Three Great Questions

There are three great questions which in life we have over and over again to answer.  Is it right or wrong?  Is it true or false?  Is it beautiful or ugly?  Our education ought to help us to answer these questions.

-- John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury, PC (1834 - 1913), English banker, politician, naturalist and archaeologist, The Use of Life (1894), ch. VI: National Education

Contrary To Law

The Founders designed our government to be a system of checks and balances.  Defendants, however, make clear that the only check they want is a blank one.  Six months after they first federalized the California National Guard, Defendants still retain control of approximately 300 Guardsmen, despite no evidence that execution of federal law is impeded in any way -- let alone significantly.  What's more, Defendants have sent California Guardsmen into other states, effectively creating a national police force made up of state troops.  In response to Plaintiffs' motion to enjoin this conduct, Defendants take the position that, after a valid initial federalization, all subsequent re-federalizations are completely, and forever, unreviewable by the courts.  Defendants' position is contrary to law.  Accordingly, the Court ENJOINS Defendants' federalization of California National Guard troops.

-- US District Judge Charles R. Breyer ruling in Gavin Newsom, et al., v Donald J. Trump, et al., that defendants must return control of the California National Guard to Governor Newsom (10 December 2025)

Nothing But Sound

Your argument is sound, nothing but sound.

-- Anonymous quip quoted in an essay in Logic, an Introduction (1950) by Lionel Ruby

Not Conversely

Men grow old because they stop playing, and not conversely.

-- Granville Stanley Hall (1844 - 1924), American psychologist and educator, in Adolescence: Its Psychology and Its Relations to Physiology, Anthropology, Sociology, Sex, Crime, Religion and Education (1904)

Note The Difference

Note the difference between a right and a privilege.  A right, in the abstract, is a fact; it is not a thing to be given, established, or conferred; it is.  Of the exercise of a right power may deprive me; of the right itself, never.  Privilege, in the abstract, does not exist; there is no such thing.  Rights recognized, privilege is destroyed.

-- Voltairine de Cleyre (1866 - 1912), American anarchist and feminist writer and orator, "The Economic Tendency of Freethought" in Liberty Vol. XI, #25 (15 February 1890)

That Result

The majority today loses sight of its proper role.  It is supposed to review the District Court's fact-finding only for clear error.  But under that deferential standard, the District Court's "plausible" (actually, quite careful) fact-finding must survive.  The majority can reach the result it does -- overturning the District Court's finding of racial line-drawing, even if to achieve partisan goals -- only by arrogating to itself that court's rightful function.  We know better, the majority declares today.  I cannot think of a reason why.

And this Court's eagerness to playact a district court here has serious consequence.  The majority calls its "evaluation" of this case "preliminary."  The results, though, will be anything but.  This Court's stay guarantees that Texas's new map, with all its enhanced partisan advantage, will govern next year's elections for the House of Representatives.  And this Court's stay ensures that many Texas citizens, for no good reason, will be placed in electoral districts because of their race.  And that result, as this Court has pronounced year in and year out, is a violation of the Constitution.

-- Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan, with whom Justice Sonia Sotomayor and Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson join, dissenting from the grant of the application for stay in Greg Abbott, et al. v League Of United Latin American Citizens, et al. (4 December 2025)

At Least For A While

I maintain that AI CAN be a very useful tool for someone who is experienced and knows what they are doing.  However, this idea that it can replace people OR drastically reduce the learning curve for inexperienced people seems perilous to me.  Someone who doesn't really know what they are doing yet would not be able to select the best options from the AI, but a lot of the folks in charge don't see it that way.  They think AI is magic and is going to replace all sorts of people.  It probably will, at least for a while. 

-- Susan Tiss via Facebook, 16 August 2024