about government spending while directly benefiting from it is the only true way to honor Ayn Rand’s legacy. https://t.co/TlUxiPAUX2

— sean (@SeanMcElwee) July 6, 2020

When one considers that Ayn Rand collected Social Security and Medicare at the end of her life, this is entirely consistent.

Today in Wicked Bad Ideas

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Congress is looking to staple the National Science Foundation (NSF) to commercial interests, because it is so blazingly obvious that the problem with science in the United States is clearly that there are not profit incentives, said no one ever:

A bipartisan group of US senators and representatives has introduced legislation in Congress that would significantly change the operation of the National Science Foundation (NSF). Proponents of the bill say that the proposal aims “to solidify the United States’ leadership in scientific and technological innovation through increased investments in the discovery, creation, and commercialization of technology fields of the future”. To do so, the so-called Endless Frontier Act would expand the NSF’s remit, rename the organization and provide more than $100bn in support. The proposal has gained approval from many, but some have objected that it may undercut the NSF’s main objective, which is to fund basic scientific research.

Those behind the bill – four prominent US congresspeople – say that its introduction stems from the perception that international competitors, and particularly China, threaten to overtake the US technologically. “To win the 21st century, we need to invest in technologies of the future,” says Ro Kahana, a Democratic congressperson from California. “That means increasing public funding into those sectors of our economy that will drive innovation and create new jobs.”

Chuck Schumer, a New Yorker who leads the Democratic minority in the Senate, says that the US “cannot afford” to continue to underinvest in science while still “lead[ing] the world” in advanced research. That view is backed by Republican senator Todd Young of Indiana. “By virtue of being the first to emerge on the other side of this pandemic, the Chinese Communist Party is working hard to use the crisis to its advantage by extending influence over the global economy,” he claims. The new act, adds Republican representative Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin, who is the fourth member of the group introducing the legislation, “is a down payment for future generations of American technological leadership”.

………

Yet the proposal has drawn some criticism. Former NSF director Arden Bement told Science of his concern that the bill could indicate to Congress – which appropriates agencies’ funds – that investments in the bill’s innovative technologies override the importance of the NSF’s core mission of funding fundamental, curiosity-driven research. But Bement’s successor France Córdova, who completed her six-year term as NSF director in March, argues that current-day science involves more seamless integration between fundamental and applied research.

Gee, ya think?

One of the causes of inequality in our society are the extensive and intrusive subsidies provided by the government to private industry,  things like this initiative, and the expansion of IP provisions.

This is bad for science and bad for the economy.

Tweet of the Day

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I choose Frankenstein, the monster who is intelligent but feared only due to his appearance—who argues to his own creator that he is a living being with a right to happiness, and is driven to violence only by that man’s cruelty and drive to exterminate his life. pic.twitter.com/GFA19Fa8HM

— Matt Bors (@MattBors) July 2, 2020

This is a wonderful take-down of right-wing political cartoonist by non-hack cartoonist Matt Bors.

Oh, You Delicate Snowflake

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I am not a fan of Bill DiBlasio, he has capitulated to police, real estate developers, and that bully from the third grade, but his decision to paint, “Black Lives Matter,” on the 5th Avenue in front of the Trump Towers is something I can get behind.

Needless to say, Donald Trump is completely losing his sh%$ over this, because he is a complete whiny baby:

President Trump on Wednesday said painting “Black Lives Matter” on New York’s Fifth Avenue would be “a symbol of hate” and wind up “denigrating” the street outside Trump Tower, as he ratcheted up objections to a plan that he suggested the city’s police could stop.

Trump’s comments, in morning tweets, were his latest volley directed at New York Mayor Bill de Blasio (D), who last week ordered that the tribute to the Black Lives Matter movement be painted in large yellow letters in a move designed in part to antagonize the president. De Blasio responded to Trump’s tweets Wednesday by calling them “the definition of racism.”

I call this your feel good news of the day.

Support Your Local Police

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In yet another example of how the Boyz in Blue are covering with glory, while protests were raging, a squad of officers, including supervisors, hung out in Representative Bobby Rush’s office drinking his coffee and popping his microwave popcorn.

One took a nap on the office couch.

The others just hung out, instead of  ……… you know ……… Doing Their F%$#ing Jobs.

Then again, considering that their job right now is basically basically brutalizing people for engaging in First Amendment protected behavior.

Still, their asses should be fired:

As protests across Chicago devolved into chaos last week and residents started to loot nearby stores, police officers were making popcorn and drinking coffee while “lounging” inside Congressman Bobby Rush’s office, officials said in a stunning news conference on Thursday.


This is F%$#ed Up & Sh%$

Speaking alongside Mayor Lori Lightfoot, Rush said at least 13 Chicago Police officers were loitering inside his South Side campaign office in the early hours of June 1 and were “relaxing” while nearby stores were being looted and burned, and their fellow officers were clashing with demonstrators.

“They even had the unmitigated gall to make coffee for themselves and to pop popcorn, my popcorn, in my microwave, while looters were tearing apart businesses within their sight and within their reach,” Rush (D-IL) said.

………

The incident, which Rush and Lightfoot said was captured on CCTV, showed the officers—and at least three supervisors—with feet up on desks. One officer “was asleep on my couch” while another “was on his cellphone,” Rush said.

“They were in a mode of relaxation and did not care about what was happening. They did not care. They absolutely did not care,” Rush added.

………

Lightfoot, at times visibly angry and tearful during the Thursday press conference, said the officers “demonstrated a total disregard for their colleagues [and] for the badge” and should be held accountable. She said she and her team were “enraged” when they learned of the incident. None of the 13 officers has been identified, and she urged them to come forward before investigators find them.

They’re not going to come forward, because ……… COPS.

That being said, when they get caught, I think that the statement from the Chicago police union defending them is going to HAVE to be one for the ages.

This is a Sick Burn, If You Know Russian

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Британский парламентарий призывает громить еврейские могилы.
🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️ https://t.co/lY5ymjJDGh

— Ruslana Boshirova Альянс пианистов (@ValLisitsa) June 11, 2020

In case you are wondering, “Британский парламентарий призывает громить еврейские могилы,” translates to, “British MP calls for smashing Jewish graves.”

It’s not a statue that he wants destroyed, it’s Karl Marx’s grave stone.

D’Oh!!!!!!

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The Republican Party decided that they did not need to update their party platform from what they had in 2016, so it includes a condemnation of the current President.

Old habits die hard, I guess.

Oops:

When Republicans read the platform their party is using for the 2020 campaign, they may be surprised to see that it is full of condemnations of the sitting president.

“The survival of the internet as we know it is at risk,” the platform reads. “Its gravest peril originates in the White House, the current occupant of which has launched a campaign, both at home and internationally, to subjugate it to agents of government.”

The warning about speech online is one of more than three dozen unflattering references to either the “current president,” “current chief executive,” “current administration,” people “currently in control” of policy, or the “current occupant” of the White House that appear in the Republican platform. Adopted at the party’s 2016 convention, it has been carried over through 2024 after the executive committee of the Republican National Committee on Wednesday chose not to adopt a new platform for 2020.

The platform censures the “current” president — who in 2016 was, of course, Barack Obama — and his administration for, among other things, imposing “a social and cultural revolution,” causing a “huge increase in the national debt” and damaging relationships with international partners.

Political Correctness Run Amuck

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HBO is doing a reboot of the Warner Brothers’ Looney Toons cartoon, and they are ‘taking Elmer Fudd’s gun away.

I get that guns are a problem in today’s society, but we are talking about guns in the context of hunting, and it’s ELMER F%$#ING FUDD!!!!!

It boggles the mind what some people will do to create the APPEARANCE of doing something about a problem while not actually doing anything.

Stupid

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Trump has withdrawn from the Open Skies Treaty, which allowed a number of countries, most notably the US and Russia, conduct unarmed surveillance flights over each other’s territory.

This is a truly stupid move, but it fits with the philosophy of many within the US foreign policy establishment, particularly on the right, that any agreement that is truly reciprocal is not for the US:

President Trump has decided to withdraw from another major arms control accord, he and other officials said Thursday, and will inform Russia that the United States is pulling out of the Open Skies Treaty, negotiated three decades ago to allow nations to fly over each other’s territory with elaborate sensor equipment to assure that they are not preparing for military action.

 Mr. Trump’s decision may be viewed as more evidence that he is preparing to exit the one major arms treaty remaining with Russia: New START, which limits the United States and Russia to 1,550 deployed nuclear missiles [The reporter got this wrong, the limit is nuclear warheads, and not nuclear missiles] each. It expires in February, weeks after the next presidential inauguration, and Mr. Trump has insisted that China must join what is now a U.S.-Russia limit on nuclear arsenals.

Considering the fact that France has more deployed nukes than China, and the UK probably has more deployed nukes than China,  I would expect that this is not going to viewed with any enthusiasm by the civilian and military leadership of the People’s Republic.

Mr. Trump’s decision, rumored for some time, is bound to further aggravate European allies, including those in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, who are also signatories to the treaty.

They are likely to remain in the accord, which has nearly three dozen signatories, but have warned that with Washington’s exit, Russia will almost certainly respond by also cutting off their flights, which the allies use to monitor troop movements on their borders — especially important to the Baltic nations.

Russia can literally do nothing but complain if they see something in the US, if European nations see a troubling mobilization on their borders, they can take immediate countermeasures.

You tell me who loses more from this.

Morons.

So Not a Surprise

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The AP has come across the original recommendations from the CDC for the pandemic, the ones that the White House suppressed, and they were far more extensive than what Trump and Evil Minions™ eventually released:

Advice from the top U.S. disease control experts on how to safely reopen businesses and institutions during the coronavirus pandemic was more detailed and restrictive than the plan released by the White House last month.

The guidance, which was shelved by Trump administration officials, also offered recommendations to help communities decide when to shut facilities down again during future flareups of COVID-19.

The Associated Press obtained a 63-page document that is more detailed than other, previously reported segments of the shelved guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It shows how the thinking of the CDC infection control experts differs from those in the White House managing the pandemic response.

Hoocoodanode?

What a Whiny Baby

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In his continuing quest to maximize his convenience at the expense of the health and lives of his workers, Elon Musk has thrown a tantrum over Alameda County’s decision to maintain to its lock-down on the factory. 

He is threatening to move Tesla headquarters (maybe 50 people, big deal) and the factory (a multibillion dollar endeavor that would involve having to retrain an new workforce, and would take years, yeah right) to Texas or Nevada, because he isn’t getting what he wants precisely when he wants.

Why do people think that this wanker is a genius?

Elon Musk and local health officials in California clashed on Saturday over the timing of the reopening of Tesla’s factory in Fremont, with the company’s chief executive pushing for an immediate return and the county’s government seeking a delay of about a week.

In a series of tweets, Mr. Musk said he would move the company’s headquarters out of California to Texas or Nevada.

The tweets came a day after health officials from Alameda County told Tesla that it was not yet allowed to resume production of electric vehicles in Fremont because of fears that the coronavirus could spread among the company’s workers. Manufacturers have been allowed to restart work in other parts of the state that have had less severe outbreaks of the virus.

“Frankly, this is the final straw,” Mr. Musk said on Twitter. “Tesla will now move its HQ and future programs to Texas/Nevada immediately. If we even retain Fremont manufacturing activity at all, it will depend on how Tesla is treated in the future.”

In a separate tweet, Mr. Musk said Tesla would file a lawsuit against Alameda County.

………

Scott Haggerty, the county supervisor for the district in Alameda County where Tesla’s Fremont plant is located, said on Saturday that he had been confident that county health officials and Tesla executives were close to an agreement on reopening the plant on May 18. But, Mr. Haggerty said, that appeared to be unacceptable to Mr. Musk, who wanted to open the plant on May 8.

“We were working on a lot of policies and procedures to help operate that plant and quite frankly, I think Tesla did a pretty good job, and that’s why I had it to the point where on May 18, Tesla would have opened,” Mr. Haggerty said. “I know Elon knew that. But he wanted it this week.”

………

Things began to break down on Thursday, Mr. Haggerty said, when a Tesla executive called him and told him Mr. Musk was thinking about suing him.

………

“He could have spent time enjoying his new baby and given me and my staff a couple more days and his plant would have been open on May 18,” Mr. Haggerty said. “Am I somewhat sympathetic with Tesla? Yes I am. Am I sympathetic to the way Musk is treating people? No.”

………

Over the last few months, Mr. Musk has issued several strident calls to reopen the Fremont plant. After local officials ordered the plant closed, he tried to keep the plant open but was forced by the officials to shut it down in late March. In a conference call this past week to report Tesla’s earnings, he called the order “fascist.”

Seriously, this guy is so far along the path to being a Bond villain, it’s buggers the mind.

The Supreme Court is Determined to Normalize Corruption

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The Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision, threw out the convictions of the New Jersey Pols behind Bridgegate.

Between this, and Bob McDonnell, it’s becoming next to impossible to prosecute corruption:

In 2013, officials with ties to Chris Christie, then the governor of New Jersey, altered the traffic pattern on the George Washington Bridge in an effort to punish the mayor of nearby Fort Lee, New Jersey, for his failure to support Christie’s reelection bid. The change in the traffic pattern led to four days of gridlock on the streets surrounding the bridge before the original pattern was eventually restored. Two of the officials responsible for the change were found guilty of violating federal statutes prohibiting wire fraud and fraud from federally funded programs. But today the Supreme Court threw out those convictions. In a unanimous decision by Justice Elena Kagan, the court ruled that although the officials’ actions were an “abuse of power,” they did not violate the federal fraud laws because the “scheme here did not aim to obtain money or property.”

The defendants in the case were Bridget Kelly, Christie’s deputy chief of staff, and William Baroni, whom Christie had named as the deputy executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates the bridge. For many years, three of the 12 toll lanes on the upper deck of the bridge going from New Jersey into New York have been cordoned off with traffic cones during the morning rush hour, so that local traffic from Fort Lee can cross the bridge more easily. After Mark Sokolich, the mayor of Fort Lee, declined to endorse Christie in 2013, Baroni and Kelly – along with David Wildstein, a Port Authority staffer – decided to retaliate against Sokolich by reducing the number of lanes reserved for Fort Lee drivers to one. They made the change on the first day of school in September 2013, without notifying Sokolich in advance. To explain the change to Port Authority employees, the trio concocted a fictitious traffic study.

………

Today the Supreme Court reversed. In a 13-page opinion, Kagan emphasized that the government needed to show “not only that Baroni and Kelly engaged in deception,” but that they did so to obtain property. The Supreme Court has made clear that unless bribes or kickbacks are involved (which, Kagan noted, are not at issue in this case), federal fraud laws cannot be used as a general tool to fight public corruption; they apply only when efforts to obtain money or property are involved.

The Supreme Court has consistently narrowed the scope of corruption statutes over the past few decades, even as our government and society has become increasingly corrupt.

Welcome to the 3rd world.