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If true, there can be no peace with Hamas and their allies in Gaza. Hamas has announced that seven more hostages have been killed in the retaking of Jewish land.
Israel must give Hamas 24 hours to release all hostages. Civilians and Soldiers. After 24 hours call in the families of those prisoners and tell them that Gaza will be destroyed. Leave no building standing.
Then issue a warning to the West Bank and Hezbollah that they are next.
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Just in case you missed it. Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Trump’s $355 million fine.
SusanShelley
Let me tell you about the time Ruth Bader Ginsburg saved Donald Trump $355 million plus interest. It was Feb. 20, 2019, and Justice Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the court in the case of Timbs v. Indiana.
In that case, police in Indiana had seized Tyson Timbs’ Land Rover SUV, which he bought for $42,000 with money he received from a life insurance policy when his dad died. The state sought civil forfeiture of the vehicle because Timbs had pleaded guilty to drug dealing and conspiracy to commit theft. However, the fine for the crime was only $10,000 and the vehicle was worth four times that. Taking the vehicle was an excessive fine, the judge ruled, and excessive fines are prohibited by the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Court of Appeals agreed.
But then the Indiana Supreme Court reversed the ruling on the grounds that the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on excessive fines applies only to the federal government, and it does not bind the states.
Yes it does, the U.S. Supreme Court said unanimously. Justices Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas wrote separate concurring opinions stating that they would have arrived at the decision through different reasoning. But the conclusion was the same.
“There can be no serious doubt that the Fourteenth Amendment requires the States to respect the freedom from excessive fines enshrined in the Eighth Amendment,” wrote Gorsuch.
“The Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on excessive fines applies in full to the States,” wrote Thomas.
“The Excessive Fines Clause traces its venerable lineage back to at least 1215,” wrote Ginsburg, “Magna Carta required that economic sanctions ‘be proportioned to the wrong’ and ‘not be so large as to deprive [an offender] of his livelihood.’”
Timbs v. Indiana was a landmark decision. It was the first time the Supreme Court had held that the Eighth Amendment’s excessive fines clause applied to the states. Just nine years earlier, in McDonald v. Chicago, the Supreme Court had acknowledged in a footnote, “We never have decided whether … the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of excessive fines applies to the States,” pointing to the 1989 case of Browning-Ferris Industries of Vt., Inc. v. Kelco Disposal, Inc., in which the court declined to decide the issue.
McDonald v. Chicago was itself a landmark decision. In that case, the Supreme Court said for the first time that the Second Amendment applies to the states as well as to the federal government.
“When ratified in 1791, the Bill of Rights applied only to the Federal Government,” Justice Ginsburg wrote.
How that eventually changed is a little-known part of U.S. history that is about to protect former President Trump from the state of New York.
The Fourteenth Amendment was added to the Constitution after the Civil War, in 1868. It read, in part, “No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
However, this did not immediately make the Bill of Rights applicable to the states. That change began more than 50 years later, in 1925. In the case of Gitlow v. New York, the Supreme Court floated the idea that freedom of speech and of the press are assumed to be “among the fundamental personal rights and ‘liberties’ protected by the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment from impairment by the states.”
Gradually over the next century, the court would pick and choose provisions of the Bill of Rights, declare them to be “fundamental” or “deeply rooted” in our history, tradition and “scheme of ordered liberty,” and make them binding on the states. (The history of this process can be read in Justice Samuel Alito’s opinion for the court in McDonald v. Chicago.)
The Eighth Amendment reads, “Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.”
The “cruel and unusual punishments” clause was declared applicable to the states in 1962, in Robinson v. California. The “excessive bail” provision has applied to the states since the 1971 case of Schilb v. Kuebel. And the “excessive fines” prohibition has been binding on the states since the 2019 Timbs case.
New York Judge Arthur F. Engoron fined the former president and 2024 frontrunner an astronomical $355 million plus $100 million (and counting) in interest. Engoron also prohibited the Trump Organization from taking loans from financial institutions that do business in New York for three years, and he banned Trump personally from working as a director or officer of any corporation or entity in New York for the same period. Engoron even refused Trump’s request for a 30-day extension of the due date to pay the fine, which New York requires before he can appeal the judgment.
This was a civil fraud trial, without a jury, in which the judge found Trump guilty of giving his assets a too-high valuation to get good loan terms, even though the bank adjusted those values downward before approving a loan that was paid back fully and on time, with interest.
“For good reason, the protection against excessive fines has been a constant shield throughout Anglo-American history: Exorbitant tolls undermine other constitutional liberties,” wrote Ginsburg. “Excessive fines can be used, for example, to retaliate against or chill the speech of political enemies.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James campaigned on a promise to sue Donald Trump, calling him an “illegitimate president.” She said she’ll ask the court to seize Trump’s buildings if he can’t come up with hundreds of millions of dollars in cash in time to pay the fine.
We’ll see. It may be easier to go up against Trump than to argue with Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Former U.S. President Donald Trump, with lawyers Christopher Kise and Alina Habba, attends the closing arguments in the Trump Organization civil fraud trial at New York State Supreme Court in the Manhattan borough of New York, Thursday, Jan. 11, 2024. (Shannon Stapleton/Pool Photo via AP)
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First Trump now a meatpacker. Who’s next on the AG’S List? Not happy with phony charges against a former President, James is now going after our food supply.
“The lawsuit filed in a New York state court in Manhattan seeks a $5,000 civil fine per violation of state business laws, and to recoup ill-gotten gains from false sustainability claims.” – Reuters reported.
“Families [are] willing to spend more of their hard-earned money on products from brands that are better for the environment,” James said in a statement. “JBS USA’s greenwashing exploits the pocketbooks of everyday Americans and the promise of a healthy planet for future generations.”
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Wind Turbines not the answer in coal country. Or anywhere else. In 2022, the country’s first major climate policy, known as the Inflation Reduction Act, passed with the promise to speed up that transition, offering at least $4 billion to boost development of renewable projects like the Pinnacle Wind Farm in Keyser.
Keyser got the jobs, all six of them. Nuff said.
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Trumps going to Texas, Joe asks if he can go to. Last week Donald Trump announced that he was going to Texas. Not to be left out, Joey asked his handlers if he could go to. They said yes, but not anywhere near the hot zones. Not Eagle Pass, but Joe’s going to Brownsville.
Monday almost 5,000 undocumented crossed the border in Texas. Brownsville recorded 12. The Texas governor should send about a hundred busloads to Brownsville so they can maybe pick up their ballots for the 2024 election.
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Biden defeats Pro Hamas Candidate in Michigan. Uncomitted. Yesterday in Michigan part of Bidens base went for the uncomitted candidate. Mostly Hamas supporters who were upset that Biden didn’t come out 100% in support of Hamas in the war with Israel.
In Dearborn, Michigan The Hamas candidate actually defeated Biden by 1,000 votes. So the Hamas supporters either Support Trump (not happening) stay home, or hold their nose and vote for Biden.
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NY State Legislature rejects new state maps. They wish to return to Gerrymandering. The Democrat controlled good old boys network are up to their same dirty tricks. They lost four seats last election. So, they want them back and more. Let’s review.
The people voted for a bipartisan Independent Election Comission to draw up the state maps. Well the Democrats rejected it and drew up maps if used would only leave two Republican House seats. The Court thre that out and had an Independent Court Master draw up the maps. The maps reflected the state and Republicans won four Seats.
Now the Legislature rejected those maps and the new maps drawn up. The New maps took away two Republican districts and made them more Democrat. Republicans said OK and acccepted them.
Democrats said no we want to draw up our own maps so more Republican districts would turn blue. Stay tuned.
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Throw out the NY Bail. Eighth Amendment Protects President Trump. The Supreme Court in 2019 ruled 9-0 that the eight amendment protects Americans from exsessive fines. Ginsburg wrote the decesion in overturning the Indiana Supreme court.
The court held unanimously that the excessive fines clause of the Constitution’s Eighth Amendment applies to the states. The ruling is potentially a major win for property owners and individual citizens facing excessive fines, fees, and forfeitures—to say nothing of Tyson Timbs, the man who fought the seizure of his SUV all the way to the Supreme Court.
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Winning for now. California school district’s critical race theory ban, transgender notification policy stand for now, judge rules. In the last election three new board members joined the Temecula school board.
Board members Joseph Komrosky, Danny Gonzalez and Jen Wiersma, elected in 2022 as what was then a Christian conservative majority on the five-member board, voted in for the ban. Board members Allison Barclay and Steven Schwartz, who have often opposed initiatives of the board majority, voted no.
Here’s what I find interesting, and we will see if this will stand. California Attorney General Rob Bonta sued Chino Valley, and a judge last September granted Bonta’s request for a temporary restraining order to block that district from enforcing its policy. In the Temecula case, in which the district’s policy is based on Chino Valley’s, Keen made the opposite ruling.
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Liz Truss. One of my new world Heroes. The former British Prime minister lasted a very short time. Biden and Europe’s deep state did her in. She had great plans to turn their economy around.
Below is the lefts attack on Liz. Some say she should have stayed and fight the good old boy network. When your own party joins in on the attack, you have little chance to succeed.
Liz now is starting a new Conservative movement in the UK. She spoke at CPAC and had some chilling things to say about Biden and the left. Time will tell if she succeeds.
Liz is just one example. Others are succedong where she failed. All over Europe the right is surging ahead. Everywhere you look, the left is losing – in Italy, Spain, Sweden, Finland, Poland, Hungary and now, following an election victory for the New Democracy, Greece.
The women of the new right are more concerned with protecting borders, jobs and families. They may differ about how much free trade and state intervention there should be. But they are united by their patriotism and refusal to be cowed by green ‘net zero’ agendas. They also oppose those who reject the reality of biological sex. As women, they are less easily accused of bigotry when they reject trans ideology. When they propose to abolish income tax for couples who have three or more children – as Meloni has done – they can’t be accused of male chauvinism.
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