Balkinization: Donald Trump's Constitution

Comments:

Our Constitution Mr. Khan was using as a prop at the DNC nowhere guarantees any right to foreigners living overseas, including a heretofore unknown right to emigrate to the United States.

Mr. Khan's general complaint against Mr. Trump is also unfounded. Mr. Trump's proposal to temporarily suspend Muslim immigration from nations "compromised by terrorism" would not have barred entry to the Khan family from the UAE, but would have barred entry of the AQI terrorist who killed Cpt. Khan in Iraq.

# posted by

Bart DePalma : 1:35 PM

I'm pretty sure that Trump hasn't actuallly defined what "compromised by terrorism" actually means. At the moment it appears to mean "are you Muslim".

# posted by

Bartbuster : 1:56 PM

He's endured many helicopter delays flying from New York to Atlantic City

I blame Chris Christie: better traffic flow, fewer billionaires overcrowding Donald's air space.

# posted by

Mark Field : 2:22 PM

He's never come under sniper fire, you have to give Hillary that much at least.

Oh, wait, you don't, she lied about that.

# posted by

Brett : 2:49 PM

Can't defend him. Change the subject. Typical spin.

HC repeatedly discussed the incident in question one way, then remembered it another way. It's a typical human way our mind works. But, no, in her case she "lied."

# posted by

Joe : 5:39 PM

It's not changing the subject, this is an election. God help us, one of the two of them is going to be President, which means everything that's brought up about either of them has to be evaluated on a "relative to the other one of them" basis!

You can't just attack one of the candidates, and rule out any comparison to the other! No matter how much you'd like to avoid having to actually compare Hillary to Trump, instead of just focus on attacking Trump.

# posted by

Brett : 6:36 PM

OK, let's compare Hillary to Donald (or Clinton to Trump; we ought to use either first names for both or last names for both). Although I'm not aware of it, it is possible that Hillary, like Donald, said that "laziness is a trait in blacks," mocked a disabled person, called the sexual harassment allegations against Roger Ailes "totally unfounded," said that a U.S.-born judge couldn't be impartial because of his Mexican heritage, called Mexican immigrants "rapists," and advocated shutting down mosques and banning Muslims from entering the U.S. But I find it hard to believe that she bragged about the size of her penis on television.

# posted by

Henry : 7:19 PM

I suppose it's also possible that Donald laundered money through cattle futures, aided his wife in covering up her rapes, broke federal laws concerning the handling of classified information and the preservation of public documents...

Not particularly taking this seriously, are you?

# posted by

Brett : 7:58 PM

I don't see how Gary Johnson can lose this election.

# posted by

mls : 11:15 PM

"I suppose it's also possible that Donald laundered money through cattle futures, aided his wife in covering up her rapes, broke federal laws concerning the handling of classified information and the preservation of public documents..."

One problem may be that none of this has been proven (in fact, most recently a lifelong GOP operative dismissed charges of breaking those laws), while the quotes Henry cites are public record.

# posted by

Mista Whiskas : 8:21 AM

Gerald, did you forget that Donald Trump's Constitution isn't abridged, it's expanded. There's an Article XII in there according to him, for example.

# posted by

Mista Whiskas : 8:23 AM

Some responses from conservatives and libertarians on if Trump is worth it for judicial picks:

http://reason.com/blog/2016/08/01/is-scotus-a-good-reason-to-support-trump

[Note, e.g., Mr. Gura, who was involved in Heller and McDonald.]

Is not "proven" really an issue if it feels right and "everybody knows" it?

# posted by

Joe : 10:31 AM

On Gerard N. Magliocca's other blog, Concurring Opinions, there is an interesting series of posts on the Second Amendment.

# posted by

Joe : 10:46 AM

That was rather disappointing. I rarely find feminist analysis of such issues illuminating, and she starts out with a huge mistake, characterizing the Zimmerman trial as a Stand Your Ground case, which it was not.

# posted by

Brett : 12:56 PM

Brett, I read that blog piece. Here's what she says about the case:

"As is well known, Zimmerman shot and killed unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin in February 2102. Police used their discretion not to arrest Zimmerman at the scene because he claimed he had acted in self-defense. A jury ultimately acquitted him of second degree murder based on instructions that included SYG language."

What in there is incorrect?

# posted by

Mista Whiskas : 2:53 PM

I question if it's wrong & even if it was how relevant is to the broader arguments made.

# posted by

Joe : 3:38 PM

What it is, is misleading. The SYG language was boilerplate, having no actual application to this particular case. There was plenty of other inapplicable boilerplate that didn't get mentioned, so why that inapplicable bit?

Why, to mislead people into thinking it was a SYG case, of course. Not a promising beginning.

# posted by

Brett : 5:19 PM

It's to a degree up the jury what in the instructions they rely on as applying, and didn't at least one juror say the SYG instruction was relied on?

# posted by

Mista Whiskas : 7:07 PM

It wasn't even the "beginning" of the fourth entry in the series.

More here, including yes, to the "at least one juror."

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/07/how-stand-your-ground-relates-to-george-zimmerman/277829/

One reference to "sought refuge under SYG" should have been left out probably but it wasn't "irrelevant" all the same, so the correction overstates the problem.

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/07/stand-your-ground-george-zimmerman-trayvon-martin

Provides more, which shows the law could have fit into the overall theme without opening itself to "gotcha!" that damns the forest for a tree.

# posted by

Joe : 7:44 PM

It was the first even vaguely substantial entry.

SYG was legally irrelevant. I'm not surprised there was some discussion of it anyway, there was a major media campaign going on trying to make the case about SYG.

In fact, the case was part of rthat campaign, it was brought as part of a media campaign to attack Stand Your Ground laws. It certainly wasn't brought for legal reasons, the usual prosecutor didn't think prosecution was warranted, the grand jury examining the case got dissolved before they could no-bill it. It was a political prosecution.

# posted by

Brett : 8:03 PM

Brett,

Unlike some political and popular accounts of the case I thought she was more careful to narrowly describe how SYG was involved. It's literally true that the police used their discretion not to arrest and that SYG may have played a role there, it's literally true the jury acquitted using instructions which included SYG. I don't think I would have dismissed the article at that point considering.

# posted by

Mista Whiskas : 8:50 AM

It's literally true the jury acquitted using instructions which included lots of aspects which didn't apply to the case.

Look, you've got a case where a guy is severely beaten, has a gun that has fired one shot. A dead body with no injuries except scuffed up knuckles and a bullet wound. That's not a stand your ground case. That's a shot somebody after they beat the cr8p out of you case. Nowhere in the US, stand your ground or not, are you required to let somebody beat you to death without defending yourself.

Of course the police didn't arrest him. It was a clear cut case of self defense.

But, I will admit I am predisposed to not be impressed by feminist analysis of random subjects. That she didn't even notice that the same prosecutor who tried to railroad Zimmerman was the one who worked to deny Alexander’s right to a SYG instruction, underscoring that it's a (Female!) prosecutor who doesn't respect SYG for males or females, didn't help.

# posted by

Brett : 9:09 AM

Brett,

The case is a bit more complicated than that, but I'd say that the author's overall point about whether SYG aren't particularly helpful for dealing with what she sees as the main threat to women's physical safety doesn't rest on the example.

# posted by

Mista Whiskas : 9:21 AM

The "gotcha" -- which is not something only people in support of gun rights do -- in which some minor point (in one article of four) which isn't even as strong as suggested is used to flag how weak the overall discussion is ... unfortunate device.

# posted by

Joe : 9:31 AM