As you wait for justice and charges to be brought against anyone in the Biden Administration or his family to happen...

...keep on waiting.

And after that...

And after that...

 

The sweet, delicious unfathomable tears of sadness of Nancy Pelosi on SCOTUS overruling Roe v Wade.

 

LINK

The unfathomable tears of Liberal sadness are raining down and they are glorious!

A late shout out to Justice Clarence Thomas and a belated Happy Birthday to this great American!

Let the LefTards REEEEEEEE! Music to my ears!

37 Senators that voted to let the FBI seize your internet history without a warrant. The bill failed by one vote.

Privacy News Online: These are the 37 Senators that voted to let the FBI seize your internet history without a warrant.

A key amendment to the USA Freedom Reauthorization Act of 2020 that would have required authorities to obtain a warrant before gaining access to American internet browsing and search history just failed on the Senate floor by a single vote. For those that are unaware, key parts of the Patriot Act – namely the mass surveillance section – is currently unauthorized and needs to be reauthorized by Congress to stay in effect. The current bill under consideration to do that is called the US FREEDOM Reauthorization Act of 2020 and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has snuck in an amendment that would allow the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Department of Justice (DOJ) to seize internet search and browsing history if they claim it is tied to an active investigation.
[.]
27 Republicans and 10 Democrats voted against the amendment and 4 senators were no-shows.
[.]
[The 37 senators were:]

Barrasso, John (R-WY)

Blackburn, Marsha (R-TN)

Blunt, Roy (R-MO)

Boozman, John (R-AR)

Burr, Richard (R-NC)

Capito, Shelley Moore (R-WV)

Collins, Susan M. (R-ME)

Cornyn, John (R-TX)

Cotton, Tom (R-AR)

Fischer, Deb (R-NE)

Graham, Lindsey (R-SC)

Hyde-Smith, Cindy (R-MS)

Inhofe, James M. (R-OK)

Johnson, Ron (R-WI)

Lankford, James (R-OK)

McConnell, Mitch (R-KY)

Perdue, David (R-GA)

Portman, Rob (R-OH)

Roberts, Pat (R-KS)

Romney, Mitt (R-UT)

Rubio, Marco (R-FL)

Shelby, Richard C. (R-AL)

Thune, John (R-SD)

Tillis, Thom (R-NC)

Toomey, Patrick J. (R-PA)

Wicker, Roger F. (R-MS)

Young, Todd (R-IN)

Carper, Thomas R. (D-DE)

Casey, Robert P., Jr. (D-PA)

Feinstein, Dianne (D-CA)

Hassan, Margaret Wood (D-NH)

Jones, Doug (D-AL)

Kaine, Tim (D-VA)

Manchin, Joe, III (D-WV)

Shaheen, Jeanne (D-NH)

Warner, Mark R. (D-VA)

Whitehouse, Sheldon (D-RI)

@ Bernard Kerik Twitter:

What about BERNIE SANDERS ? He was too busy to show up for work and vote on a matter of such little importance.

Daily Beast: Senate Proposal Against Warrantless Internet Spying Died by One Vote. Bernie Sat It Out Entirely.

A bipartisan proposal to protect citizens’ internet search and browsing history from warrantless government surveillance died in the Senate on Wednesday. It lost by just one vote.
[.]
Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-TN), who is quarantining from the coronavirus, Patty Murray (D-WA), Ben Sasse (R-NE) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT) did not vote, according to the roll call.

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Privacy News Archived

Bad Spaniels 1; Jack Daniels 0

One is a dog chew toy. The other is a glass bottle of liquor. If you can't tell the difference,
 you should not buy either product, or always buy both.

Tech Dirt: Jack Daniels Gets Chewed Up In Trademark Case Over 'Bad Spaniels' Doggy Chew Toy.

We've seen roughly a zillion trademark disputes and cases in the alcohol industries, but perhaps nothing quite like this. Jack Daniels, the famous liquor company, found itself in a prolonged court battle with VIP Products LLC. At issue? Well, VIP makes a doggy chew toy that is a parody of Jack Daniels' famous whiskey bottle and trade dress.

...while the toy isn't exactly similar to the Jack Daniels bottle, it's a clear homage or parody of it. Parody, of course, has space carved out for it by the First Amendment. While trademark law might lead one to see a problem here, it's the fact that even this commercial product is expressive parody that keeps it from being trademark infringement.

The Jack Daniels folks didn't agree.

So Jack sued.

Back to Tech Dirt:

...the court held that, as a threshold matter, the Rogers test needed to be applied. Under that test, a trademark infringement plaintiff must show that the defendant’s use of the mark either (1) is “not artistically relevant to the underlying work” or (2) “explicitly misleads consumers as to the source or content of the work.”  Id. at 9 (quoting Gordon, 909 F.3d at 265). The Ninth Circuit vacated the district court’s finding of infringement and remanded for a determination, in the first instance, of whether Jack Daniel’s can satisfy either element of the Rogers test.

It seems damn near impossible to imagine any scenario in which Jack Daniels manages to satisfy the Rogers test. And the real question is why it felt any of this expensive litigious adventurism was necessary in the first place.

The short story: Jack lost. Good!

Why the corporate brain trust at Jack decided to move forward with this case is nothing short of mind-boggling. Can the PR/Ad/Legal Team at JD be so unimaginative, humorless and petty?

Could it have been that hard for JD to partner, in some way, with Bad Spaniels for a co-branding promotion - maybe buy a bottle of JD and get a Bad Spaniels chew toy? This is PR and Advertising, not brain surgery.

A Toast and Cheers to Bad Spaniels! Who's a good dog? Who's a good dog?
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Tech Dirt Archived

Avenatti convicted of Nike extortion. Flashback: Ana Navarro compares Avenatti to The Holy Spirit. Avenatti, "all of my fantasies involve handcuffs."

Note Navarro's line, "He'd make a great lady around the table." I'm sure his new friends at the Manhattan Metropolitan Correctional Center feel the same.

NY Post: Michael Avenatti convicted of trying to extort up to $25M from Nike.

Disgraced lawyer Michael Avenatti was convicted on all counts Friday of attempting to shake down Nike for as much as $25 million over claims it illegally funneled payments to college basketball players.

NY Post: Stormy Daniels says jury found Michael Avenatti’s ‘true character’.

“Sadly, it appears what Michael Avenatti did to me was just the tip of an iceberg of deceit,” wrote Daniels, a former client of Avenatti who claims he stole $300,000 from her and forged her signature, on Instagram.

“I am not surprised his dishonesty has been revealed on a grand scale,” she said[.]
[.]
“His arrogant, fraudulent and overly aggressive behavior became so pervasive that the jury found his true character,” she added[.]

I read elsewhere (didn't bookmark the story), where Mikey complained he found his mattress at the MCC uncomfortable and that he's chilly at night. That. Is. So. Sad.

New, disposable vaping bars not covered by flavor bans.

I heard this vaping device referred to as a "bar" - as in candy bar...or ice cream bar, because of its short, flattish, stick-like appearance.

From "The Legal Circumvention Department" files:

Market Watch: Young people have moved on to a new kind of vape not covered by the flavor ban: disposables.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. government on Thursday began enforcing restrictions on flavored electronic cigarettes aimed at curbing underage vaping. But some teenagers may be one step ahead of the rules.

Parents, researchers and students warn that some young people have already moved on to a newer kind of vape that isn’t covered by the flavor ban.

These disposable e-cigarettes are sold under brands like Puff Bar, Stig and Fogg in flavors such as pink lemonade, blueberry ice and tropical mango.

Critics of the FDA policy fear teens will simply switch to the cheaper disposables, which are widely available at convenience stores and gas stations.

“They are very accessible and seem to be the new buzzy product,” said Dr. Karen Wilson, a tobacco researcher and pediatrician at Mount Sinai’s medical school in New York.

The FDA confirmed that the flavor restriction won’t apply to “self-contained, disposable products,” but only to rechargeable ones that use pods or cartridges prefilled with a nicotine solution.

A "buzzy product." I can't stop laughing at that.

Well, you HAVE TO BE a certain age to LEGALLY purchase tobacco and all its related products. How are those under-age obtaining these products? THAT is such a mystery. It must be like all the criminals who pass background checks on the guns they legally purchase. Because, there's no other way to obtain anything other than legally, is there?
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Market Watch Archived

Muslim Group Sues Maryland over "No Boycott of Israel" Executive Order

Arab News: Maryland’s ban on contracting with businesses that boycott Israel tramples on the First Amendment rights of a software engineer who advocates for Palestinians, a Muslim civil rights group claims.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations’ federal lawsuit seeks to block the state from enforcing an executive order that Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan signed in October 2017.

The order requires contractors to certify in writing that they don’t boycott Israel. The group’s suit claims the order has an unconstitutional chilling effect on First Amendment-protected political advocacy supporting Palestine.

CAIR says 25 other states have enacted measures similar to Maryland’s, through legislation or executive orders. CAIR attorney Gadeir Abbas said other federal lawsuits have challenged measures in Arizona, Arkansas, Kansas and Texas.
[.]
In December, the Arkansas Times weekly newspaper sued to block a similar measure. That state law, which took effect in August 2017, requires contractors to reduce their fees by 20 percent if they don’t sign a pledge not to boycott Israel.

Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge’s office argued that boycotting Israel is not activity protected by the First Amendment.

“It is neither speech, nor is it conduct that is inherently expressive, nor associational activity that is afforded constitutional protection,” wrote attorneys representing Rutledge’s office.

These suits filed by CAIR (which I refer to as standing for "Can't Antagonize Islamic Radicals") will be interesting to monitor.

I don't have a lot of knowledge of how government-private business contracting works. I do know a government institution can require certain conditions be met for certain employers, like minority and women-owned companies. And, believe it or not, I understand the essence of CAIR's lawsuit. But to claim some type of disadvantage, or discrimination by using the First Amendment to support their basis? I'm not an attorney or a judge, but this issue seems to fall under contractual law. If you dislike the terms of a contract, don't sign it. I don't see the slightest foundation for CAIR's argument based under Freedom of Speech. Governments discriminate every day against every one. CAIR needs to learn this.