illinilaw08

QUOTE (JenksIsMyHero @ Feb 8, 2017 -> 10:38 AM) Deadspin had a great post yesterday where they put together clips of "the media" covering 75 of the 78. Has anyone asked his admn yet why they chose those 78? I assume the response is going to be that they didn't mean the media didn't cover the stories at all, just that they didn't stress the terrorist angle enough. I think it's pretty clear that their definition of media coverage means more than just the "media reported on the event." The administration seems to think if you don't say "radical Islamic terror attack," then you haven't adequately covered it. It's the same reason that the administration does not give attention to "white guy in Quebec shoots up mosque killing a handful of Canadian Muslims" and why "Dylan Roof shoots up black church" aren't on their list. Jenks, even some of the more conservative posters on this site have been rather up in arms about the way Trump has conducted himself over the last two weeks. From nonsense like claiming 3-5M people voted illegally (with no supporting evidence), to the fact that he hung up on the President of Australia (an ally), to the fact that he continues to falsely claim that the murder rate is the highest it has been in 45 years (which is demonstrably false), to the fact that he still hasn't removed himself from his conflicts of interest, to the fact that he places aides in press conferences to give the impression that he is receiving standing ovations, to the clownish way the administration rolled out the travel ban including, but not limited to, the complete lack of instruction to people on the ground as to how they are to handle detentions. I mean, even if you support the ban, or are ambivalent about the ban, you have to be furious about the roll out. And that's just off the top of my head. If that were Clinton or Obama's first week, the Right would have (rightly) exploded. People have every reason to be concerned with the way that Trump has conducted himself, and his vision for this country. Referring to concerns about any of the above as an "overreaction circle jerk" is ridiculous.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Feb 7, 2017 -> 06:04 PM) Well yeah. Do you expect a car dealer to tell people to go buy a bicycle? It's only a problem if the car dealer sells them a car that he can easily discern they can't afford (and even that is more on the finance guys than the dealer/salesman). Beyond that, the consumer needs to bear a burden of understanding. Which is why, as you've seen me say before, I am 100% on the idea that no one in this country should graduate high school without a course in basic finances to include not just balancing a checkbook, but understanding what mortgages, car loans, credit cards and plain vanilla investment vehicles are and how the work at a high level. It should be a basic proficiency standard, tested the same way reading, writing and arithmetic are. That's not really an apt analogy though. Financial professionals and asset managers don't hold themselves out as salesmen. They hold themselves out as professionals who will take care of and invest your money. Financial professionals are closer to lawyers in my mind. I'm a professional providing services to my clients and I have a duty of care that goes along with that - a standard that I have to be held to. I'm selling a service in that I'm billed an hourly rate and paid accordingly, but if I don't fulfill my duty, I can be sued. If you want financial planners, asset managers, and other financial professionals to be held to the same standard as a car salesman, they should probably just be called salesmen.

QUOTE (JenksIsMyHero @ Feb 7, 2017 -> 05:18 PM) Again, i'm not arguing she was a stellar choice. I just don't see the doomsday scenario. Yeah, Jenks, it seems like your argument boils down to Secretary of Education being a completely unimportant position that has no possibility of creating tangible harm or tangible good. I think a lot of people in this thread respectfully disagree with that position, and have already provided a number of examples of potential tangible harm. The point here is that it doesn't need to be a doomsday scenario with schools in flames for DeVos' educational philosophy to have a really negative impact on a lot of kids and a lot of families.

QUOTE (JenksIsMyHero @ Feb 7, 2017 -> 04:15 PM) "Our kids." No, this may impact poor kids who already go to s***ty public schools. Now they'll just go to s***ty for-profit charter schools. "Our kids" will stay in good school systems. edit: I'm not saying i'm thrilled about the choice. I just don't see it as some colossal failure either. She's going to fail like every other education secretary when trying to fix poor school systems/districts. Considering that she didn't know what IDEA was, and charter schools have historically been reluctant to take kids with disabilities, I'd say that any parent of a kid with a disability has a right to be furious about the choice.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Feb 7, 2017 -> 02:44 PM) re: DeVos, Jill Stein remains a colossal moron Yep. It's the Democrats, in service of their corporate overlords, who convinced 50 Republican Senators to vote to confirm Devos. Or is she blaming this all on Hillary Clinton? As to the Biden Rule, fair enough. I'll be curious to see Brett's response to your post.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Feb 7, 2017 -> 02:31 PM) Trump was retweeting fake stats from neo-nazis about "black crimes" at least as far back as January 2016. This really isn't anything new. That doesn't mean we shouldn't stop calling attention to it, does it?

QUOTE (whitesoxfan99 @ Feb 7, 2017 -> 02:16 PM) I think the scariest part of what is going on in this country right now is the complete disregard for actual facts. You have a guy who did nothing but make s*** up his entire campaign win the presidency and now you have a lot of his dumbass supporters believing everything he says even if it is directly contradicted by evidence. We are now a country that ignores facts and evidence and believes everything that the news says is "FAKE NEWS" (I know your post was in jest) when the actual fake news is coming from the president and his administration. Terrifying world. http://www.vox.com/2016/10/12/13255466/trump-murder-rate Relevant here. Trump continues to claim that the US murder rate is at its highest level in 45 years when that could not be farther from the truth.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Feb 7, 2017 -> 02:16 PM) I'm still confused why it's okay and good to deny a President the powers of their office for at least 25% of their elected term regardless of what Joe Biden thought about it in 1992. The argument goes that, if Joe Biden thought that in 1992, the Republicans denying that power to the President in 2016 is not unprecedented, but in fact is ordinary course. That's a silly argument, of course, for all the reasons I laid out above and does not alter the fact that the Republicans engaged in unprecedented obstructionism.

QUOTE (brett05 @ Feb 7, 2017 -> 02:00 PM) Let's correct this. No one said there was an official rule, but it is called the Biden Rule. No outrage over his statement was made by the liberals when it was said. So yes, the fact is the idea is a liberal idea and it came thru this past election cycle. You'd get smashed in even a liberal court with this silliness. Ha! It's called the Biden Rule by Conservatives who are attempting to grasping to find some historical evidence to obstructing Garland. To the extent that we were in Court, the evidence of the Biden rule would, at best, be circumstantial evidence that Biden might have tried to prevent a SCOTUS appointment in 1992 had one been available. But the weight of that evidence would be lessened because what Biden would have actually done is, at best, speculative. One more time. Biden did not prevent a SCOTUS appointment in an election year because there was no vacancy in 1992. Also, you didn't respond to the comparison of the "Biden Rule" to the ACA's origins as a Republican idea in the early 90s.

QUOTE (brett05 @ Feb 7, 2017 -> 12:56 PM) except it was former VP Joe Biden that said this is what should be done. So yeah, it was a liberal idea that has bi-partisan support. I've explained this before, but Biden never created a rule to not give a vote to a SCOTUS nominee in an election year. Nor did he ever refuse to vote on a SCOTUS nominee in an election year because there was no vacancy on the Court when he gave that speech. Furthermore, even if Biden would have pushed for no vote until after the election if there had been an opening (which is speculative at best), there is no evidence to suggest that Biden would have had sufficient support to prevent that vote from happening So yeah, it's not a liberal idea, and it clearly did not have bi-partisan support when Garland was nominated. ETA: Would you say that Obamacare is a Republican idea since the idea originated in a Conservative thinktank in the 90s and was first implemented by Romney in Massachusetts? Because there is better evidence to support that argument than there is to support the idea that Biden wanted to establish the precedent in 1992 that Congress never consider a SCOTUS nominee in an election year.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Feb 3, 2017 -> 12:20 PM) From a consumer side, there would be no good reason to take on low net worth individuals. That is a great point and one I hadn't even thought about. You are spot on that you would never generate enough in commissions to make up for their added compliance costs. From a lawyer side, I don't see why this needs to be all that complicated or expensive to enact. You are basically just changing the duty that a financial adviser has to their client from "suitability" to "fiduciary." Keep the burden on the investor to bring suit, and use FINRA's mediation procedures to try to keep litigation costs down. There would need to be additional disclosures to the client, but I don't really get why this would be any more complicated than that. Note that as I see it, the biggest issue is that the institutional advisers can operate at a greater volume, and don't necessarily need the higher commissions to make do. The smaller guys don't do that level of volume and need the higher commissions to make ends meet. But I'm not entirely sure why that couldn't be resolved through disclosures (ie, using me as an adviser comes with higher fees which replace being charged an hourly rate, and also include more personalized service or whatever), or an opt-out at a certain income level. But maybe I'm oversimplifying this...

QUOTE (Reddy @ Feb 2, 2017 -> 03:26 PM) Agreed. But they're pulling moderates to their cause. I have friends who were die-hard Hillary supporters who are now siding with Shaun King and his ilk. It ain't good. I think we might define the far left differently. Shaun King said back in June or July that he would be voting for Clinton. And Shaun King's causes are usually not that far out of line with the left side of the Democratic Party. The left wing of the party can attempt to push policy left while also voting for Democratic candidates who are up for office. I'm not sure why that would be mutually exclusive - and it certainly hasn't been mutually exclusive among those I know.

QUOTE (bmags @ Feb 2, 2017 -> 02:24 PM) Well, I think they were right in that withholding support on all didn't matter. It didn't matter if they voted in the rest while trying to "single out" the egregiously underqualified candidates to put pressure on republicans to vote against. That happened anyway. It really isn't the left alone that is mobilized, not the left we are used to marching. There were straight up middle aged parents driving to Ohare on a saturday to be heard. This isn't a NATO protest crowd. It's not a minority pulling things around in the party. It's the whole shebang. The second half of this post is a really important point. A lot of the people that participated in the women's march or protested at airports, or those who are just straight up jamming the phone lines of representatives are people who have never previously been politically active. If that portion of the Democrats stays politically active, the midterms could actually be kind of interesting.

QUOTE (Reddy @ Feb 2, 2017 -> 02:22 PM) You don't know the far left then. They didn't vote for Clinton, and they won't vote for people like Kaine if they think he's not being "tough enough". And that's why the far left continues to fail politically. If the far left wants to influence policy, they need to get involved in the Democratic Party because the Republicans will never align with their policy goals and staying home or voting Green just strengthens the Republicans.

QUOTE (brett05 @ Feb 2, 2017 -> 02:12 PM) Way to ignore all the times they passed on that idea. Are there any intellectually honest liberals? Any? I think my favorite thing about Brett as a poster is that he keeps calling SS2K a liberal.

QUOTE (bmags @ Feb 2, 2017 -> 02:03 PM) I think the tea party tactics handwringing is overrated. This groundswell isn't to pull party left in policy (though it will) as much as pull it from accommodation politics. The dems wanted to focus on a few appointees to try to spotlight them and use that focus to pull repub support. The base rightly realized that's stupid and won't work and instead was forcing the party to not have their name on any of the bad candidates, to fight against the crazy policies and fight a president they find to be dangerous. If the dems actually tried to prevent a debt limit raising and destroy the country to make Trump look bad I'd be furious. But to play nice and act like this is any other president is wrong. Republican defections need to happen and it won't happen any sooner if you give them bipartisan cover for their initiatives. Well, and that was basically my point. If the far left is mad about the way the Democrats have acted over the last 2 weeks, as Reddy stated, then they have two options - get involved with the Democrats to try to pull them left, or continue to make the road easier for Trump and the Republicans (third party, staying home). I'm not sure the second paragraph is right, however. We saw 2 Republicans defections on Devos. And there's a chance that somebody else will follow suit. Even if the Dems just succeed in knocking out Devos, they have accomplished something.

QUOTE (brett05 @ Feb 2, 2017 -> 02:00 PM) I think the public spoke and if the Democrats keep up politics as usual, they are going to be voted out in record numbers. Ummmm... what? The Republicans literally obstructed Obama for 8 years and it did not really seem to impact their viability on election day. But that's been said a bunch of times to you in this thread already. I suspect that this post will also fall upon deaf ears.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Feb 2, 2017 -> 01:59 PM) They need to get over themselves, just like the Jill Stein voters. Maybe one day there will be a different system, but for now its generally choice a or b, there is no magical c candidate behind the mystery door. This. The far left has never consistently voted D - they have voted Green or stayed home (maybe others have a different definition of the far left than I do). The far Right is one of the most consistent Republican voting blocs in primaries and mid-terms.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Feb 2, 2017 -> 01:41 PM) The left's choices are to vote D or let Trump keep his clean road to do whatever he wants. I am pretty sure this won't be an issue that stops them from voting. This. To the extent that the Left develops a "purity" test, then they need to start primarying the candidates that don't meet that test. Staying home or voting for the Green Party accomplishes absolutely nothing.* The next 2 years need to lead to a real awakening in the Democratic Party. The increased activism and engagement from the left in the last weeks has been a good start. But that needs to continue for the next two years, and it needs to ultimately lead to voting for Democrats in the midterms. * For the record, I've said this before over the last two weeks, but it's absurd that anyone is questioning Warren's cred as a progressive (even as she has been the leading champion for the CFPB and other financial protections) because she voted to confirm Carson.

http://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/...-lands-backlash Some good news today on Public Lands. This is definitely one of those rare areas where voters on the right and left of aisle can see eye to eye.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Feb 2, 2017 -> 10:08 AM) I really want to know what the justification behind denying a President his powers of appointment for at least 25% of his term is. Our "election season" started in early/mid 2015--should he have been denied those powers for as much as 50% of his term if Scalia had died back then? And how does it even make sense to withhold these powers from President Obama because two other people are running to replace him and he has no possible way of maintaining the Presidency? It was rightfully his choice, not Trump's or Clinton's. Yep. And since Trump has already taken the unconventional step of filing his 2020 candidacy with the FEC already, isn't he already in "election season?" Republicans can try to spin it anyway that they want, but they stole a seat from Obama and set a very, very dangerous precedent going forward.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Feb 2, 2017 -> 08:32 AM) I can't watch YT from here, but... what does what Biden may have said some time ago have to do with anything? Basically in June of 1992, Biden said that in the event that a SCOTUS spot opened up, any vote should be held after the election. The full context of his speech at the time was that the Clarence Thomas nomination, and the recent history of confirmation votes in the 80s, meant that by the time a justice resigned, and someone was put up for the spot, the odds of confirmation were remote at best. This was merely a speech, and no rule was ever enacted. The most important context here, of course, is that there was no opening on the Court when Biden made the speech! So whether Biden would have gone forward with preventing a justice (and whether the rest of Senate Judiciary would have followed suit) from getting a hearing is speculative at best. Further, Biden made the speech in June - four months after Scalia passed. So... yeah, Biden in 1992 really has nothing to do with the obstructionist behavior by the Republicans in keeping Garland from getting a vote.

QUOTE (Con te Giolito @ Feb 1, 2017 -> 12:46 PM) And you are hung up on this idea that I'm afraid of terror attacks and that its "risky" to let them in lest we invite more attacks onto our shores. That's not really the point and never has been. Terror attacks are just symptoms of larger issue Muslim refugees have assimilating into the native culture, but because you dont really understand what assimilation is (the fact that you think it means they have to respect our laws actually made me LOL) having this discussion with you is worthless. It'd be like asking my dog how to fix something on my car. I'm not falling for it, and my refusal to insult my own intelligence and do battle with somebody who is literally clueless on the topic is not "running away from the argument". It's like you entirely ignored SSK's post about assimilating immigrants in the US across the last 200 years - oh wait, you hand waved that away as a high school history lesson. The point is that immigrants generally take a generation to assimilate, and have throughout American history. That's because of language gaps in the first generation, close communities made up of the same ethnicity, etc. The second generation learns the language and assimilates. In a lot of cases, they still hold on to their religion and identify with cultural things from their homeland, but that's no different than the way the Irish, Italians, Germans, etc. identify with their native land multiple generations down the road. Your underlying point is the same point that has been made by Nativists and Isolationists about the "other" since this country was founded. But your argument actually goes further. In the above paragraph, you seem to be arguing that Muslim refugees are incapable of assimilating, and that their inability to assimilate leads to terror attacks (an argument that is not even a little bit backed up by any amount of data). Thus, your argument - if I'm understanding correctly - would support a blanket ban on further immigration by Muslims into the USA because none of your arguments are limited to the countries in Trump's ban. Which is a startling and really, really, un-American (at least it's antithesis to the values that this country was founded upon) argument to be making (not to mention that it's insulting to the many, many Muslims who are an important fabric of what makes America great).

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Feb 1, 2017 -> 09:15 AM) Exactly. If I'm the democrats, I make it clear - nominate Merrick Garland, and they will both confirm him AND promise no filibuster on any future nominee during Trump's 4 years. That puts things back to the way it should work, and pops the balloon on continued obstructionism. The more I think about it, the more I think this is the right result (subject to the future nominee having the resume to actually serve on the Supreme Court - Gorsuch does have that). We can't have every single SCOTUS position filibustered forever, but the Dems caving is basically letting the Rs steal the seat. The Dems can filibuster the nominee for at least the next two years, and the unbalanced bench honestly helps D policies. The Republicans created this crisis, and it needs to be fixed. Thinking out loud, but I wonder if there will be some behind the scenes negotiating - rumors that Kennedy has been talking retirement, maybe he agrees to retire on the condition that Garland takes his seat, and Gorsuch takes Scalia's seat, and then we all pray that RBG holds on for another 4 years...

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 31, 2017 -> 03:29 PM) I don't think executive orders need to go away, I think executive orders as replacement for governing need to go away. I'm glad that DACA was done in 2012, but policy is so much more tenuous when done this way. It's bad for all. No disagreement there.