Source: https://reason.com/2019/02/20/trump-administration-loses-yet-another-s
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 23:57:12+00:00

Document:
In a case brought by the City of Philadelphia, the court struck down a Justice Department policy conditioning federal law enforcement grants on assisting federal immigration enforcement policy.
Because of the press of other exciting legal news, the case has attracted relatively little attention. But, on Friday, the Trump administration suffered another in a long line of courtroom defeats in its war against sanctuary cities. In City of Philadephia v. Attorney General, the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit struck down a Justice Department policy imposing three conditions on states and localities that receive federal Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance grants for law enforcement agencies. The conditions are intended to force "sanctuary cities" to assist the federal government's efforts to deport undocumented immigrants.
1. Prove compliance with 8 USC Section 1373, a federal law that bars cities or states from restricting communications by their employees with the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) about the immigration or citizenship status of individuals targeted by these federal agencies.
The City attacked the government's ability to impose the Challenged Conditions on several statutory and constitutional fronts. But we need only reach the threshold statutory question. Where, as here, the Executive Branch claims authority not granted to it in the Constitution, it "literally has no power to act … unless and until Congress confers power upon it." La. Pub. Serv. Comm'n v. FCC, 476 U.S. 355, 374 (1986). Therefore, our inquiry is straightforward: did Congress empower the Attorney General to impose the Challenged Conditions?….
Concluding that Congress did not grant the Attorney Gen-eral this authority, we hold that the Challenged Conditions were unlawfully imposed. Therefore, we will affirm the Dis-trict Court's order to the extent that it enjoins enforcement of the Challenged Conditions against the City of Philadelphia.
The decision largely mirrors a long line of other federal court rulings striking down the Trump administration's Byrne grant conditions on much the same basis. It upholds a very thorough decision in the same case by US District Judge Michael Baylson, which I analyzed here.
Unlike Judge Baylson, and a number of other decisions in recent sanctuary cities cases, the Third Circuit ruling did not address the question of whether Section 1373 is independently unconstitutional, because it violates the Tenth Amendment ban on federal "commandeering" of state and local governments. The Third Circuit panel concluded they need not reach this issue, because they ruled that compliance with Section 1373 cannot be required as a condition of receiving Byrne Grant funds, even if 1373 does not violate the anti-commandeering rule. Those federal courts that have addressed the issue have all ruled against Section 1373, at least since the Supreme Court's May 2018 ruling in Murphy v. NCAA undercut the standard defense of it. I explained how Murphy undermines Section 1373 and otherwise helps sanctuary cities here, here, and here.
While the Byrne Grant program is not all that significant in and of itself, the sanctuary cases have important broader implications for federalism and separation of powers. If Trump prevails, the executive would have the power to circumvent congressional control over federal funds and use grant conditions to pressure state and local on a wide range of issues. Conservatives who may support the current administration's attacks on sanctuary cities are unlikely to be happy if a future Democratic administration use the same type of leverage to force red state and local governments to adopt liberal policies on issues such as education, gun control, health care, and transgender bathroom access.
So far, however, the courts have held firm against this particular executive power grab. Notably, both Democratic and Republican-appointed judges have almost uniformly ruled against the administration in the sanctuary cases. The Third Circuit ruling continues that trend. While Judge Rendell and one of the the other two members of the panel are Democratic Bill Clinton appointees, the third member - Judge Anthony Scirica - is a Republican appointed by Ronald Reagan.
The Byrne Grant cases are just one of three lines of sanctuary cases currently being litigated in the federal courts. All raise important federalism questions that have broader implications going beyond the specific area of immigration policy. I provided an overview of all three here. In this July 2018 post, I assessed the initial district court decision in the Trump administration's lawsuit against California's "sanctuary state" policies.
What do you expect from the liberal 9th Circuit? What do you expect from democrat-appointed judges?
Oh, wait (as the OP pointed out) . . . .
The 3rd US Circuit Court of Appeals is full of Democrats and RINOs.
Libertarians are already aware of fact that most judges don’t follow the Constitution AND should be impeached immediately.
Judge Scirica is 78 or 79.
After law school and one year as a Fulbright scholar, he was in private practice for 14 years. However, he was also in the public sector for 13 of those 14 years. Since 1980, he has been exclusively engaged in the public sector.
The legal community should condemn any lawyer with such a pedigree. It is unseemly and wholly incompatible with the principles of a free society. A judge should serve as a judge for a short period of time and only after making, producing, and serving in the private, non-crony sector.
In what way did the court not follow the constitution?
You will find out when the SCOTUS swats this retarded decision down like the other pro-open border lawsuits decisions.
Hard to have a comeback to analysis by vehement hubris!
Why don’t you tell me the grounds you think SCOTUS will swat this decision down on?
Like the Travel ban cases, what happens in the lower circuits will not necessarily be a guide to what the Supreme court will do.
Some of the sanctuary city policies will be struck down in the end, some will be upheld. The bottom line is that, commandeering aside, states aren’t, as Arizona was told, allowed to have their own foreign policies.
Or naturalization laws. Which sanctuary state laws are starting to verge on.
Foreign policies? Naturalization laws? This is deranged.
Report to us when Philadelphia starts handing out US citizenship, or when they start negotiating treaties with foreign governments.
Well, they’re already deciding immigration law. And some sanctuary jurisdictions are starting to grant the vote to illegal aliens, and not being very concerned if they end up voting in federal elections.
Ok, serious answer: Yes, they actually are responsible for ensuring the integrity of the federal elections.
No, they’re not strictly speaking prohibited from letting illegal aliens vote in state elections. But voting IS generally viewed as one of the rights associated with citizenship, so what we’re seeing here is creep in the direction of treating illegals as though they were citizens.
It’s not so loosey-goosey For state elections, it depends on the state’s constitution. For example, in Massachusetts, you needn’t be a citizen, simply a resident.
The Constitution gives Congress the authority to oversea state election process for federal office.
There’s a federal statute that makes it a crime for non-citizens to vote in elections for federal positions. IDK to what extent, if any, that states must enforce that.
No. They are not deciding immigration law. They are deciding what their own resources may be used for.
And if that interferes with the police state tactics of ICE, so much the better.
If it was a police state the mayor and councilmembers of Philly would be in a prison camp.
Low bar you’ve set there, Bob.
So how is it a power grab for the executive branch to make policy on immigration, but not for the states to do so?
It is a power grab for the executive to start imposing conditions on grants that were not specified by Congress when it set up the grants.
The only reason that response occurred in the first place is because states forced the executive’s hand by violating federal immigration policy.
Which is why we have a Congress that is supposed to pass laws to effectuate federal policies. The Executive is not the federal govt., it is one of three branches of it.
I understand that as a matter of principle, but I was under the impression that the conditions the AG asked of Philadelphia were already federal law, like not forbidding municipal employees from communication with DHS/ICE. If DHS and ICE were already mandated by law to communicate with municipalities about citizenship data, how are they not mandated to enforce it as well? IANAL but something feels off about the court’s logic. “they ruled that compliance with Section 1373 cannot be required as a condition of receiving Byrne Grant funds” is the part that bothers me. How can they be required to follow the law but can violate it and still receive grants? Why do we even have laws if people cannot be punished for violating them?
When this subject first came up on this site a couple of years ago, they pointed out how only grants could be withheld if Congress said so, and only how they said, and it had to be clear so the locality had a clear choice.
They then went on to say there was just one small law where this was done, and it didn’t amount to much. Is this law that law?
How exactly is it a power grab when the Attorney General is just requiring compliance with a federal law? More pointedly, the law gives the AG (Or AAG) the power to ensure that grantees comply with federal law. There may be other procedural improprieties, but as a matter of statutory interpretation, this mess strongly merits reversal.
The federal government can go after municipalities for violating the law, but they can’t add conditions to other things without following due process (in this case, congressional authorization).
If you’re violating the zoning on your property, the city or state government can take action against you. But the governor can’t just say “I’m holding onto your tax refund unless you comply.” He’d need legislation that says he can do that.
The courts aren’t saying that grants can’t require compliance with immigration law. They’re saying unless they SAY that the feds can’t retroactively add them.
While admittedly not being completely familiar with all the procedural background, I don’t think this is purely matter of retroactively imposing conditions. The court is plainly saying the AG lacks any statutory authority to set these conditions at all, retroactively or otherwise. If there is language in this case limiting this to only the retroactive application of these conditions on previously awarded grants, please point it out.
I don’t know what you mean by “language in this case” but it seems pretty clear that if the statute doesn’t let the AG set these conditions then he in fact lacks statutory authority to do so.
Apparently, a little hard for you to understand but my point was that the court erred in construing the statute as prohibiting the AG from setting these conditions. If you failed to grasp that, then discussing the retroactive application of these conditions (which was brought up by another comment) will really just confuse you.
y point was that the court erred in construing the statute as prohibiting the AG from setting these conditions.
The AG can’t set conditions, retroactively or prospectively, unless they are specified in the statute or he is expressly authorized to do so.
Is any of that in the statute? Where?
Hmm. How about this. 34 U.S.C. ? 10102(a)(6) gives authority to the AAAG to place special conditions on all grants and to determine priority purposes for formula grants. Under ? 10153(a)(5)(D), grantees in the Byrne JAG program may be required to comply with all applicable federal laws. And, 8 U.S.C. ? 1373 independently requires states or local government entities to comply with federal law regardless of federal grant funding.
Mistakenly re-posted but worth saying twice I guess.
The main point is that state and local jurisdictions want federal money but do not want some of those strings attached for taking the money.
Since the federal government cannot force state governments to enforce federal law, the constitutional manner is to offer money in exchange for enforcement.
While all federal money is not the same nor comes with the same strings attached, state governments will likely get away with some of it. The SCOTUS might make a compromise that states don’t get the money and they don’t have to enforce federal immigration laws.
Even a common streetwalker has more morals.
Of course state and local jurisdictions want that, but it is completely beside the point. The main point is that only Congress has the constitutional authority to attach those strings to the spending of money from the federal treasury. The only real question is if Congress has given the President the authority to condition the awarding of these grants.
Well, not sure if that’s the only legal question, but I think the statutes I noted above pretty clearly provide sufficient authority to condition funding. It is unfortunate that the administration has to endure such a persistent, stubborn, and unreasonable judiciary.
I’m glad that a persistent and stubborn judiciary exists to make sure the executive branch adheres to the law. “Unreasonable” is probably just a product of your disagreeing with a particular decision. You may be right that the Trump administration has the authority in this case, we shall see.
I should have said “stubbornly unreasonable.” And yes, I do strong disagree with a court that ignores the plain statutory text to arrive at the result it wants. Have I misrepresented the import of the statutes cited?
Some “sanctuary” laws will be overturned — such as (I’m certain) the one criminalizing the actions of private citizens who voluntarily allow Federal authorities into non-public areas of their businesses (I’m looking at you, California).
So . . . which one of the slack-jawed right-wing incels commenting here is Christopher Paul Hasson?
I doubt he’s a commenter here, but I have no doubt some of the commenters are fans of his.
Once again, the issues of separation of powers and federalism are being conflated.
The Third Circuit quite properly limited itself to the statutory question of whether Congress put conditions on money it expended, and if not, whether the President can add conditions. It is a perfectly proper (and indeed conservative) response that the answers to these questions are No and No.
It is quite another thing, however, to assert that Congress could not impose these conditions on federal expenditures. That, IMO, would be a radical reading of the Constitution. Nothing in federalism requires Congress to give money to any State, nor is there any limit on conditions it may impose on receiving those funds (apart from invidious discrimination and such). States are free to not cooperate with the federal govt in enforcing immigration laws, for example, but that makes it more expensive for the feds to enforce those laws. It is certainly rational to withhold funds for States that make that election.
The interesting question, to my mind, is what happens when Congress sets conditions for passing out grants, but allocates too little money to pass them out to everybody qualified by those criteria; Must the executive diminish the payout proportionately, or allocate them by lottery? I think in that circumstance it isn’t unreasonable for the executive to chose among the qualified applicants by it’s own additional criteria, so long as those don’t contradict anything Congress enacted.
I think in that circumstance it isn’t unreasonable for the executive to chose among the qualified applicants by it’s own additional criteria, so long as those don’t contradict anything Congress enacted.
Of course it’s unreasonable. Whether it would be legal, I don’t know.
I’d say that in those circumstances the obligation is to give the money out in such a way as the executive reasonably thinks will do the most to accomplish the objective.
This is hardly unusual, after all. There are not unlimited government funds for say, cancer research, and there are surely more good grant applications than can be funded. So try to figure out the best ones.
Brett, that sounds suspiciously like the reasoning the Obama Administration used for DACA.
I think you’re right, but just counting heads, there are at least 5 votes on SCOTUS for an anti-commandeering argument so long as the conditioned funds make up a large (>10% or >28.9%) portion of the state’s budget, per Sebelius. I think that’s nuts, because it encourages states to become dependent on federal money, but the votes were Roberts, Kagan, Breyer, Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, and Alito. That’s 5 existing votes.
So, two staunch liberals, two staunch conservatives, and a crossover. It’s nice to know it’s bipartisan, I guess.
Have I got that right? …it’s all so very confusing.
Or… instead of separation, should I have said, federalism?
Actually, supremacy clause, where the problem is the Court has applied the Supremacy clause to executive branch policy, rather than the Constitution and duly enacted laws.
The Arizona case was one where what Arizona was doing was perfectly consistent with federal law, but ran afoul of executive branch policy of not enforcing that law.
This is semantic game playing – making a policy exception to the Supremacy Clause would render the supremacy clause a nullity, since most federal laws are enforced via policy documents, and have been for the entire modern era.
It isn’t a policy “exception”; The supremacy clause clearly makes federal LAW supreme. Policy and law are two different things, and in the Arizona case, they conflicted.
In a rational world it would have been Arizona citing the supremacy clause, not the feds.
But that’s not actually at issue either, because nobody has contended that this spending condition is “coercive.” There’s no argument that it is.
Instead, the courts have been striving to conclude that the spending condition doesn’t even exist in the legislation, and that it was just made up by the Trump administration.
The “coercive” argument is an anti-commandeering argument. See Part IV from Sebelius and dissent relating to same. And Philadelphia did assert that argument, in this case, but the 3COA didn’t reach it because they ruled for the City on other grounds.
Several courts have reached the commandeering question and decided that it was coercive. See here and here. The 9COA similarly ducked the 10A question because they agreed on the separation of powers argument.
Wrong. Anti-commandeering does not apply to spending conditions. It applies to other attempts to commandeer states and localities.
There are things that Congress can require a state to do as a condition on receipt of funds, which it could not require states to do as a naked directive. The standard is much, much lower, as SCOTUS has held that spending conditions are very much in the nature of a contractual agreement with terms being agreed to in exchange for funds. Such an agreement merely needs to be not “coercive,” a completely different test than anti-commandeering.
Several courts have decided that Sec 1373 by itself violates anti-commandeering. That would have seemed like a stretch until, the Murphy decision in 2018. Now under Murphy that seems quite right I think.
But no court has ruled that the substance of Sec 1373 applied as a spending condition would be “coercive” and therefore unconstitutional. There’s no argument there, it’s miles and miles away from being coercive under voluminous current federal practice and precedent such as South Dakota v Dole. It’s just not even close.
I could go on but the holding is in the opinion. I don’t agree with the Court, but in Sebelius they said anti-commandeering can include spending provisions where the money is sufficiently important to the states. Seven Justices joined in that part of the decision.
Your reference to Dole is noted. Please review the Sebelius case and control F for “Dole”. Or just read page 50, here.
Thank you for proving my point. “Commandeer” as you cited, refers to the commandeering, meaning taking direct control of a State’s legislative or administrative apparatus. It applies literally to federal legislative commands.
Spending Clause legislation, on the other hand, is permitted to come with conditions on State recipients of funds. But there has to be a legitimate choice, no compulsion, no undue influence . . . i.e., not coercive.
Put simply, Congress may tax and spend. This grant gives the Federal Government considerable influence even in areas where it cannot directly regulate. . . in exercising its spending power, Congress may offer funds to the States, and may condition those offers on compliance with specified conditions. See, e.g., College Savings Bank v. Florida Prepaid Postsecondary Ed. Expense Bd . . . These offers may well induce the States to adopt policies that the Federal Government itself could not impose. See, e.g., South Dakota v. Dole, 483 U. S. 203, 205?206 (1987) (conditioning federal highway funds on States raising their drinking age to 21).
Do you now understand the difference between commandeering and coercive spending conditions? One is not a category within the other.
As you quoted, the constitutional structure recognizing the sovereignty of the States “has led this Court to strike down federal legislation that commandeers a State’s legislative or administrative apparatus for federal purposes . . . It has also [i.e. in different cases] led us to scrutinize Spending Clause legislation . . . ” So, these are two separate tests that apply to completely different circumstances, and in mentioning commandeering the Court was merely giving another example, for background, of how federal power over the States is limited.
So what would this imply for the 2011 Dear Colleague Letter?
Or the Rethink School Discipline policy?
Yet one more virtue signalling, anti-American set of city politicians. As a Vietnam veteran, I am disgusted with the open borders crowd, who seem to be clueless to the idea that we are a great nation because we *are* a nation, not a destination.
And as a Vietnam veteran, I am amazed at the lack of historical understanding about the way this national has been populated by immigrants and their motivation for coming here..
Complete lie. Immigration was a big thing between 1880 and 1924, but prior to that, most of America’s population was descended from the colonists. And nearly all immigrants save some Chinese immigrants were white.
….colonists and their slaves and the hispanics that were in territories that we conquered.
Sure, but you know my feelings on that.
Point is that America has never been, and never will be, a white ethno-state. What’s done is done, we live with the consequences.
You have your right to your opinion, but standing on your vet status to try and give your political views more weight is pretty weak.
You mean, like, Vietnam or Cambodia?
The left loves to claim that sanctuary cities aren’t about brown immigrants stealing jobs that have traditionally gone to white Americans, but look what just happened in Chicago.
You mean the two black guys who were hired to stage the assault on the “Empire” guy, thereby taking the job from needy white guys?
And the white guys were doing it for free.
Now, of course, jerks will try to get him removed from his TV show, as if this hoax had anything to do with that.
The court got it wrong, I think.
Even the Obama administration agreed, near the end of his term, that Sec 1373 was an applicable federal law, and the Congress itself conditioned these grant funds on compliance with Sec 1373.
But of course, then comes Trump.
Judge Rendell performs quite a contortionist act in pages 25-30 of the opinion, complete with creative applications of canons, in order to conclude that Sec 1373 is not an “applicable federal law” . . . even though it is literally a federal law that applies to the municipalities who are grant recipients. Not one of the points made in this section of the opinion is compelling.
Boilerplate all other applicable federal laws isn’t a sufficient nexus, if you’re going to take any kind of limitation on conditional funding seriously.
Which, if you think such limitations should die off, fine – but somehow I don’t think the right will like where that takes the balance of power between the federal and state governments.
Sufficient nexus? You’re just making things up now.
The requirement that Congress explicitly condition funds includes a requirement that said condition be related to the funds’ specified use. I can dig into previous threads to find the exact post discussing this aspect if your understanding is different.
It’s true that the condition must be related to a federal interest in the grant program. And that is the case here, this being a law enforcement grant.
“Applicable federal laws” is a routinely used phrase in funding legislation, requiring compliance with everything from federal civil rights laws to labor laws. The phrase is used in legislation for grants under the authority of the Federal Railroad Administration, the Federal Aviation Administration, DHHS, National Endowment for the Humanities, etc. etc.
That scope would swallow the entire requirement, and you know it – what federal effort isn’t about law enforcement? This is a completely separate effort and subject. See Int’l Development v. Alliance for Open Society Int’l, Inc., finding anti-prostitution efforts were not germaine to an anti-HIV program for a sense of how the scope question actually operates.
Precisely – it’s boilerplate and giving it the ability to create a nexus would effectively destroy both the nexus and the explicitness requirements. Which is why it’s not being discussed up by lower courts.
Failing to find state force behind government action wouldn’t be what I expected from you!
You can see a law enforcement nexus in immigration law, financial enforcement, defense spending, food and drug inspections and certifications, our space launch enterprise. All have their IG’s and inspector/auditors.
Anywhere there’s a requirement, there’s law enforcement!
Nothing that you are saying is relevant at all, or makes any sense. Try reading the opinion. No court has said that this condition, if imposed by Congress, would be unconstitutional by reason of not being sufficiently related to the grant program, or by any other reason. It’s just a pure statutory interpretation issue of whether Congress imposed the condition, or not. They’re coming up with creative reasons why the statute must mean something other than its plain meaning.
You do the statutory analysis before the constitutional analysis, ML, so I don’t know what you think you’re proving.
As I stated very clearly in my first post, I disagree with the court’s statutory analysis on this particular issue. You responded by bringing up some things that sounded only vaguely like the relevant constitutional analysis.
Hey Somin, how many semi-retarded mestizos is America obligated to let in? 100 million? 500 million?
As many illegals as it takes to destroy the United States of America.
Ilya Somin is a Russian, you see, and was too young to remember how bad Communism was in the USSR when his family came to the USA- legally.
Nothing like non-American born people attempting to undermine the system that embraced them via legal immigration.
Legal or illegal isn’t the issue. These people are mostly a problem in either case.
I tend to agree with you that even legal immigration needs a massive slowdown until a generation assimilates.
I would settle for every illegal we can find be deported and make it known that Americans decide what immigration laws America will have.
Where you’re mistaken, is that Americans *are* deciding what immigration laws America will have. They are part of this tribe called Democrats and establishment Republicans, and they voted in politicians who gave us the status quo we currently suffer under.
Maybe don’t take the guy talking about ‘semi-retarded mestizos’ seriously, loveconstitution1789.
Maybe don’t take the guy criticizing people for being “non-American born” too seriously either, Sarcastro.
Hah – I try for baby steps.
Do you deny that mestizos have a genetically low IQ relative to whites and East Asians?
No way there will ever pass through Congress an immigration policy that gives IQ tests to potential immigrants, because there is a lot of individual level variation in those country by country averages. You either do let people in (or not) by country, or give a proxy IQ test like you let in those that have a college degree, like in the immigration 1924 law (back when college degrees were rare). Israel has a genetic test immigrants which tests for Jewishness, which works as a IQ test, but that won’t work in polyglot America.
Average IQ in Nigeria –70.
Percentage of Indian-Americans with graduate degrees: 44%.
Sometimes puzzles have lots of pieces.
That’s because the burden of getting here from Nigeria and India are great, and we get their best and brightest. We get genetically defective garbage from Latin America.
We get a lot more that than the best and brightest, with chain migration, but good point.
Of course not, because Democrats rely on low IQ non-whites for votes.
Your understanding of “genetically defective” is somewhat skewed. We are actually getting the “fittest” of Nicaraguans and such, because they are the ones physically capable of making the journey, and who are more than capable and willing (as in they are doing so) of propagating their genetic material at the expense of those who they are displacing. Is it successful, in the evolutionary sense, yes.
Only because we’re willing to support them.
Nicaraguans who move to the United States are coming here to work. They’re accepting jobs that Americans want to hire them to do. We really do get the best Nicaraguans. If our immigration policy is unfair to anyone, it’s Nicaragua.
I suppose they’re “fit” if you consider guilting mentally superior people into paying for your sh*t.
Evolution doesn’t care about your morality.
So by that standard, Africans are more fit than Europeans by virtue of the fact that they’ve managed to convince whites that their failure everywhere they exist in the world is due to white racism, and not their own inferior genetics.
Damn that black craftiness gene! It was a good run, but I guess they win and us whiteys will have to vacate as the lesser genetic specimens.
Maybe if our brunch-making and folk music skills are sufficient, our black overlords will let us stay as nonvoting chattel.
Yes, you are correct ARWP. Western culture is spread at a meta-evolutionary level, and it carries with it the seeds of its own destruction.
There are three things going on. First, by meta-evolutionary level, culture inculcates beliefs in those born into it such that selection for fitness for pro-creation is as much determined by cultural standards as biology. They get baked in because reproductive selection is as powerful a mechanism as evolutionary fitness. For example, women want to mate w/men high in the hierarchy from their biology, and if a culture praises that, it further reinforces such selection by propagating genes based on those traits.
Second, W. civ since the Greeks, and especially since the Enlightenment, questions itself. This has been a source of renewal. However, Western Civ was always grounded in a belief in objective moral truths, especially since Christianity. With increased secularization, , the backing of these objective moral truths has faded away. There is a belief in among many in the West thatall cultures are equal. If you don’t believe you have any moral standing because all cultures are equal in value, and that your culture is racist, then there is a corresponding lack of desire to defend it.
So, for point 3; Therefore, when a culture begins to select increasingly on those who question their own fitness to continue as a culture AND the culture itself has no objective truths it can fall back on AND it is a culture that relentless questions assumption (which was formerly a point of strength) Western Civ carries within it the seeds of its own possible destruction.
Is that really the right metaphor? More like “perfectly normal political effort against sanctuary cities”..
Like a past his freshnesd date Dr. Whoopy teaching Chumley about the principles of the steam engine.
All that’s missing is the 3D BB.
Nowhere else but here folks, and it’s free!

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