The word “liberal” has a big history. As a political word, it has a definite beginning. Thanks to digitization, scholarship has proven beyond all question that “liberal” took on a political meaning for the first time in the 1770s. Adam Smith and friends christened their politics “liberal.” Liberalism 1.0 was Smithian liberalism.
Does the Fifth Amendment’s protection against self-incrimination mean that police cannot unlock your smartphone? It might be concerning to know that the answer to that question is in a legal gray area. However, with a recent ruling in the Utah Supreme Court, it is an issue that is presumably one step closer to finding its way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Earlier this year, the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) issued a proposed rulemaking on New Source Performance Standards for greenhouse gas (GHG) Emissions from New and Reconstructed Electric Utility Generating Units (EGUs). It is colloquially known as the “Power Plant Rule.”
Chris Mortenson, a San Diego developer, hired an architect to find out what type of SRO (single-room-occupancy) building he could develop for very low-income people, many of them homeless, if unnecessary state and local regulations were ignored. SROs are basically apartment buildings that typically have rooms without kitchens and shared bathrooms at the end of hallways. SRO units are no-frills, but they are safer and cleaner than the streets.
“I got a lot of problems with you people, and now you’re going to hear about it!” That statement announces the traditional opening of the “airing of grievances” part of the Festivus season. In the U.S. Congress, Senator Rand Paul has adopted the spirit of the Festivus holiday as an opportunity to highlight wasteful government spending.
How much does it cost Americans to be subjected to almost 1.1 million federal regulations? Writing in Ten Thousand Commandments, Clyde Wayne Crews Jr. estimates that the cost of all those regulations is more than $1.939 trillion a year. This figure represents the combined cost of complying with all those regulations and their economic losses.
The U.S. Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) is the publication where virtually every rule issued by the U.S. government’s bureaucrats is published. QuantGov says it contains over 100 million words and “would take the average person over three years to read.”
In 2020, 23-year-old Jorge Molina was arrested in Avondale, Arizona, and charged with murder. Molina knew he was innocent, but during what he would later characterize as a “nightmare” scenario, police insisted they had their suspect during his interrogation. According to the police, Molina’s phone was “without a doubt” at the crime scene. Unbeknownst to Molina at the time, detectives arrested him based on Google location data obtained through a geofence warrant and because surveillance footage showed a white Honda registered to Jorge near the crime. Molina was eventually released after six days when his alibi was confirmed, but his arrest had lasting repercussions. Molina lost his retail job and had to drop out of school. Without an income, his car, which was impounded due to the investigation, was repossessed. Jorge’s estranged stepfather, who seemingly took Jorge’s car without permission, was eventually arrested in connection with the murder.
On the morning of December 13, the city of Alexandria, Virginia, together with MSE (the company owned by Ted Leonsis that owns the Washington Wizards, NBA, and Washington Capitals, NHL), the Commonwealth of Virginia, and the developer and land owner JBG Smith, held a press conference to announce that the Wizards and the Capitals will be moving from DC to Alexandria. Here we go again.
Sandra Day O’Connor, a Reagan appointee, was the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court. She died on December 1, 2023, and multiple tributes have followed online and in print. One appearing yesterday on the SCOTUS Blog caught my attention. Entitled “Justice Sandra Day O’Connor protected us from the extremes,” Marci A. Hamilton, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and former O’Connor clerk, argues that America needs more judges like her old boss. However, Hamilton’s praise and candor are a microcosm of what is wrong with American law.
