Haven’t seen it but only heard good things from anyone who has.

And over to the Fedi Film Club to nominate this

Done.

Big Trouble in Little China

See this post and comment … but basically it’s a classic, and I’ve never seen it!

Lol!

Ohh JFC I’m so hype about this.

Their channel is prob what sold me on YouTube. I was legit hanging out for their vids to drop back in the day. It was sad when they shut down! This is awesome news! Thanks!

Maybe a good candidate for Fedi Film Club?

I’ve never seen it!

Cheers!

It was a crisis the moment that the Journal system was allowed to be built without any oversight from academia or the government itself.

A whole class of intelligent professionals performing a public good on public funds were tricked into doing most of the work for profitable companies who then charged these same people to read their peers’ work. They were tricked by appealing to their ego and longing for prestige.

And so now we have incessant publication/citation metrics and a tsunami of untrustworthy papers while shitty corporations rob the public funds of money that could much better spent.

Once that system was built, it was a crisis. Not just because it exists (and naturally leads to the current situation and worse). But because it was allowed to come into existence, which speaks to an intrinsic inability to self-govern on the part of the academic community.

I think that immunity for explicitly delineated powers makes sense purely from a logical point of view: the constitution says the president can do a thing, therefore a law saying they can’t do that thing is either unconstitutional, or doesn’t apply to the president.

Yea, it’s an interesting one. AFAIU, the delineated powers are basically command of the military and the power to pardon. I really don’t see how a Crime can generally be applicable to either of those. It’s not like “commanding the army” can just become a crime.

But regulating what the army can legally do … seems like a very natural thing. I don’t know if individuals of the military in the US can be responsible under ordinary law for anything. If so, then I don’t see why that would extend to the president should they order something that’s obviously a crime. If not, then that’s that. And again, there are probably natural exceptions to carve out regarding the very nature of military action that would lead to preposterous inconsistencies if they could possible be made generally criminal … where again, it seems to me that you don’t need immunity … it’s just the nature of the power that is amenable to falling within the meaning of legislative regulation.

Beyond all of that though … there’s the opening line of Article II:

The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America

WTF is “the executive power”?! I’m sure there have been attempts in the US to give it some shape … but I’d also wager it’s been left somewhat nebulous too, involving elements quite distinct from whatever powers Congress/Law can confer. Does that count as an enumerated power?

Otherwise … yea I’m with you. The “official acts” thing seems more than wonky to me … seems downright expansive. Excluding military action and whatever “fuzzy” powers may be considered intrinsic … I’d imagine most of the executive’s powers come from legislative laws. So the body conferring power can’t constrain it to “not doing something criminal”!!!

I’ve wondered since having a brief look at the decision that the SCOTUS is playing a game here … where they do not want Trump’s trials to affect the election and are hoping to clarify this decision and what “official” means at a later date after the election.

It’s reasonable to me to say you cannot sue the president for vetoing a bill, or criminally prosecute the president for commanding the military. The constitution says the president can do those things, and that the check on presidential power is congressional acts including impeachment.

Yea I dunno … why not just have no immunity? It’s not like the whole idea of the separation of powers is to ensure power is freely exercised … it’s the opposite.

If a president has to pause for a moment before doing something to ask their lawyer if it would be a crime … maybe that’s the point of having fucking legal system and constitution?

Sotomayer’s dissent provided pretty good evidence (AFAICT) that the framers would have put criminal immunity into the constitution if they thought it wise … because it was a known idea at the time that had been done by some states regarding their governors. They didn’t. Cuz that’s the whole point … “no man is above the law”.

And as for Congressional impeachment being paramount … I’m not sure that’s either necessary or even consistent with the Constitution (again, as Sotomayer’s dissent addresses).

For example … Article 1, section 3 (emphasis mine):

Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States: but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law.

In short (AFAICT) … impeachment and general legal liability are not the same thing … and the latter totally still applies.

Beyond all of that, the general law probably achieves everything that the majority’s decision was worried about (while they were conspicuously not worried about all of the other things that one should be when crowning a king). Civil immunity is a well established doctrine (government’s just too big and complex a thing for civil responsibility to make sense). And while I don’t know anything about it, there are similar-ish ideas around criminal responsibilities that just don’t make sense for the very nature of a governmental responsibility, war, I think, being a classic example. Sotomayer again speaks about these things.

Overall, once you start to squint at it, the whole decision is kinda weird. To elevate the separation of powers to the point of creating literal lawlessness seems like plain “not seeing the forest for the trees”.

The bit I wonder about, without knowing US Constitutional law/theory well at all … is whether a democratic factor has any bearing. A criminal law is created by the legislature, a democratic body. And also caries requirements for judgment by jury. So couldn’t an argument be made that the centrality of democratic power in the constitution cuts through any concerns about the separation of powers that the SCOTUS had, and enables democratically ordained law to quash concerns about whatever interference the judiciary (or legislature?) might exercise with the executive.

I know there’s the whole “it’s not a democracy, it’s a republic” thing … but the constitution dedicates so much text to establishing the mechanisms of democracy (including the means by which the constitution itself can be altered) that it seems ridiculous to conclude that democratic power is anything but central.

Science coms whinge: not a single graph! Come on!

Otherwise, my own experience … exam hall exams are awful … they’re distracting, the number of people around is distracting, they’re often either cold or warm … this result makes sense.

I’ve taken exams in smaller spaces and they definitely felt more calm.

Great review! Thanks!

Quoting from Sotomayer’s dissent (pp 29-30, paragraphing my own):

This new official-acts immunity now “lies about like a loaded weapon” for any President that wishes to place his own interests, his own political survival, or his own financial gain, above the interests of the Nation. Kore- matsu v. United States, 323 U. S. 214, 246 (1944) (Jackson, J., dissenting).

The President of the United States is the most powerful person in the country, and possibly the world.

When he uses his official powers in any way, under the majority’s reasoning, he now will be insulated from criminal prosecution.

Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to as- sassinate a political rival? Immune.

Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune.

Takes a bribe in ex- change for a pardon?

Immune. Immune, immune, immune.

They go on with an incisive critique of the majority’s reasoning:

Let the President violate the law, let him exploit the trap- pings of his office for personal gain, let him use his official power for evil ends. Because if he knew that he may one day face liability for breaking the law, he might not be as bold and fearless as we would like him to be. That is the majority’s message today.

Cheers! Huuuge amount of credit goes to sorrybookbroke and jayjader running their twitch streams every week!

Dunno. In hindsight it seems its biggest problem was following Casino.

Well yea, which would be the point. The Other parts of the country’s government using their power to impose a limitation (congress and the states).

More than crushed it!

I was going to provide a quip along the lines of “If you want to re-watch Skyfall … you might be better just looking at stills of Roger Deakins’ cinematography while listening to Adele’s Skyfall theme”.

EDIT: See this wonderful webpage: The Cinematography of Skyfall

How well would a constitutional amendment fly? (I’m not a USian)

Could a states’ rights pitch be made for enshrining some legal limitation on presidential action?

Terminator 2: Judgment Day

Just because I realised my partner has never seen it, and it’s a banger, and about AI, and has a strong female character, it seemed interesting to revisit some 30 odd years later

Yea anything big and mainstream just seems super shallow.

I’m not on top of things to compare accurately, but it was always kinda like that (and is like that here sometimes too). But whenever I’ve gone back, I’ve definitely felt like it has gotten somewhat worse. Some of that could easily be a shifting standard from spending more time on other less “mainstream” platforms though.