“Sometimes a potentially seismic shift in the law is masked by opaque and technical legalese. So it was last week, when a federal court of appeals in Washington struggled to decide whether a nongovernmental organization that seeks to improve democratic elections was sufficiently injured—making it eligible for so-called standing to sue—to have its day in court to enforce a never-used provision of the Constitution. The 435 seats in the House of Representatives are apportioned among the states according to their population as determined by the decennial census. If the NGO is successful, some of those apportioned seats could be taken away from states that prevent citizens from exercising their right to vote. But though this possibility has been outlined in the Constitution for 156 years, most everything about this case, which attempts to actually utilize it, is uncertain.” (04/18/24)
Source: Cato Institute
bvy Ryan Bourne & Sophia Bagley
“Over the past year, the Biden administration has furthered its efforts to curb ‘junk fees.’ As we’ve noted, the definition of junk fees is a somewhat moveable feast and could more aptly be described as any fee the administration thinks customers might dislike or find annoying. Nonetheless, regulations against them continue pouring down from government agencies. Some states have followed suit, introducing legislation to ban ‘junk fees,’ with California passing a bill in October 2023. Among those fees that Biden isn’t keen on are telecom companies’ early termination fees, as well as overdraft fees and credit card late payment fees in financial services. … It may come as a surprise then that governments themselves employ similar fees and charges in their own operations.” (04/18/24)
“In Francis Ford Coppola’s 1979 classic Apocalypse Now, a US patrol boat heads upriver during the Vietnam War to assassinate Colonel Kurtz, a rogue commander whose followers worship him as a god. In writer-director Alex Garland’s new film Civil War, four journalists take a road trip from New York to Washington DC to interview a rogue president before the collapse of his illegitimate regime. The White House is no less the heart of darkness than Kurtz’s lawless outpost in the Cambodian jungle. Civil War is Garland’s third collaboration with A24, an indie production and distribution outfit primarily known for producing ‘elevated horror’ and small, popular award-winners. With its $50 million budget, Civil War is the company’s first swing at a blockbuster. It arrives three years after the January 6 insurrection as America prepares for what promises to be another bitterly contested presidential election.” (04/18/24)
“In our digitally chaotic world, relying on the reporting strategies of the past is like bringing the rules of chess to the Thunderdome. There has, of course, been some progress. The major cable networks no longer carry Trump’s rallies live without context, but they still broadcast town-hall meetings and interviews with the former president, which boost ratings. NBC’s abortive decision to hire Ronna McDaniel, a former chair of the Republican National Committee, as a contributor, despite her role in spreading lies about the 2020 election, highlighted the disconnect between this moment and much of the national media. And then there is the internet. It is certainly possible that richer, more insightful media will emerge from the digital revolution, but we’re obviously not there now.” (04/17/24)
“How to sue supermarkets for shutting down: One. Move to San Francisco. Two. Support a proposed ordinance ‘amending the Police Code to require large supermarkets to provide six months notice to their customers and the City before permanently closing, and to explore ways to allow for the continued sale of groceries at the location.’ Three. If the ordinance passes, wait for a large supermarket to go out of business without having known six months in advance that it would need to do so. Four. Sue.” (04/17/24)
“As the Covid vaccines failed spectacularly to stop the spread of infections and did nothing to lessen all-cause mortality or even decrease population level Covid-associated deaths in highly vaccinated countries, Pfizer saw another opportunity. Sure, their signature product failed to perform as expected. So why not create another one as an antidote? Enter Paxlovid. Paxlovid, an antiviral drug, was supposed to help individuals with symptomatic Covid, who’d already been infected, recover more quickly and lessen the risk of severe illness. Sounds great right? … A newly released study on Paxlovid on randomized adults with symptomatic Covid; one subset was given Paxlovid (nirmatrelvir-ritonavir) or a placebo every 12 hours for five days, with the intent of determining how effective it was at ‘sustained alleviation’ of Covid-19 symptoms. Spoiler alert: it wasn’t effective at all.” (04/17/24)
“The president published another strange op-ed tying the wars in Ukraine and Gaza together. His immediate goal was to urge Congress to pass a bill funding more military aid for Ukraine and Israel, but to do that he insists on linking the two wars together as if they are comparable and equally worthy of support. This is the same line he has been pushing for months ever since he decided to try to use Congressional support for Israel to get more funding for Ukraine last year. It was a strained and unpersuasive argument six months ago, and now it is just insulting.” (04/18/24)
“I am not ordinarily a celebrant for the state of the economy, but the media have been so over the top in pushing the economic doom story during the Biden presidency, that I feel the need to put some reality into the picture. One of the central lines among the doomsayers is that we are spending a larger share of income on housing and that for many it has become altogether unaffordable. I will agree that housing is a serious problem. … but a big part of that story is that we are spending a much smaller share on other things. … In 1947 we spent 23.0 percent of our income on store-bought food. This had fallen to just 7.1 percent last year. The share of income going to buy clothes fell from 10.3 percent to 2.6 percent. The share for buying household furnishings dropped from 5.5 percent to 2.5 percent.” (04/17/24)
“Iran’s chosen response to the fatal strike on its embassy seems not to have been about retaliation nor escalation. If it had been, they would have fired more missiles than drones, and they would not have announced the drones as soon as they were launched nor declared the operation ‘concluded’ before they arrived. They would not have shared in advance the details and timing of the operation with Saudi Arabia, other Gulf countries, and Turkey, a member of NATO, who then, predictably, shared it with the United States. The chosen response was about re-establishing deterrence.” (04/17/24)
