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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 15h

I feel we are about to get the "torture debate" redux where the law is clear - CAT and EO's - but pundits and lawyers are going to debate the shit out of this on bullshit technicalities and wild readings of law, normalising this and making the flatly illegal de facto legal.

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 15h

I'm not saying they can't get creative. But " this is what we approved" is pretty fucking explicit, it's literally black letter law, the blackest, Art1 Sec9 black ink.

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 15h

It all comes back to "Congress has expressed its will as to where the funds go" and to get around that you are stuck with doing illegal shit. You might have the dollars laying around, you can get creative, but "using monies for purposes not explicitly approved for" is kind of clear.

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 17h

It's clear that impeachment as a load bearing mechanism was a bad idea, as is the "law" that SCOTUS has created around it to expand Presidential authority to basically include any official act, regardless of criminality, as "official"

billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 17h

You point about pardoning officials carrying out clearly not just illegal but anti-constitutional actions is pretty terrifying. Not a scenario I had thought of. Up there with Seal Team Six my opponent shit.

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 18h

It's just an extension of "the bad thing he's done". As currently stands he's claimed the power of the purse, any further drastic measures is just taking it to a further extreme.

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 18h

I think there is no meaningful difference. This is a Rubicon level event. It's like arguing all the technicalities of Caesar crossing the river with troops into Italy. A line has been crossed that is as clear as black and white. It's a simple seizure of Congress's power that's forbidden in law.

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 18h

Tuchman's "A Distant Mirror" is a story of knights being randomly slaughtered in a few epic battles while also being traded around like playing cards.

billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 18h

Amitav Gosh "Smoke and Ashes" check it out, that's my current bedside book

billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 18h

This is fascinating too in the light of the $1bn crypto scandal that happened when Trump announced (again) the 100% China tariffs, and the recent UAE cash for microchips deals. It's a monstersball of naked corruption. And ah, you know, this Baron shit after all the Hunter Biden crap, sighs

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 18h

Giggling while I he says “I’ve had a few small beers” was priceless

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 19h

I keep on thinking how if this was happening in Sydney we’d probably already have violent rebellion on our hands .

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 19h

The founders were not unaware of the classic Roman and Ottoman problems
of the Ruler paying his own troops.

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 20h

Are many of these Repub justices ruling against Trump pre-FedSoc types?

billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

Is paying for your own private army bad?

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

You fool.‘it’s savvy. Just watch the pundits applaud it

billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

Did this CDC study include all Ur, Pu processing and also assembly site? Or just Los Alamos?

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

Thank you

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

If you are in Sydney your pint (or schooner) is on me.

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

How do you manage a vast military while not walling it off long term from civillian society is a pretty huge question I am not sure the US is managing well right now?

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

I'd really like to hear more from you and your homies about this. The difference in culture is so .....vast.

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

so different from the personnel and culture I met and observed (from afar) in the 80's and 90's. My uncle was USN Gunner's Mate First Class, Swiftie, Cambodia veteran, and the culture he had and the people he introduced me to as a kid seem so distant from the culture today as to be another world.

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

I find this all so fascinating. I'm Aussie in OZ. We see our service personnel as people with jobs that are important. We celebrate the diggers once a year on Anzac Day and play two up and get pissed. No thank you for your service shit here. And yet your culture is so martial now but also...

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

Asking huge question like a complete bastard in a 280 character format....was the AVF a bad idea?

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billypilgrim65.bsky.social @billypilgrim65.bsky.social · 1d

I find it still very weird. “Soldiering”
Has a distinguished multi thousand year history ( yes obviously that’s a generalisation but), especially in the terms of the US military it’s so just so completely at odds with “win hearts with Hershey Bars and Luckies”

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