Beneficient Power Outside Of Government?

A shocker from Frank Bruni of the NY Times:

The Sunny Side of Greed

In the dire prophecies of science-fiction writers and the fevered warnings of left-wing activists, big corporations will soon rule the earth — or already do.

Fine with me.

They’ve been great on the issue of the Confederate flag. Almost immediately after the fatal shooting of nine black churchgoers in Charleston, S.C., several prominent corporate leaders, including the heads of Walmart and Sears, took steps to retire the banner as a public symbol of the South; others made impassioned calls for that.

And when Nikki Haley, the South Carolina governor, said that the Confederate flag at the State House should come down, she did so knowing that Boeing and BMW, two of the state’s major employers, had her back. In fact the state’s chamber of commerce had urged her and other politicians to see the light.

Eli Lilly, American Airlines, Intel and other corporations were crucial to the defeat or amendment of proposed “religious freedom” laws in Indiana, Arkansas and Arizona over the last year and a half. Their leaders weighed in against the measures, which licensed anti-gay discrimination, and put a special kind of pressure on politicians, who had to worry about losing investment and jobs if companies with operations in their states didn’t like what the government was doing.

And if it were up to corporations, we’d have the immigration reform we sorely need. Early last year, the United States Chamber of Commerce publicized a letter that urged Congress to act on “modernizing our immigration system.” It was signed by 246 enterprises large and small, including Apple, AT&T, Caterpillar, Facebook, Goldman Sachs, Google, McDonald’s, Marriott and Microsoft.

Are these companies acting in their own interests? Absolutely. They’re trying to make sure that laws and local customs don’t prevent them from attracting and retaining the best work force. They’re burnishing their brands in a manner that they hope will endear them to customers.

Not all good things come from government? This is breakthrough stuff. Someday he may discover that, just for example, the drugs discovered by Big Pharma save lives, including gay ones.

OK, then maybe one day he will discover the 'regulatory capture hypothesis' and learn that Big Business often co-opts Big Government. It is a matter of suspense as to whether he will conclude that the solution is Bigger Government.

Comments

[jimmyk on iPhone]

"OK, then maybe one day he will discover the 'regulatory capture hypothesis' and learn that Big Business often co-opts Big Government. "

Or that government power, and the ever present threat to use it against businesses, will result in their doing the government's bidding.

[Thomas Collins]

My Political Science 1 professor, the great Edward Beiser, explained this as the ox gore theory, which goes as follows: For most people, their general position on an issue depends on whose ox is being gored. There are precious few who articulate positions based on a defensible overall principle.

[narciso]

of course they will be back to the 'two minute hate' soon enough, the commenters are oblivious to a corporation which is at sufferance of a mexican oligarch, there's so much 'mind arson' there aren't even ashes at the crime scene,

[Dave (in MA)]

https://goo.gl/ujvgpx

Another discovery by Big Pharma that will hopefully come to the attention of my coworkers some day.

[Cispigmented Heteronormative Microagressive Ignatz]

--Not all good things come from government? This is breakthrough stuff. Someday he may discover that, just for example, the drugs discovered by Big Pharma save lives, including gay ones.--

That's really the takeaway from Bruni showering praise on a bunch of corporate cronies marching to the beat of Uncle Sugar and the leftist social mafia? Really?

Someone needs to go back and read Sultan Knish's last post on leftists and their greed for power.

[narciso]

looking for the nuts in the field, amids the squirrel

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-06-30/tallying-right-wing-terror-vs-jihad

[narciso]

because they allowed themselves,

http://mosaicmagazine.com/observation/2015/07/how-israel-got-taken/

[henry]

Something tells me he wouldn't like big business controlling the rules for union elections.

[Old Lurker]

Cross posted because it is fun:

My fantasy dream of the Art V Convention is that it starts out by declaring that all court cases and "precedents" which have been said to modify the original constitution and valid amendments thereto are hereby declared of no consequence in interpreting the Constitution as amended by the Art V gathering so that, for the first time since 1789, all men can know their rights by reading this one document, and the secret code known only to their betters is hereby void. Further ALL rules and regulations crafted by those of our superiors are hereby declared null and void 365 days from this date except for those which are revalidated by direct action by the people acting through their representatives at the appropriate local, state and perhaps federal level during the next year.

Or words along those lines.

:-)

[henry]

The benificent Shell Oil headed to arctic for drilling. Many kayaks relocated in the process. (for daddy from our ChiTown Lurker).

[Cispigmented Heteronormative Microagressive Ignatz]

The only way an Article V convention would work is if the one resolution it came up with was "Every person registered to vote as a Democrat is immediately deported to Zimbabwe to live the dream you have planned for the rest of us."
There's your fundamental transformation, right there.

[jimmyk on iPhone]

Dennis Prager on the gay marriage ruling:

https://stream.org/the-formal-end-to-judeo-christian-america/

[narciso]

I see what you did there, henry, but it summons skydragons, from the north,

[henry]

narciso: keep up with the flavor of the day. Today all big business is benificent no matter what hijinx they get up to. Just like the Folsom St parade guys are in it for love no matter how many Priests they spit on.

[James D]

narciso @ 12:30

That column is a perfect exmaple of why McArdle is so awful. She spends several hundred words hemming and hawing and dancing around the obvious conclusion, which is that the NYT article she was dexcribing is garbage on every level.

[Jack is Back!]

If you go to Henry's link at gCcaptain you will also find a story about the disruption on the Channel Tunnel due to the Ferry workers striking. Of course, they are mainly French. But please do read all the way to the end where the get a sound bite out of one Stanley Shakespeare:)

Which reminds me of the old joke about two gays watching the State Island Ferry dock. One says to the other "I knew we were organized but I never knew we had a navy".:)

[narciso]

nothing to see here:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3145662/Tunisia-terror-gunman-s-accomplice-reached-Libya-trying-enter-Europe-hidden-aboard-migrant-boat-crossing-Mediterranean.html

[Cecil Turner]

. . . which is that the NYT article she was dexcribing is garbage on every level.

Concur, but . . . at least she got in the point about low frequency high mortality events, which is critical, especially when generalized to national security. Much of our foreign policy and national security strategy is designed around preventing another WWII. Daily casualty listings and wall-type memorials tend to obscure the bigger picture--that one battle in a major war, e.g., Iwo Jima, overshadows the entire WOT. And most lefty analysis completely misses the point, trying to turn it into a bean counter report.

So, at least there was some minimal redeeming value (though it was certainly painful to read).

[JeanD]

I formally nominate OL as one of our designated reps at the Article V Convention.

I yield the balance of my time.

[Miss Marple]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3146116/Sir-Nicholas-Winton-Britain-s-Schindler-saved-hundreds-Jewish-children-Nazi-concentration-camps-dies-aged-106.html?ito=social-facebook

[Janet]

jimmyk's Prager link at 12:42 is great.

[Old Lurker]

...and all such rules and regulations which are ratified as provided above by the local, state or perhaps federal governments shall without exception apply to every department, agency, office, employee, subcontractor or agent of any and all such governments. Further, while each such person might receive a contribution toward insurance and/or retirement needs and which they can deposit into their personal HSA and/or retirement funds as part of their compensation, in no case will any government employees be entitled to any other pension, deferred payment or any other obligation which might impact any budget year past the current year so that no such obligations become a burden on future budgets ever again.

[Thomas Collins]

I would propose only one amendment to an Article V convention: No tax withholding. That by itself would croak the administrative state and better focus individuals on what the Feds drain from them.

[Old Lurker]

If we got but one, TC, that would be a very good one especially if you worded it so that all other such levies which apply to employment are also paid to the employee as part of their pay and then paid by that employee to the government as a tax. (eg the employers' share of FICA and all that stuff.)

[James D]

I like that, TC!

I'm not sure what amendments I'd want, because a lot of the abuses we all complain about already ought to be prohibited by a reading of the clear language of the Bill of Rights.

[Captain Hate]

Revoke Marbury versus Madison. Eff the black robed tyrants.

[danoso]

Yeah, I think James pretty much nails it. What good will any changes make? As the last week has shown, words will simply be ignored when necessary.

[Jack is Back!]

Its a Constitional Convention. Doesn't that mean that only the Constitution can be modified, amended and/or repealed etc. and not precedent law?

I don't know if even a strictly originalist bunch of conservatives would be able to totally scrap the 13th amendment but you could reform it along the lines of the Fair Tax or Flat Tax but you do have to find a way to curb the police state known as the IRS.

I'd also like to make the POTUS a one 6 year term.

Off for errands.

[daddy]

"Every Tea Party member knows that media coverage of actual protests is unequal.

I heard a dozen times yesterday on the AM Radio news stories at the breaks that some Black Church in Alabama was probably set on fire by White Racists, followed then by comments on the Charleston Church shooting and then rumors of other Southern Black Churches set on fire.

Now I see on FOX a report that the Church was set on fire by lightning. No such story has yet been reported on the AM Radio News breaks I've been listening to.

[Captain Hate]

Doesn't that mean that only the Constitution can be modified, amended and/or repealed etc. and not precedent law?

The states could just declare that they aren't bound by anything imposed on them from the federal government unless they agree with it. They can just carry on their business unimpeded by the EPA, DOJ, HUD and any other executive branch creation that's overstepped their boundaries unless the state's citizens deem it important.

[danoso]

Shark attacks are on the rise as well - we hear about them practically every day.

Sometime in the not-too-distant future someone will figure out the number of shark attacks are about the same as they've always been. But it will have served the purpose of getting us all worked up.

[daddy]

Henry,

Regarding Shell's Drilling rigs, our paper is still telling us this: "Shell still lacks final federal permits that would allow exploratory drilling and possible confirmation of rich oil reserves under the Chukchi Sea."

I may be mistaken but I think that is still over and above the regulation mandating that even if they do drill, they can only drill one well at a time, since their proposed hellholes were within 15 miles of each other, which Fish & Game determined was bad for walruses in 2013.

Here's the latest: Environmental regulation could change Shell's plan for drilling in Alaska's Arctic

[Captain Hate]

This is already starting off as a *great* month:

http://www.inquisitr.com/2215823/ben-affleck-and-jennifer-garner-are-divorcing-after-10-years/

[Extraneus]

No tax withholding.

Great choice!

[Thomas Collins]

JiB, did you mean the 16th amendment? The 13th amendment effectuates a partial banning of slavery and involuntary servitude (without looking it up, can anyone name the case in which slavery or involuntary servitude is still allowed).

As to originalism, originalism is quite consistent with amendments. The "original" in originalism refers to the meaning at the time of enactment.

[Extraneus]

Man charged with robbing same New Jersey bank 5 years later

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) -- Prosecutors say a Philadelphia man robbed a New Jersey bank four months after he was released from prison for robbing the same place five years earlier.

[Publius]

Who does not think that an Article V convention would not be declared unconstitutional by our presently constructed Supreme Court?

[daddy]

Narciso,

Sort of local news: Man convicted of harassing Sarah Palin charged in new Pennsylvania harassment case

Also, local News reports that the official first action of our newly elected Democrat Anchorage Mayor, Ethan Berkowitz, is that he changed the TV Channel on the overhead TV at the City Hall Building from FOX News to CNN.

In an email, former Mayor Mark Begich, a Democrat, said he also turned the lobby TV to CNN.

[daddy]

Henry,

What happened to your Wisconsin Supreme Court Head who refused to quit being the head of the Court? Has that been resolved yet?

[daddy]

I'm watching video of the old cars on the streets of Cuba.

I think car aficionado's might have a field day going over there and buying the old things, shipping them back stateside for refurbishment, then selling them at immense profit to collectors and car lovers.

Any of you car guys getting excited seeing all those old Packards and Chevie's weaving round the potholes of Havana?

[Cecil Turner]

. . . which Fish & Game determined was bad for walruses in 2013.

Yoko Ono could not be reached for comment.

(without looking it up, can anyone name the case in which slavery or involuntary servitude is still allowed).

It was in the news recently, but I forget where. IIRC, "as punishment for a crime" is the answer.

[henry]

daddy, heh. I think the hearing is next week. So far Patience has taken control and is running things with Shirley pouting when she has to show up. The courts (district & appeals) have not stayed the WI Constitution yet, so Shirley gets to embarrass herself in public. Most of the noise around here has been the budget (they have a deal of some sort, too many RINOs) and the Bucks arena (taking on water). Plus the Milwaukee bus drivers went on strike so nobody can get to Summerfest and drink heavily while attending concerts in perfect summer weather. That'll help attitudes toward unions!

[daddy]

And now that we know Hillary had a FAX Machine, even tho' we know she didn't know how to operate it, does anyone know if she turned over any FAX's to Gowdy's Committee?

[Captain Hate]

Who does not think that an Article V convention would not be declared unconstitutional by our presently constructed Supreme Court?

I don't; it would probably be 5-4 but I think Kennedy would concede that something specifically mentioned in the Constitution is constitutional.

[Thomas Collins]

That's it, CT.

"Amendment XIII

Section 1.

Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2.

Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

[henry]

Does Gowdy's inbox resemble a shredder? what difference at this point does it make?

[James D]

I can think of several things I'd like to be addresses by amendments, thinking about it more. I just don't know how they could be worded so that they would be effective - and also not open up a Pandora's Box of unintended troubles.

Like, for example, an amendment to expressly prohibit sovreign immunity for police, prosecutors and judges.

Or one barring federal elected or appointed officials from receiving any federal contract, or working for any company receiving federal contracts, for life, after their terms end.

Or one barring relatives of elected/appointed officials from federal employment, federal contracts, etc.

[Thomas Collins]

It is unlikely to be declared unconstitutional, but there would be lots of challenges to the state proceedings calling the convention.

On state nullification: I think ultimately the Feds would back down if a state refused to sanction same gender marriages if the state was willing to lose federal funds, and subject itself to business boycotts and other pressure that would be brought to bear on the state. The Feds and the Confederacy went to war essentially over disputes relating to slavery including over extension of slavery into the territories. I don't see Barry Obama sending troops to die in a war with Texas over whether a same gender marriage must be recognized in Texas as a matter of state law. I do believe that for federal law purposes, the marriage would be recognized even if the couple didn't go to a state performing same gender weddings before coming back to Texas.

In any event, my prediction is that all states will fall in line.

[Miss Marple]

Thomas Collins,

I bet the Left keeps that Article in mind as they strive to criminalize thought.

Justification for the work camps.

[James D]

I don't see Barry Obama sending troops to die in a war with Texas over whether a same gender marriage must be recognized in Texas as a matter of state law.

No.

But I could see Obama pulling ALL troops and federal law enforcement officers out of Texas, leaving the state to patrol the border with Mexico on its own. And federal disaster-relief personnel, too.

[matt]

Capitalism has largely turned into corporatism and cronyism. Let's call it what it really is.

Apple and most major corporations have trillions socked away in tax havens and play countries off against each other daily.

The Chinese screwed everyone when they rigged their currency and the multinationals scrambled in so that we could keep inflation down and their profits up.

And now Disney who I consider the antichrist, are trying to import cheap labor legally and place them in the same seats that Americans occupied the day before. The West's borders are being overrun by illegals and the Pope and our own leaders encourage it. This is truly screwed up.

The Chinese have also exported their ethical system worldwide, which is none at all. We have caught a big dose of that in this country.

The world has gone insane.

[DebinNC]

Loved the tribute to Sir Winton. How amazing that his heroism only came to light 50 yrs. later when his 84 yo wife came upon a briefcase in their attic.

Meanwhile in Germany, an elderly Auschwitz guard is currently on trial. He blames the "indoctrinated obedience" of Germans at the time. Thanks to BOzo, we've all being exposed to that relentless, insidious process.

[Extraneus]

leaving the state to patrol the border with Mexico on its own.

What could be better than that?

[daddy]

Yesterday I linked the story about how our Ice-Breaking Ferry Boat is now for sale for only $2 Million, especially since "unexpected rain in Ketchikan" fell into the smokestacks of the berthed behemoth, creating a million dollars worth of damage to the engines.

Now there is great stink on the Radio Talk Shows demanding to know how in the rainiest city in America (Ketchikan) the guys who berthed the Ferry Boat could be so stupid as to let rain destroy the engines.

Anyhow, the saga is ongoing, and I propose that our JOM NRO Cruise bunch (Jane, Caro, A(B), Manny T, etc) make a special point of visiting the stranded FerryBoat when they pull in to Ketchikan. I would recommend you drag along Jonah Goldberg (if he's on the cruise) since his wife is Alaskan.

We need a first hand report, including photos, so I'm counting on Team JOM to give us one.

[Miss Marple]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2012/06/22/gay-activists-visiting-white-house-take-photos-of-themselves-flipping-off-reagan-portrait/

In case you missed it, the White House announced it had relaxed the rules on taking photos within the White House (something that has been in effect for at lest 50 years and unevenly enforced).

Next thing we know, these photos show up.

The White House has disavowed them, but that doesn't mean that the photos aren't out there. If you ask me, this wasdonoe with the approval of the White House political team and Obama.

I guess the Rainbow Lights weren't insulting enough.

[Thomas Collins]

Yes, Miss Marple, the organizers who did so well for Obama in 2008 in the caucus states would be out in full force packing the convention. Free exercise of religion would be toast if the community organizing crowd was the center of gravity of the convention. And they would go on from there.

I could see the Feds doing that, too, James D. I don't think it would come to that. But there would be interesting Westphalian system developments if Texas had its own nukes and its own place in the Westphalian system. Israel would have a strong ally, for one.

My personal opinion? Convince your rich friends not to fund a convention effort, but to start by funding conversative web sites focused on the family and personal relationships. Your Tango and Cafemom type sites. Convention won't help in this cultural environment. It might hurt.

If I had the ear of the Koch Brothers and Adelson, I would try to convince them to tell the RINOs they are devoting half of what they were going to contribute to conservative PACs to Your Tango and Cafemom type web sites. That would be a twofer. It would get the RINOs' attention while making a serious pushback in the cultural battle.

[matt]

It is interesting to hear what the Republican leadership has said on last week's rulings, which is virtually nothing. There's your answer right there.

[DebinNC]

I bet the Marine Corps Band are looking forward to a better class of people to play for or at least people with more class.

[Jane]

Changing the subject.

Do you guys think there will be terror attacks over the 4th? If so, where?

(No prize for the winner)

[Captain Hate]

I can think of several things I'd like to be addresses by amendments, thinking about it more. I just don't know how they could be worded so that they would be effective - and also not open up a Pandora's Box of unintended troubles.

Based on the difficulty of passing the original Constitution, if I were a betting man I'd put money on nothing being done. But the mere act of holding a convention might be enough of a shot across the bow to get the insatiable beast to curb itself.

As far as the Pandora's box argument, I have faith in the representatives from the states being close enough to people like us to think things through and scrutinize everything to the nth degree. Plus the MFM would be covering it in an OMG THEY MIGHT SHIT ALL OVER US way and do their best to critically cover it.

[Captain Hate]

Next thing we know, these photos show up.

Trash acting like trash; how could it be otherwise?

[Jack is Back!]

TC,

Yep! I mean't the 16th. Brain fart.

Too bad we never met up for a cocktail when we were in Boston. I hung out at the Aragosta at the Battery Wharf Hotel for my cocktail before we ventured down to Hanover Street and the North End vibe for dinner.

BTW, this is the hurdle for an Article V convention: There are already over 700+ applications.

http://foavc.org/file.php/1/Amendments

You will agree with most but there are some doozies also.

[Thomas Collins]

Whether or not it's on the Fourth, Jane, I think we are in for a run of jihadist attacks. There were several last week around the world. And America itself will be struck. And Obama will remind us that TRUE ISLAM IS A RELIGION OF PEACE. And then go back to sucking up to Imam Khameinei and the Castro brothers.

[Thomas Collins]

I was in New Hampshire and RI at client meetings when you sent out your invitation for refreshments at Battery Wharf, JiB. We'll try again when we're in the vicinity of each other. I'm sure you have stories about construction lawyers and finance types I have dealt with over the years (not that I would press you to tell me anything about them you thought should remain discrete; I would just try to get you intoxicated so the gossip would flow :-))).

[Jack is Back!]

TC,

When I first started out I was put in Contract Administration to run the Insulation contract on a power plant in southern Maryland. I had to go up to the regional office in Gaithersburg to get a brief on contracts. The legal department provided all the presentations and one of the lawyers told me not to get hung up on "legalese and legality" because half the lawyers doing contract litigation are proved wrong every day:)

[rse]

Jane-I am hearing the concern has to do with targeting mall crowds there for the fireworks.

[danoso]

But I could see Obama pulling ALL troops and federal law enforcement officers out of Texas, leaving the state to patrol the border with Mexico on its own. And federal disaster-relief personnel, too.

Sounds like a good first step towards independence. "We'll keep our tax dollars, too".

[daddy]

Do you guys think there will be terror attacks over the 4th? If so, where?

Jane,

If I was ISIS and I wanted the biggest propaganda value for the buck, I'd hit Baseball Stadiums. With our porous southern border I'd probably target whichever teams on the Southern Border states have home games this 4th of July (i.e.) the Texas Rangers, Houston Astro's, Arizona D-backs, and San Diego Padre's. And I'd also consider hitting the Nationals in DC for the shock value of showing they can target the nations Capital.

I wouldn't waste effort hitting the Red Sox (they already pulled off the Marathon Bombing) nor do I see them hitting the Mets, but I think bombing the Bronx Bombers would have to be a huge target, as what bigger symbol would there be worldwide, than killing the Yankee's?

If they wanted Military Bases I think this time they'd aim for Navy Bases. They've already hit an Army Base in Texas, and I think they'd leave the Marine's alone since the Marine's strike me as less shackled with PC rules about killing bad-guys, but proving they could target a home-berthed US Naval War-Ship would be an enormous psychological coup, so I think something harbored in Pearl Harbor, San Diego, or Norfolk would be their second tier target.

A deadly raid on Gitmo would also be an excellent achievement, but overall I'll stick with Ball Parks as their Number 1 choice.

[rse]

jib-that comes by and large from lawyers not changing the form language to fit the relevant facts and not understanding the nature of the business well enough to get reps and warranties that really get at what is being purchased and why a deal was priced as it was.

I spent two years after the diva was born getting lawyers to appreciate why language said what it said. For me though those phone calls were a nice break from the reality of 3 kids under 7.

[Jane]

They cancelled the fireworks at Olde Sturbridge Village - of which my deck is the best seat in town. I wonder if that is the reason.

[Porchlight]

MM, the photos of people flipping off Reagan are from 2012. They were taken against the rules. I remember being really mad at the time.

[Miss Marple]

Porchlight,

Thank you. I figured Beck would have checked that, but like everything else in this country, even the conservatives are incompetent.

Well, as Rosanna Rosannadanna said, "Nevermind."

[Miss Marple]

I should have said Emily Latella!

Both played by the same person, so I got mixed up.

[Publius]

I don't; it would probably be 5-4 but I think Kennedy would concede that something specifically mentioned in the Constitution is constitutional.

But Captain, in the AZ redistricting case, Art I, Sec. 4, the Election Clause, did not stop Kennedy from calling a commission a legislature, in direct contradiction to the explicit wording as written in the Constitution.

[Jack is Back!]

rse,

My experience over 35 years of doing small and big and mega projects is schedule + cost impact due to owner changes, interference or forebarance. Without owners, most projects would get done on time an at cost:)

But that ain't going to happen.

[Cispigmented Heteronormative Microagressive Ignatz]

--I wonder if that is the reason.--

They would really cancel the fireworks just because you had the best seat in town?
Petty.

[Jack is Back!]

In re the SCOTUS without being a lawyer critic but when you tell 9 lawyers you have an appointment for life and you are God when it comes to our laws and constituion, it is not surprising that 5 or 6 of them took up such a great deal.

[rse]

jib-I was always shocked by the lawyers "who never change their form language." So I would explain to them the real consequences to the business or their client's interests of not changing the language. Usually at that point I would prevail, but then I would write something that fit with the actual concerns lawyer had and he or she, usually back then a he, would apparently tell the client they wrote the language.

The point I would make that always fascinated me was when someone wanted me to assume financial liability when I had no control over the behavior involved. That's what insurance companies do.

[Thomas Collins]

It's a balance, rse and JiB. Sure, there is ancient language in a document that may not be appropriate for the deal at hand, and a lawyer may not want to think through how that language actually affects a deal. But I find an equally troublesome occurrence is so-called "plain English" types, both lawyers and non-lawyers, trying to "improve" the document by changing longstanding language that has built up a fixed meaning over time and has been the subject of case law. In both cases, it's not thinking through the historical background of the language and how it affects the deal at hand.

I am especially sensitive to this in my two main areas of practice, tax and public finance, because, for example, people will try to "modernize" language in bond resolutions that the statute requires. Get the statute changed, but in the meantime don't mess with the resolution. Or, they will preen about changing "taxese" when tax related language has been crafted to fit court decisions favorable to the taxpayer.

[Jack is Back!]

TC,

I can't even rememer if our "boler plate" was ever changed but we always use Special Conditions to make the more serious points. But in construction you have specs, drawings and contract language. A lot of the crap gets caught in the specification trap. Spec also reference industry standards and you'd be siurprised how many of those win cases against and for contractors.

Thats why I always told my people to RTFC (Read the F**king Cointact) and make sure the job gets built to the specs and drawings. Then if there is a problem let the forensic lawyers argue it out.

[rse]

TC-have I ever told the story about the form language as managed care was just getting started and the form contract from one of the big insurers said "tortuous conduct", instead of tortious conduct.

That got changed, but the GC laughed at how many eyes had ignored that language difference.

[Dave (in MA)]

Jane, https://www.osv.org/event/independence-day-celebration-2015

[Old Lurker]

JiB "Without owners, most projects would get done on time an at cost"

I represent that remark. :-)

[rse]

This is an excellent observation. http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2015/07/the-road-ahead-for-believers-not-so-gay.php

Kurt Lewin, in a passage I did not use in today's post, wrote that the traditional liberal concept of the individual was an obstacle to the kind of followership needed for a true economic justice style democracy.

Yep and it is why it is under such concentrated attack now in K-12 and everywhere else.

[Jack is Back!]

OL,

Yeah but my Owners have hundreds if not thousands of people smarter than me and my guys/gals. You as an individual and/or partnership is a no brainer.

[Miss Marple]

http://www.tallahassee.com/story/news/2015/07/01/tallahassee-church-fire-arson-despite-reports/29583511/

[Old Lurker]

Knowing it is your own money and not a bunch of shareholders' does focus one's attention on changes during construction, that's for sure, Jack.

[Old Lurker]

Speaking of negotiating with owners during a dispute, how do you think this show of good faith is gonna end?

"VIENNA—Iranian officials said Monday that the Islamic Republic’s Central Bank has successfully repatriated 13 tons of gold as part of a package of sanctions relief provided to Iran by U.S. and Western powers.

The gold was transferred to Iran by the government of South Africa, which had been holding onto the assets due to harsh sanctions meant to pressure Tehran to rein in its rogue nuclear program.

The gold appears to have been released as part of a sanctions relief package that will have awarded Iran nearly $12 billion in unfrozen cash assets by the time negotiations wrap up next week.

Iran received $4.2 billion in unfrozen assets under the 2013 interim agreement with the United States and was then given another $2.8 billion by the Obama administration last year in a bid to keep Tehran committed to the talks."

Yessiree. We're showing them now.

Fools.

[Cispigmented Heteronormative Microagressive Ignatz]

The Weekly Standard says Republicans laugh at Trump at their peril.

[Extraneus]

Fools.

Maybe, but people don't do things without motivation. I wonder what incentives were involved. (Aside from the laughable ones they tells us about, I mean.)

After all, that's a lot of money.

[Cispigmented Heteronormative Microagressive Ignatz]

This article by Johnathon Last at the Weekly Standard was written right before Kennedy blew his pixie dust in our faces, but it might be the best thing written on homosexual marriage, its ramifications and what the bait and switch intentions have been from the start.

Well worth reading and it's actually a better read because it was written prior to Obergefalafal (Roe was too simple?)

[Publius]

http://www.ft.com/intl/fastft/353721

Hal.....Hal? What did we do wrong, Hal?

[Cispigmented Heteronormative Microagressive Ignatz]

And an equally excellent "big, fat, gay marriage post-mortem" by Johnathon Last from today.

[Extraneus]

I never cared much about gay marriage*, but I do hope a lot of people do and will ream these fascists but good come November, 2016.

*I do care about the SC making it up as they go along, and waxing poetic while rubbing our noses in it.

[Cispigmented Heteronormative Microagressive Ignatz]

God please forgive me for this but Steve McIntyre has dropped slaying the skydragon in favor of slaying the Wells report and defending little Tommy Brady with four (so far) posts on the science behind the balls.
Have at it.

[Jack is Back!]

rse,

K. T. McFarland has compared our negotiations on Iran to giving our kids their desert before their meal at dinner.

[God]

You're forgiven. Don't do it again.

[Jane]

Dave, that was just their excuse. Altho I will say in the last 2 years I've known 2 people who became citizens and that part is cool.

"petty"

Tell me about it!

[maryrose]

JIB
That's about right
They are giving away the store and the Iranians have the upper hand
No more money for terrorists
Call it a draw and reassert the sanctions

[maryrose]

Jane
No terrorist attacks over the 4th of July
Just hype by Bammy to bring up his poll numbers