Category Archives: ethics

A California Judge Has Spoken

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Recall California Proposition 22, which exempted Uber Technologies Inc, Lyft Inc, and DoorDash Inc from a California state gig law that, in essence, requires businesses to reclassify their gig associates from independent contractors to employees. That proposition was passed overwhelmingly by the citizens of California.

A California state judge ruled last Friday that the proposition was unconstitutional and so unenforceable. His rationale:

Superior Court Judge Frank Roesch said in Friday’s ruling that Proposition 22 limits the state legislature’s authority and its ability to pass future legislation, which is unconstitutional.

The judge has ruled that the people are not allowed to limit the authority of their employee, of their government. Keep in mind that, although Roesch couched his ruling in terms of the State’s legislative branch, his own judiciary branch is a part of that government whose authority he’s protecting.

The California government (including Roesch, et al., mind you) is not subordinate to the citizens of California?

Here’s the preamble to the California State constitution, which according to Roesch has no meaning.

We, the People of the State of California, grateful to Almighty God for our freedom, in order to secure and perpetuate its blessings, do establish this Constitution.

It used to be the People of California’s constitution, not the State judiciary’s.

Here’s Art II, Sect 1:

All political power is inherent in the people. Government is instituted for their protection, security, and benefit, and they have the right to alter or reform it when the public good may require.

Here’s Art II, Sect 10(a):

An initiative statute or referendum approved by a majority of votes thereon takes effect the day after the election unless the measure provides otherwise. If a referendum petition is filed against a part of a statute the remainder shall not be delayed from going into effect.

Unless a member of the State’s government, here a judge, demurs. Then the people’s decision is set aside. Because the People are no longer sovereign in California.

Hmm….

Some SIV Questions

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A Just the News piece centered on plans to temporarily house 10,000 Afghan refugees at Ft. Bliss (assuming President Joe Biden (D) will deign move to help them escape in the first place) also had some information on how what requirements Afghanis must satisfy in order to be eligible for the Special Immigrant Visas that would allow them to enter the US.

  • worked with US military or through the Chief of Mission authority as translators or interpreters in Iraq or Afghanistan
  • provide a picture ID
  • proof of a US military background check
  • letter of recommendation
  • filing fee of $435
  • go through in-person interview at a US embassy or consulate

In the chaos of the collapse of Biden’s effort in Afghanistan—a chaos he’s said in plain terms that he knew would occur—and the parallel (!) collapse of Afghanistan, how will these Afghanis satisfy any of those criteria?

Where will they get the picture ID that having one of on their person puts them at immediate risk of butchery by Taliban thugs?

In what way will they prove the existence of a background check—especially in the face of the precipitous nature of Biden’s “retrograde?”

Where will they get those USD435—AFN37,500 and rising (as of 19 Aug) in the face of the Biden Retrograde?

At what US embassy or consulate will a prospective Afghani undergo his in-person interview?

What is Biden doing to reduce the already existing backlog of 10s of thousands of SIV applications already in his State Department’s pipeline?

What is Biden doing to streamline this cumbersome—even were all the pieces easily accessible—process?

It’s certainly critical that Afghan refugees be successfully sorted out from terrorists masquerading themselves as Afghan refugees before anyone is allowed into our nation, but it’s also clear that neither Biden nor anyone else in his Executive Branch (particularly his State and Defense Departments) are prepared to deal with this situation, or even are serious about catching up with their Afghan refugee crisis, much less their Afghanistan nation crisis.

Missed the Point

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President Joe Biden (D) took a break, Monday, from his vacation (which he decided to go on during his Afghanistan failure) to come to the White House and deliver a 20-minute talk about why he’d taken us out of Afghanistan so precipitously. Then he returned to his vacation.

Just the News thinks he messed up with his speech.

Forced to confront bipartisan anger over the bungled US exit from Afghanistan, President Joe Biden instead gave a speech on why drawing down US troops after two decades [of] war was in the American interest.
In so doing, he missed the point.

It’s true enough, as JtN goes on to say, that most Americans wanted us out of Afghanistan, and it’s true enough, as JtN adds, that what we didn’t want was the utter failure of Biden’s withdrawal execution.

But JtN missed the point of Biden’s little talk.

Biden didn’t interrupt his vacation to justify his withdrawal or his method of withdrawal. On the contrary, Biden disrupted his vacation to make a Saul Alinsky-esque effort to change the subject from his bungled withdrawal to the subject of it being everyone else’s fault we still were there, and it being the Afghans’ fault their government didn’t perform up to snuff.

That Biden botched even that simple task is just a measure of the man’s own, continuingd, failure to perform up to snuff.

America Last Again

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In the collapse of the US presence in Afghanistan and the collapse of the Afghan “army” and so of that pseudo-nation, there is a wholly justified effort to help Afghan refugees escape from the coming destruction and slaughter.

However.

This is what our President Biden/Harris and their Defense Secretary, Lloyd Austin are doing about that:

[Department of Defense Press Secretary Admiral (Ret) John] Kirby says American citizens will not be given priority evacuation over Afghan SIV [Special Immigrant Visa] applicants.

In Biden/Harris’ and Austin’s own words, recited by Kirby:

We’re going to focus on getting people out of the country, then sorting it out at the next stop. It’s not going to be just Americans first, then SIV applicants. We’re going to focus on getting as many folks out as we can.

It’s not going to be just Americans first.

Wow.

Not even in this administration’s present failure are these folks putting Americans anywhere but the back of the metaphorical bus.

Oblivious

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President Joe Biden’s (D) Secretary of State Antony Blinken, just a few days ago in the depths of the Afghan collapse:

We’ve known all along: the Taliban are at their strongest since 2001.

Yet Biden chose to withdraw, completely and relatively suddenly, it turns out, at the height of the Afghan fighting season. When he, Blinken says, knew the Taliban were at their strongest. He chose not to wait until winter. He chose not to carry out former President Donald Trump’s withdrawal plan, even as he claimed he was trapped by it, both in his Saturday “statement” and Monday afternoon when he finally showed up for work—briefly; he hustled off the stage rather than take questions—to make his excuses for his everyone else’s failure in Afghanistan.

That speech came after he and Vice President Kamala Harris (D) both were absent from duty until after Kabul had fallen, together with our embassy; the Kabul airport was blocked from incoming/outgoing flights; and he’d surrendered Bagram Air Base north of the fallen capital.

This is a level of dereliction of duty that is amoral and seriously dangerous to our national security, to our nation itself.