Big news early Saturday morning, the Supreme Court “ordered Trump administration not to deport Venezuelans under Alien Enemies Act for now” — NPC News.

Or did they?

Yep, they did. But there are interesting things happening in this short order.

First, it was issued at in the early morning of Saturday. Second, the Solicitor General is invited to file a response ASAP. Not on a particular date and time, but now.

In A.A.R.P. v. Donald J. Trump, in his official capacity 25-CV-00059 N.D.TX., the district court judge found for the administration and did not grant the TRO nor the Preliminary Injunction.

They appealed to the Fifth Circuit Court, A.A.R.P. v. Trump, 25-10534, (5th Cir.). The Fifth Circuit denied the appeal because the case is at the TRO stage, and TROs cannot be appealed. Where have we heard this before?

What we are likely to see is the statements by Alito and Thomas in the coming days. From there, they will wait for the Solicitor General of the United States to file a response, so they have both sides of the argument, briefed.

At that point, they will likely say, “This is in an interlocutory state, we aren’t going to interfere.”

I noticed that we don’t see Garcia’s face clearly.  All the images are from the side.

There are some perspective issues when they are shaking hands.

Finally, they went from, “No, you can’t see him.” With the Senator getting stopped by the military 2 miles from the prison, to sitting and having drinks in a nice location.

This looks faked to me.  If not the images themselves, then in the setup.

I had the joy of staying at the Fort last weekend. Originally, the temperatures were supposed to be in the high 40s at night, and the 60s during the day. Perfect Fort weather! That didn’t turn out to be correct (go figure…). It was below freezing overnight Friday night into Saturday morning, and Saturday night into Sunday morning it was 33*F. Saturday was above freezing but very wet and raw. Sunday wasn’t bad, being in the mid 50s and overcast, but dry.

Staying at the Fort always gives me an appreciation for what our ancestors lived through. In one weekend (with albeit “white man fires” going full blast), we went through an entire bin of wood. Some of that was for cooking, because we ran into our usually spring thaw challenges with warming up the fireplaces. Some of it was because my cabin-mates were cold at night. The first was a necessary issue, but the second just left me flabbergasted. Regardless, if we went through that much wood in a weekend, how much wood would the entire fort community have gone through in an average month? It’s no wonder that the entirety of NH was essentially deforested during that period!

Here’s the deal: the Fort is made of logs and flagstones and local stone and brick, in a rather haphazard way. In the 1700s, that fire would never have gone out. Ever. During the night it would have been banked, and during the day they’d have been cooking over it. It’s much easier to keep a fire going than to get one started, and that’s exactly what they would have done. When we leave the Fort in November, and it doesn’t get opened up again until March, it’s been sitting almost five months with no fire. Over that time, the damp and cold get into the stones in a way that would never have happened historically. It takes at least two days of heavy fire burning to bring the entire hearth and wood oven up to heat, so that cooking can be done. This was something our ancestors would never have had to concern themselves with.

No matter how you look at it, when we arrive, it’s going to be COLD at the Fort, and we’re going to have to work hard to change that.

This is what I do when I’m going on an overnight trip to the Fort (or anywhere, quite honestly):

• check the temperature for the time I’ll be there at least a week in advance
• keep checking the temperature to catch any trends up or down as the week progresses
• check the projected temperatures for my trip the day I’m leaving, and make appropriate choices for sleeping and clothing
• pack extra warm stuff, just in case

Read More

Trump Before The Supreme Court

Thursday afternoon, the Supreme Court consolidated three cases on appeal from by the administration and scheduled oral arguments for May 15, 2025, at 10 a.m.

24A884, 24A885, and 24A886 are consolidations of 10 different cases, though some of those are duplicates as they came through the circuit courts.

In short, this is the vehicle for the Supreme Court to knock down the raft of inferior courts granting nationwide TROs and preliminary injunctions.

I don’t know if this will extend to final judgment, regardless, this is the case to watch.

Fort at #4 — Projects

I will be up at The Fort tomorrow to take some pictures. I just finished two woodworking mallets. Boy, I’m a poor wood turner. They look ok. I’ve polished one of them and put a sealing coat on it. On the other hand, I can see ever mis-cut and catch as I learn how to do this.

I’m hoping to get at least one of the spinning wheels down and into the cabins. This will give me something to do when I don’t want to be in the wood working shop.

Which means I need to finish the clamps for the clamp to hold my wool combs. I like the way wool spins once it has been combed.

I might even try spinning some carded wool. I’ve not tried that yet.

I have a reed in our big floor loom. We got the loom for cheap, but the reeds were rusted nasty things. I’ve not recovered them yet. I need to make a raddle to allow me to warp the loom. And I have to spin some yarn for the weft.

Computer Frustrations

There are two standard ways that power is supplied to computer type devices. One, they take a 110v AC into a power supply, which then generates 12V and 5V from that for the system. Two, they have a “wall wort” which generates 12V DC, which is then converted as required internally.

More and more of the small devices I’m picking up use the 12V wall wort. The issue? Space for the wall worts.

Wed, I went to plug in a new device. Accidentally unplugged the wrong wall wort, dropped my room switch until I got it plugged back in.

Once I had the correct wall wort removed, I found that I had 2 open outlets but the orientation of the outlets and the orientation of the wall wart don’t fit.

Now I’m dealing with another issue, A new switch that won’t come online.

Snope

The SCOTUS Friday Conference was moved to Thursday. Snope was conferenced again.

I really, really, want to see some forward motion on these Second Amendment Cases.

The reason I don’t update you on Ocean State Tactical is that it has been following Snope and I’m too lazy to have another tab open on https://www.supremecourt.gov

Tea!

I used to drink Coke-a-Cola. I stopped years ago, mostly because of the sugar content. I was converted to coffee.

I do drink tea occasionally. It is not my go-to drink.

In 1773, a bunch of rebels dumped 342 chests of tea into Boston Harbor. Approximately 92,000 pounds.

For much of my younger years, I thought they were talking about Lipton tea bags. I.e., loose tea in individual small filter bags. There was no way that you could get that much tea into just 342 chests. Then I found out about real loose tea. This was better.

Then I found that what was actually transported were bricks of black tea from the orient. These bricks were solid.

For use at The Fort, we ordered a brick of black tea. It is formed the same way it would have been formed in 1773. Our brick is 2.5 pounds.

The cool thing? It has a shelf life of 50 years. This is prepper paradise!

Question of the Week

What do you think will happen when Karmelo Anthony is convicted for murder?

The NPCs will have their marching orders by now. Yesterday it was “Trump is ignoring a 9-0 Supreme Court ruling that he return Garcia”, today it will be “Trump held in contempt of court.”

Since I’m writing this yesterday, we’ll see how good I am at predicting the NPCs.

We need to start on March 15, 2025. The Trump signed an EO designating TDA and MS-13 as terrorist organizations and ordered their removal under the Alien Enemies Act. Five TDA members filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus.

If the writ is granted by the court, the named plaintiffs must be presented to the court, in person, in corpus (body)

That same day, the court granted a TRO forbidding the removal of the named TDA members. The court claims that the plaintiffs (bad guys) have satisfied the four factors governing the issuance of preliminary relief.

The court didn’t bother to show what those arguments are, nor did the court bother to write an opinion to accompany the order. It is reasonable for the TRO to be granted, the order entered, and then later an opinion entered into the record.

The government immediately filed an appeal to the D.C. Circuit.

Later that same day, the 15th, the court decided to extend the TRO to all noncitizens of the in U.S. custody who are subject to removal via the AEA.

The government then appealed the class certification, extending the TRO to all terrorists in U.S. custody.

Lots of back and forth took place, then on the 28th, the court extended the TRO until April 12th. Thus putting a one-month delay on deporting terrorists.

The same day, the government filed an application with the Supreme Court to vacate the orders of the inferior district court.

The first thing to note is that what the district court was a TRO the Supreme Court construed as appealable injunctions. The D.C. Circuit Court has taken all TROs at face value. I.e., not appealable.

The Supreme Court then vacated the TROs on the 7th of April.

As is normal in such situations, the Supreme Court ruled on the narrow question of venue. And that venue is NOT the district court of D.C.

Conclusion

I’m tired of reading this rogue inferior court judge yap. So I’ll wrap it up for y’ll.

The plaintiffs and the court were attempting to stop the Article II executive branch from performing its Constitutional duties and responsibilities.

The court issued a TRO even though the court did not have the jurisdiction to do so nor had they properly analyzed the Winter Factors as applied to this case.

The problem for the government is that judicial orders, in general, must be obeyed. Even if the court issued them erroneously and without proper authority to do so.

The administration learned their lesson. They are no immediately filing appeals when there are tight deadlines. Even an administrative stay gets them out of the contempt trap.

In this case, there was no deadline. The deadline was “now”. Since the government didn’t do what the court told them to do, they can be held in contempt.

Even though the Supreme Court later vacated the self-styled TRO.

This is just lawfare in a different way.

If I’m in enemy territory right now, it’s because I’m under cover of darkness, cloaked in mystery, and mistaken for a friend. I spend at least a few minutes each day, reading the news and whispering, “What the actual fuck…” over and over again. It’s depressing. Yes, I realize most of you have been doing that for ages, but hey, I’m new here.

Yesterday morning, it was the entire mess with El Salvador and Ábrego García being deported.

What are the actual facts? Well, you really have to dig to find them. They’re always behind the “read more” line in any article on a news site. Basically, García came to America illegally in 2011. Now, if that was the case (and it does seem to be correct), if he had no ties to any gangs or illegal operations, and his ONLY illegal act was in coming to America, he could have appealed to Obama for clemency. If that had happened, he would have been here legally by the time Trump came into office this time around. Regardless, he was granted “protection from deportation” (what does that mean? I can’t seem to find any info on it… Chris?) some years ago, and has been living with his wife and kid in Maryland. (BBC)

Kristi Noem has said, “This was just one of those examples of an individual that is a MS-13 gang member, multiple charges and encounters with the individuals here, trafficking in his background, was found with other MS-13 gang members—very dangerous person…” (DHS) So according to the director of DHS, García has multiple charges of being in MS-13, trafficking, and other stuff. I would VERY much like to see the paperwork involved with that, partly to shut up the Left, but also because I continue to have a healthy distrust of all things government and I like to check their information as much as I check anyone else’s. I don’t like it when we’re “told but not shown” stuff. It makes me wonder if they’re hiding things.

Regardless of all of the above, García was transported to El Salvador. At this point, he has been repatriated to his home country, whether that was the right thing to do or not. We no longer have any control over García because he is in the hands of his own government. We don’t get to say, “Hey, García was here illegally and should have been deported, but we want him back so we can run him through the court system to prove it well enough to make some of our citizens happy.” It doesn’t work that way. El Salvador isn’t required to send their citizens to another country, especially another country where they’re going to face possible legal trials. The fact that the president of El Salvador simply locked the dude up as a gang member doesn’t phase me.

Read More

Our court system is built around a false or better said, forced, politeness. This means that words have meaning in the context of the Supreme Court that aren’t obvious outside of those that watch The Court.

The Education Industry also does this. When my children were in kindergarten, I had a meeting with their teachers. The teacher said something to the effect of, “Your son is not sharing with his friends.”

I was surprised at this, to say the least. Then I found out that the school had changed the definition of “friend”.

It seems they had noticed that children treat their friends differently and often times better than those that are not friends. So the school changed the definition of “friend” to mean any classmate or student the child interacts with.

The court is filled with this sort of rhetoric, using polite words of friends when it is more likely that somebody wants to rip their lying opponent’s throat out.

This is a polite way of saying that the state has made the claim that Garcia is a member of MS-13 but that the Supreme Court doesn’t accept it as proven.

Fact: An Immigration Judge (Article II Judge), found that Garcia was a member of MS-13.

This is also polite court speak for said but not proven.

Fact: Garcia is charged with a crime, he is an illegal alien. He has a removal order put in place under Biden.

This is Court speak for, “You were wrong. We are returning it to you to fix.” The word “requires” is an order. It is telling the inferior court judge that he MUST correct their error.

“Clarification” means that the inferior court said something wrong.

With normal people, this is the equivalent of “I believe you are mistaken” when you want to say, “What you said is wrong. And the entire room is dumber for having had to listen to it.”

“…unclear, and may exceed the District Court’s authority” is court talk for something like. “Either you meant what you said which is outside your authority, OR you meant something else. You must have meant something else. Make it clear you didn’t mean what you said.”

This is as strong of language that I’ve read in a SCOTUS opinion.

Sometimes, I will be in a discussion with somebody, and they will say something insulting or rude to me. I will respond, “Did you intend to call me ignorant/a lier/stupid/racist?” If I’m saying this, I’m pretty darn sure they said it intentionally. This gives them an opportunity to walk it back without me forcing the issue.

The intended scope of the term “effectuate” in the District Court’s order was clear. The judge was ordering the US government to put Garcia in front of the Judge by midnight. And that judge didn’t care what the government had to do to accomplish his order.

“…with due regard”, “deference”, and “conduct of foreign affairs.” are all code. “Due regard” is SCOTUS telling the inferior courts that the Executive branch is co-equal with the legislative and judicial branch. “Deference” means that the executive branch is responsible for the executive branch, not the courts.

The last part, “conduct of foreign affairs,” means that this is a limited ruling. If it has to do with foreign affairs, the executive branch is responsible, not the judicial or legislative branches. This also means that if it is not “foreign affairs”, the court might have the authority to step in, after giving due regard and deference.

Conclusion

There are many situations where the setting demands a level of decorum, of the trappings of respect. In oral arguments before the Supreme Court, it is proper to refer to the opposing council as “my friend.” To call congress critters “honorable”.

Unfortunately, there are those in the business of selling panic know that most people will not understand forced respect, instead they will latch on to the thing that is panic worthy, or which is what they want to hear.

The order heretofore entered by THE CHIEF JUSTICE is vacated sounds like it is a loss for the administration. It is not. The stay issued by the Chief Justice did what it was supposed to do. It protected the administration from charges of contempt.

The differences between effectuate and facilitate is lost on the masses. The number of people who believe that the administration was ordered to return Garcia to the United States is nearly unbelievable.

They want to believe that Trump is breaking the law.

As Allyson says, “read the bill”. Unfortunately, I believe that the plain text of Supreme Court opinions is beyond the comprehension of most people suffering from TDS.

This randomly showed up on my Google Radio the other day, and it made me stop and listen. The music strikes me as a cross between a Russian folk song and something out of a circus performance. But the lyrics… Oh, the lyrics.

My first impression of this was that it was a rallying cry to the Left. Jobless on the streets and all that. But when you listen to (or read) the lyrics, it’s something else entirely. I found out this song was originally written in Yiddish in the 1930s by a Jewish Krakow resident named Mordechai Gebirtig. He wrote it as a song of resistance against the rising tide of antisemitism in Poland and Germany. You can read more about Mr. Gebirtig here, and I highly recommend you do. I had no idea who he was until this song arrived in my play list. I’m glad it did.

Mr. Gebirtig lived through a time where he was treated horribly, persecuted and prosecuted without reason. Here was a man who wanted to work, who had meaningful work, who had family to support, and he was put out of Krakow because of his religious beliefs.

The Left talks a lot about how the Right is like the Germans and Trump is our Hitler. But when you actually read things like the above history of Mr. Gebirtig, you see that it’s the other way around. And it’s rather frightening.

For whatever reason, every party I ever went to in the 1980s included at least one version of this dip, served in a bread bowl. I’m not sure why we stopped making it, because it’s iconic comfort food, tasty and with a healthy kick to it from the spinach. Therefore, I shall share it with you, dear readers. Because it’s yummy. 

Ingredients:

• 10 oz frozen chopped spinach (cooked, cooled and squeezed dry)
• 16 oz sour cream
• 1 cup mayonnaise
• 1 package Knorr ® Vegetable recipe mix
• 8 oz water chestnuts, drained and chopped (optional)
• 3 green onions, chopped (optional)

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix. Chill the spinach dip for about 2 hours.

In a good size round of bread with a chewy crust (in other words, one that won’t fall apart being used as a bowl), cut a circle out of the top. Using a knife or your fingers, pull out bits of bread to make the round into a bowl. Add the chilled spinach dip to your bread bowl.

Serve this classic spinach dip with the bread that you pulled out of your bread bowl, and a stack of fresh vegetables as well. Make a double batch, because you will need to refill the bowl before the night is over.

Notes:

You can make this vegetarian or vegan! Replace the sour cream with 16 oz of cashew yogurt. Replace the mayo with Nayonaise or another vegan mayo. That’s all you need to do! Another alternative is to use a cashew cream cheese in place of the mayo, for a thicker dip. Be prepared to thin it out with a bit of oat milk if it’s too thick.

While scrolling through X, looking for something to write about, I stumbled on a posting regarding Trump’s annual physical and its results.

/Trump’s 2025 Annual Physical Results

The post and almost all the comments are of the “It’s a fake!” or “They’re lying!”

His temperature is normal. That can’t be because it is just an average. They lied.

He scored 30 out of 30 on the Montreal Cognitive Assessment. This is a lie, everybody has seen he is cognitively impaired.

We know his height and weight are BS.

His resting heart beat is too good. It must be a lie.

He was tested on the 11th of April, but they didn’t release the results until the 13th. This proves it is a lie. They wanted time to fabricate the results.

Or my favorite, they noted the scar on his right ear but not the scars from multiple failed hair transplants. Since the assassination attempt was fake, this proves the medical report is fake as well.

Trump got a clean bill of health, since he isn’t showing any issues, it must be wrong.

These people are sick in the head. They just want him, and us, dead.

P.S. My favorite bit of TDS this week was a bunch of people looking for information about the kid that attempted to assassinate Trump. Since the monster was killed and the attempt was faked, this is another indicator that Trump faked the assassination attempt.