Dave had this in the headlines over the weekend but it's too great not to post in prime time.

Chris Christie and This Guy in '12!

Posted by: DrewM at 07:57 AM | Comments (203)
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While everyone is focusing on the Kagan nomination, the court continues to wind down its current term. As always at the end of the court's year there are a number of highly anticipated decisions in controversial cases.

In Graham v. Florida the court ruled 5-4 that sentencing minors to life in prison without the chance of parole for non-capital crimes is a violation of the 8th Amendments prohibition on "cruel and unusual punishment".

The court ruled in the case of Terrance Graham, who was implicated in armed robberies when he was 16 and 17. Graham, now 22, is in prison in Florida, which holds more than 70 percent of juvenile defendants locked up for life for crimes other than homicide.

"The state has denied him any chance to later demonstrate that he is fit to rejoin society based solely on a nonhomicide crime that he committed while he was a child in the eyes of the law," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in his majority opinion. "This the Eighth Amendment does not permit."

You just knew Kennedy would write this opinion.

On a human level I certainly agree with him and the decision. On a legal level I'm not sure how you get that a prohibition on "cruel and unusual punishment" requires the state to allow someone to petition for parole. That's a moral/policy judgment best left to legislatures. However after Kennedy v. Louisiana, it's pretty clear that for the moment the 8th Amendment says whatever Anthony Kennedy says it means.

In another highly anticipated case, United States v. Comstock, the court ruled 7-2 (Thomas and Scalia dissented) that the federal government can institute a preventative detention regime to hold those found to be sexually dangerous past their scheduled release date.

The decision appears to turn on the meaning of our old friend 'the necessary and proper' clause.

Not surprisingly Justice Breyer, writing for the majority, argues for an ad hoc and expansive grant of federal power.

We take these five considerations together. They include: (1) the breadth of the Necessary and Proper Clause, (2) the long history of federal involvement in this arena, (3) the sound reasons for the statute’s enactment in lightof the Government’s custodial interest in safeguarding the public from dangers posed by those in federal custody, (4) the statute’s accommodation of state interests, and (5) the statute’s narrow scope. Taken together, these considera-tions lead us to conclude that the statute is a “necessary and proper” means of exercising the federal authority thatpermits Congress to create federal criminal laws, to pun-ish their violation, to imprison violators, to provide appropriately for those imprisoned, and to maintain the securityof those who are not imprisoned but who may be affected by the federal imprisonment of others. The Constitution consequently authorizes Congress to enact the statute.

Justice Thomas argues in his dissent (which Scalia joins for the most part) that the Constitution does not authorize any such laws (pdf).

more...

Posted by: DrewM at 07:23 AM | Comments (79)
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I'll bet Charlie Crist isn't giggling about this.

Charlie Crist received a bounce in the polls when he left the Republican Party to run for the U.S. Senate as an independent. New numbers suggest that the bounce for the governor is over.

A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely voters in Florida finds Republican Marco Rubio with 39% support, while Crist earns 31% of the vote and Democrat Kendrick Meek trails at 18%. Twelve percent (12%) are undecided.

Two weeks ago, just after Crist announced that he was running as an independent, he held a 38% to 34% advantage over Rubio.

The full Rasmussen post notes just how weak Crist's numbers are. Might be time to start budgeting that cash, Charlie. It doesn't look as though a whole lot more is going to come in.

Posted by: Slublog at 06:57 AM | Comments (104)
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Monday.

Posted by: DrewM at 05:47 AM | Comments (147)
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Boffins at the University of Leicester have apparently gazed into their navels and constructed a set of heavily vetted, peer reviewed, comprehensive bullshit "criteria" as to what constitutes that "elusive notion of contentment" known as happiness.

Feeling sad? Researchers at Britain's University of Leicester reckon you might just be in the wrong country. According to Adrian White, an analytic social psychologist at Leicester who developed the first "World Map of Happiness," Denmark is the happiest nation in the world.

White's research used a battery of statistical data, plus the subjective responses of 80,000 people worldwide, to map out well-being across 178 countries. Denmark and five other European countries, including Switzerland, Austria, and Iceland...

...The U.S. came in at 23...

Perhaps when socialistic societies rid themselves of misfits, malcontents, and the chronically depressed through high suicide rates, the survivors realize that means more government bling for them and their moods uptick accordingly? In a twistedgreeddrivendon'tgivearatsassabouttheotherguy kinda way it might make sense.

Oh, BTW, the US suicide rate is somewhere around 11/100K [2005] (at the height of BDS and the "worst economy since the depression" according to John Kerry).

Denmark? 10.6/100K [2006]
Switzerland? 15.1/100K [2007]
Austria? 12.7/100K [2008]
Iceland? 12.2/100K [2008]

Back in 1997, when the world economy was booming at the zenith of the tech bubble, Denmark's suicide rate was 14/100K, so maybe they have spent the past 13 years weeding out the unhappy ones?

Posted by: Purple Avenger at 10:03 PM | Comments (102)
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End of the weekend for some, just another day for others, but all are welcome at the ONT party.

America Sleepwalks Towards Economic Suicide

Courtesy of Doug Ross here's a chart from the Chicago Tribune showing America's government debt as a percentage of GDP over the last 70 years. It actually went over 100% for a few years in the mid 40's which isn't too surprising given WWII and all the war bonds issued. But it's been heading that way again since 2008.

And this isn't just a slightly interesting statistic - national debt hitting 90% of GDP seems to be a tipping point for countries that puts them into a permanent state of low growth and high unemployment. So unless we stop Obama and the Democrats' spending spree, that's our future too.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 05:43 PM | Comments (1025)
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Tyler Durden over at Zerohedge is a "gold bug", but until recently I've never found his arguments about the desirability of gold all that compelling. But with the Euro diving faster than a holed submarine and Europeans stampeding each other to buy up all the gold they can get their hands on, I may have to revise my opinions. Gold is trading at nearly $1250 an ounce and going higher.

This may mean that the Euro bailout has failed a week after it was begun. The markets took a look, raised their eyebrows, and continued shorting the Euro. No one seems to believe that it can succeed. The huge numbers of Europeans looking for gold bespeaks a deep lack of confidence in the Euro, and a belief that hard times rather than recovery lie ahead. Countries like Greece and Portugal are getting caught in a fatal spiral: they must implement draconian austerity measures to bring down public spending, but this in turn slows down the economy, which reduces the public and private coffers. These countries are bound to the Euro and so cannot devalue their own currencies; deflation -- and all the terrible social and political upheaval that follows -- is their only option. (We might speak of "growing their economies" as an alternative, but for deeply uncompetitive countries at the periphery of the Eurozone, this isn't an option either.)

Greece is casting about for someone to blame their troubles on (besides themselves, that is) and have settled on...the Americans! (Or at least US investment banks.) To me this simply means that Greece is trying desperately to open some safety valves so that their own population have some outlet for their anger besides the government. To the investment community, it's simply another sign that the Greeks either will not or cannot pay their debts.

And via Instapundit, we get this story that indicates how low the trust in the European Central Bank (ECB) has fallen in the investment community. The so-called "nuclear option" -- where the ECB directly intervenes into the bond markets of the Euro nations and backstops them -- violates a core ECB tenet of "independence". The EU bureaucrats are completely ignoring their own rules and regulations now; it's panic-time in Brussels, Paris, and Berlin.

The EU may yet slap on enough bandages and sticking-plaster to stop the bleeding for a time, but the wounds are probably mortal. Many analysts both here and in Europe seem to think that the main question now is not if the Euro will collapse, but when.

How should Americans feel about the demise of the Euro, if it comes about? It's possible that a Euro collapse could trigger a wave of sovereign defaults all across Europe, and the ripples would inevitably fetch up here. It could tip us over from a really bad recession into an all-out global depression (if indeed we are not already in one).

Posted by: Monty at 12:38 PM | Comments (565)
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The shaming of our nation to the world by our administration continues.

I swear, this apology tour is really starting to irritate the hell out of me.

From Jay's post and link:

Posner said in addition to talks on freedom of religion and expression, labor rights and rule of law, officials also discussed Chinese complaints about problems with U.S. human rights, which have included crime, poverty, homelessness and racial discrimination.

He said U.S. officials did not whitewash the American record and in fact raised on its [their?] own a new immigration law in Arizona that requires police to ask about a personÂ’s immigration status if there is suspicion the person is in the country illegally.

So now, in addition to the Democrats' smearing of SB1070, a scurrilous rant proposed for no reason other than to prop up their own power, we are now officially apologizing to the Chicoms for our backward redneck ways?

Do I have this right? To effin Red China, we're sorry we still fret about how we treat human beings?

What the hell planet did I wake up on today?

via ExJon

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 11:55 AM | Comments (202)
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Outraged, they considered mass resignation.

Instead they disobeyed orders, carried out the mission, and rescued their men. (warning: graphic photo of a soldier in a burning armored vehicle).

The SAS launched a daring mission to rescue two of its own men held hostage in Iraq against the orders of the Ministry of Defence, the Daily Mail can reveal.

The elite unit was pushed to the brink of mutiny after it was banned from saving the SAS soldiers captured by militants because to do so would embarrass the Government.

The astonishing edict drove SAS officers close to mass resignation, according to a hardhitting report by the Tory MP Adam Holloway, a former Guards officer.

The explanation for the refusal was flat-out embarrassment that their training program in southern Iraq was a mess (the captives were held by insurgents that had infiltrated the Iraqi police), and at odds with the rosy picture painted to the British government.

The LTC in charge of the operation didn't think that was a good enough reason, and pressed forward anyway.

Good for him, and his soldiers.

via TheRickWilson

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 06:35 AM | Comments (259)
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The previous post...was a tragic mistake. Let us pretend it never happened. In Obama's America, we can forget the past and look only towards our glorious future!

Here's a peace offering:

Posted by: Monty at 03:18 AM | Comments (164)
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