• I wasn’t expecting this opinion this quickly. The Supreme Court heard oral arguments on the 15th, they issued their opinion on the 16th. It is only 24 pages long.

    This case has many concurrent issues running through it. It is important to focus on what the opinion actually does, how it does it, and what the legal issues the Court is attempting to resolve.

    What the holding is, what it means

    The Supreme Court has issued an injunction stopping the deportation of TdA terrorists while the Fifth Circuit Court issues a new opinion. This injunction stands until the Supreme Court issues their opinion in this case after being fully briefed and oral arguments given, OR if the Court denies certiorari, OR neither party appeals from the Fifth Circuit Court.

    This Supreme Court Order vacates and remands the case back to the Fifth Circuit with specific instructions:

    … (1) all the normal preliminary injunction factors, including likelihood of success on the merits, as to the named plaintiffs’ underlying habeas claims that the AEA does not authorize their removal pursuant to the President’s March 14, 2025, Proclamation, and (2) the issue of what notice is due, as to the putative class’s due process claims against summary removal. …

    I hope you realize what a slap in the face the highlighted section is to the inferior courts. The inferior courts are well aware of the Winter factors. They are well aware of the order in which the factors should be evaluated.

    This line is written to all inferior courts. It is a blunt warning that the inferior courts should apply the Winter factors, correctly, to any injunction (or stay) being granted.

    The second part is the Supreme Court punting. They want somebody else to do the heavy lifting on “what notifications need to be given to afford a terrorist due process?”

    The J.G.G. plaintiffs are claiming it is 30 days. The state has argued that 24 hours is more than enough. The Fifth is likely to come down with something closer to the state’s standing.

    Another part of this, is that there is a question of “adequate notification.” The plaintiffs want the notifications to be in English and Spanish. The state provided the notifications in English only. Since these people are in the United States, it seems reasonable to ask that they figure out how to read an English document or get a translation.

    And, as one pundit on X put it, the government should give notification to every criminal alien they currently have detained, and any new ones they pick up, a notification of deportation. This will start that clock running and whatever time is finally determined, the state will be that much closer to the time limit.

    Finally, this injunction is not going to keep any of these criminal aliens in the United States.

    If you are in our country illegally, you can be deported. That is a full stop. If you are a criminal alien, you can be deported.

    Trump declared TdA to be Alien Enemies, then used the Alien Enemies Act to deport them.

    He did not need to use the AEA!

    All the focus on the AEA is a distraction. The Trump administration could load all those terrorists on to planes tomorrow morning as criminal aliens and ship them down to CECOT with no issues. As long as they don’t use the AEA for the source of authority.

    What wasn’t addressed

    The Solicitor General in oral arguments and in the briefings advanced the argument that universal injunctions are bad. That these rogue, inferior court judges do not have the authority to block the executive with nationwide injunctions.

    This opinion does not address universal injunctions.

    When Democrats are in office and a court issues a universal injunction, Sotomayer, Kegan, and Jackson Brown are in full agreement with the rest of the court that universal injunctions are wrong.

    When Republicans are in office and a court issues a universal injunction, Sotomayer, Kegan, and Brown believe that universal injunctions are great.

    Legal Games

    This case should not be in front of the Supreme Court. It is here because of games played by the plaintiffs (bad guys).

    The D.C. District court, having had their hands slapped, were on warning not to take cases outside their jurisdiction. This meant the case was filed in Texas, where the terrorists are housed, pending deportation.

    The lawyers for the plaintiffs opened the case, then called the judge and demanded action. The transcript of that call was entered into the record by the judge. He was not happy.

    The call was an ex parte communication. This is in violation of the Code of Conduct for Federal Judges, Canon 3(A)(4)) and Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 65(b)(1).

    Regardless, the judge in the case was working on the complex issues involved in this case.

    After the judge filed his remonstration of the plaintiffs’ lawyers, the plaintiffs filed a motion for a TRO.

    They demanded the judge respond within 42 minutes, or they were going to appeal the case. 133 minutes after filling the motion, they filed an appeal to the Fifth Circuit.

    The Supreme Court majority, seven justices, felt that the plaintiffs were right in appealing. Thomas and Alito dissented.

    The case was moving rapidly, the judge was responding to the motions being filed. The important aspect of the judge’s response was he had given the state 24 hours to respond.

    The plaintiffs knew this before they filed. The judge had pre-emptively told the state they had 24 hours to respond.

    The plaintiffs didn’t like this. They felt that the judge should issue the injunction as if he were a robed, rogue D.C. district court activist, litigating from the bench. This Texas judge wasn’t a slave to the leftist agenda. He was doing his job correctly.

    Conclusion

    If Thomas and Alito are on one side of the argument, and you are on the other side, you are wrong. Having been there myself, I know of what I speak.

    Alito and Thomas are superb at what they do. Trust them.

    Final Thoughts

    The Supreme Court majority was making judgments about what the inferior courts should have done with 20/20 hindsight. There are things in the record now that were not there when the lower courts issued their orders and opinions. Thomas and Alito point this out and tell the majority to follow proper procedures.

            

  • We often talk about government interference. We are forced to talk about race, constantly.

    Just as most gun control laws are racist in nature, designed to disarm blacks so that racist assholes could murder them, marriage license serve a similar purpose.

    What is a marriage license?

    In short, it is the government’s permission to perform a religious or secular ceremony declaring somebody to be your partner.

    It is also a legally binding contract. At the moment you sign that contract, you have agreed to a set of laws, enforced by threat of force, on how you separate, what it costs to separate, and who will decide the access you will have to your children.

    Many entities recognize that license as granting you special privileges and services.

    In other words, that license is what your spouse uses to get on your insurance or for you to get on theirs. It sets the rules for custody and property. It details death benefits.

    All of this in an implied contract.

    Having signed that contract three times, I know what the contract implies.

    How did marriage license come to be?

    Before the War of Northern Aggression, the southern states had laws against blacks and whites marrying. It wasn’t allowed.

    That didn’t mean that white men weren’t dipping their wick when they wanted. It didn’t mean there weren’t mixed race babies.

    This didn’t bother them. If it popped out of a slave, it was a slave that would be a slave until emancipated or death. If its skin color was too dark, it was a slave until emancipated or death. Racist as hell.

    I’m sure there were some “bucks” that were servicing white women, but that wasn’t acknowledged at all.

    After the unCivil War, many of those racist laws were struck down. The rules against mixed marriages went away as they were rules for slaves, not laws.

    So laws were passed. These laws were designed to work around certain federal restrictions on racist behavior.

    The gist? To be legally married, you need to have a license from the government, granting you permission.

    The requirements to get that license weren’t relevant enough, so we’ll just do that later.

    Blood Tests

    Ostensibly, the marriage license protected against inbreeding, transfer of STDs, and mixing of blood.

    You know, that thing that got the German’s in so much hot water in the 1938-1945 time frame. Mixing races with a government designated inferior race.

    The reason Los Vegas became a marriage destination wasn’t the Gambling, Food, and Shows. It was because there were no blood tests and no waiting.

    You and your bride-to-be could fly into Vegas in the morning, be married by noon. Be broke by 5pm. Be on a plane back home by 7pm. Arriving with your beautiful wife to an empty airport.

    But we need records!

    Absolutely, we need records. Does the government require a record of your marriage? Not really.

    But we want to stop people from marrying somebody else while still married!

    What business is it of yours how many spouses a person has?

    Well, we don’t want people defrauding insurance companies!

    Sure. But is the least intrusive method?

    The fact is, that before those racist laws came into existence, and the government took over record keeping, births, deaths, and marriages were recorded. They were recorded in the family bible and at the church where you married.

    Those records are still trusted today. Finding a family bible with those records in them is a treasure trove for people doing genealogy.

    There is no record keeping that requires government involvement.

    But what about the children!

    Yep, that’s an important thing. What about the children?

    Bluntly, most people getting married have no idea what the contract they are signing implies. They are likely not even thinking of that.

    It is the same with pre-nuptials. Why are you talking about pre-nuptials when we are about to get married? Don’t you love me? Don’t you trust me?

    The needs of the children need to come first. Notice the word “need”, not “want”. If you separate, you still have a responsibility to your children.

    Property

    Let’s pretend you are wealthy, you’ve got an entire $1000 in your bank account. You get married in California. How much money do you have in your bank account?

    The correct answer is $500. Your spouse now has $500 in your bank account.

    As one cynical lawyer explained it to me, a 50/50 state is where she starts with 50 percent of everything you own, the rest of the divorce is her working to get 50 percent of what you have left.

    An extreme example is during John Denver’s divorce. His wife was going to get 50% of everything he owned. He took a chainsaw to their wedding bed and cut it down the middle, giving 50% to her.

    Of course the judge didn’t see it the same way, but that’s neither here, nor there.

    All of these can be handled by actual, explicit contracts.

    We had a constructed family a few years back. The family owned 125 acres of woodland and farm land as well as a large house, a barn, and a couple of out buildings. One part of the family put up the down payment. My lovely wife and I were putting our salaries into the homestead.

    When the constructed family was destroyed, we needed to split up the household assets.

    I had been stupid, I trusted and didn’t get a good contract.

    The toxic person who destroyed the family had planned it that way. Her husband was responsible for the finances. Every penny she or her husband brought in went to paying down the mortgage. The money my wife and I brought in went to “maintenance” and “living expenses”. And he had records to prove all of that.

    The amount of their down payment plus the total of all of their salaries was about 1/3 of the total contributes my wife and I made.

    That was entirely my fault for failing to have a good contract in place.

    Contracts

    The legal books are awash with contract law. There are lawyers who have spent and will spend their entire career doing contract law, the last courtroom they saw was the mock court in school.

    We know how to write good contracts. We know how to read contracts. We can write a contract that will cover what needs to be covered.

    Do you want your spouse to have survivor benefits? Put it in the contract. Do you want child support to be 50/50? Put it in the contract. Do you want 50% of the first 5 years of your spouse’s income after you put them through school? Put it in the contract.

    Is it challenging to think of all the things that should be in that contract? Yes. Are there people that can do it? YES.

    Conclusion

    Let’s go back to a time when marriage was a religious or secular event, and contracts were contracts.

            

  • We are a rich people, here in America. Even our poorest has enough food (or could if they applied). We just don’t see people in the US starving. It doesn’t happen. There are no swollen bellies here.

    That doesn’t mean people aren’t hungry. As someone who’s lived on food stamps and charity at one point, I can tell you that the pickin’s are slim and you don’t get a lot of veggies. I had to be creative to keep myself and my family fed. But I managed.

    This is an art that too many people just don’t get. I covered it briefly in my last article about food, but it bears repeating. There are too many people in our country who have such a sense of entitlement that they think everyone should have “great food.” While I’m liberal enough to believe that we should be providing just enough food for people to survive on, even if they’re poor, I’m not of the opinion that it should come in the form of filet mignon or lobster tails. If you are poor (when I was poor), you have to learn to budget.

    And therein lies the problem. This generation has a terrible time with budgeting. They can’t seem to budget time, money, credit… and who can blame them, with the various people who’ve been in office over the last couple of decades. “Budget” has not been much in the vocabulary of any of our leaders. It definitely doesn’t seem to be in that of the parents of today’s generation.

    I remember a time, about ten years or so ago, when I was picking up supplies in a bump and dent store. We were tight, and I wanted to make my grocery dollars stretch. I walked past a gentleman with his very young daughter, staring forlornly at the dried beans. I paused, and asked if he had a favorite bean, and he looked at me with tears in his eyes and explained. Seems his wife had left him, and he was trying to work, care for his daughter, and feed her. Money was too tight, and he couldn’t afford meat. He knew beans were a way of getting protein, but he had no idea how to cook them from dry. He’d only ever had canned. I sat and explained to him several really tasty recipes that I thought would go over well with a toddler, and he bought up bags of beans with a grateful thank you over his shoulder. After that, I actually printed out several bean recipes and with the store’s permission, posted them in the beans aisle. They would be picked up every single week. I got a lot of thank yous.

    (more…)

            

  • SCOTUS Watch: Trump v. CASA, Inc, 24A886

    This is a case regarding birthright citizenship. That is not the important part before the Court. What is significant is rogue inferior courts issuing nationwide, or universal injunctions.

    The numbers of universal injunctions is difficult to know, at this instant because there could have been another yesterday, or today.

    Bush had 6 universal injunctions issued against him, 3 by judges appointed by democrats.

    Obama had 12 injunctions issued against him, 7 by judges appointed by republicans.

    Trump 1.0 had 64 injunctions issued against him, 59 by judges appointed by democrats.

    Biden had 14 injunctions issued against him, all 14 by judges appointed by republicans.

    As of May 15, there have been 40 nationwide injunctions issued against Trump. 35 come from the same 5 districts.

    This case is about those nationwide injunctions. I’ll need to spend some time reading the transcript, but my takeaway from the first few pages is that Justice Sotomayor is firmly for universal injunctions.

    My guess, is that she knows that rogue inferior judges live primarily on the left. She doesn’t need to worry about rulings that go against her agenda in the lower court getting nationwide injunctions. Those come mostly from leftist rogue judges.

    Thomas asked the first question. Sotomayor talked over the answer and monopolized the mic to the point that Roberts asked “May I hear the rest of his answer?”

    Hard reading.

    Airplanes are Bribes?

    Something that I have not confirmed, it seems as if the Biden puppet masters were talking to Qatar about getting this plane in 2022.

    The amount of noise in the signal is pretty bad on this one. My best filters suggest that the plane is being given to the US military. Both narratives seem to agree on this.

    One side says that the plane will be taken down to its bones and rebuilt to spec. The other side says we can’t trust Qatar and that they are giving a bribe to Trump in the form of this plane, which they will then blow up while Trump is aboard. The same group says that it is too expensive to accept because it will be stripped to the bones and rebuilt, so we should pay more, wait for the delivery from Boeing.

    At which point the military will strip it down to the bones and …

    One side says that the plane will stay in service. When Trump steps down, the plane will stay as part of the fleet transporting our next president. The other side says that the plane will go to the Trump library, making this a bribe to Trump.

    You can guess which side I’m leaning towards.

    Maryland Man Upgraded to Salvadorian Man

    This case is over in the court of public opinion. We’ve got the left claiming Trump is so dumb that he thought the characters M, S,1, and 3 were tattooed on his hand.

    This has led our smartest, elitist, left representatives to claim “The image was doctored! It doesn’t say MS-13”

    Then argue that the actual tattoos don’t indicate MS-13 because they found an expert who says it doesn’t.

    TdA is About to Go Flying

    It looks like the case of J.G.G. is about done with. The left is still trying to bury Trump with “contempt of court.” The plaintiffs (bad guys) wanted the terrorists to get 30 days to seek representation and to have a chance in court. The case has been enjoined for that period of time. This means the case is moot and the government should be able to ship them out.

    I have read part of a court finding that says that Trump is allowed to continue deporting terrorists.

    Typescript is Winning

    As I learn more of the syntax and tricks, this is getting easier and easier. I finished most of the text editing module yesterday. This makes it possible to edit live blocks on the page.

    I still miss Makefiles.

    Snope

    Has been listed again. It is in conference today. I do not expect to hear anything about it.

    Ocean State Tactical

    It seems I was mistaken, this case is still in an interlocutory state. The fact that it hasn’t been denied cert is very surprising to me.

    Question of the week

    What current behavior was not tolerated in your youth?

    Has your tolerance of that behavior grown stronger or less over the last few years?

    Are you suffering from behavior fatigue?

            

  • I admit that I have horrible organizational skills. I use different tools to account for that lack.

    I love me some Kanban and it looks so pretty when I start. And then it gets left behind.

    Git allows me to make cheap commits. It allows cheap branches.

    The development model should be “Create Issue. Create a branch to match issue. Work the issue on the branch. Resolve issue on branch. Merge master to issue branch. Resolve conflicts. Merge the issue branch back to master and delete the issue branch.”

    I have a branch which was “Add MD5 to images”. By the time I was ready to commit, I had almost 40 files that had been modified. I spent about an hour making commits. Moving to different branches to get the changes into the right branches.

    Once that was done, my workflows kicked the commit because of issues. Four hours to create typing stubs and to lint the added code. Painful.

    Why? Because I got the md5 done but was in the middle of using the new code, then a higher priority issue popped which got its branch but which …

    About once every two weeks, I have to spend a day organizing to get things back to reasonable.

    I love working at the Fort at No 4. The current director is wonderful. She is also in over her head and struggling to get everything done that needs to be done.

    This leads to her moving from most important to next most important until there is no organization, no completion.

    Yet, she keeps it all going. I don’t know how she does it.

    Today we had a longish meeting to go over Use Cases for the new website.

    For me, use cases are formalized brainstorming. Every use case is written as

    “As {Actor} I {Want|Need} {something}”

    The something needs to be well-defined, and it must be a single thing. You don’t write, As a web visitor, I want to be able to read the EULA and the Privacy Statement.

    That is two different use cases.

    As we were working our way though one section of use cases, she told me that the process of writing use cases for the website was helping her to organize her job as the director.

    Which is an extra benefit.

    I’m a bit tired right now. I stayed up way too late Tuesday Night, 0300 late. I’m in the making good progress, fighting my way through the tangled web of code.

    Today will be an even better day.

    Now all I need to do is find time to read some more court documents, without taking my blood pressure through the roof.

            

  • I am well and truly confused over the panic that’s currently occurring over the use of tariffs. An acquaintance of mine just posted the following (changed slightly to protect the author, who I didn’t ask before posting this):

    “We have to reconstruct the exterior stairs that were ripped off this house before we moved in, so there is a second exit during an emergency. This requires wood. Which comes from Canada. I also sell books, otherwise known as printed paper. Which comes from China. Tariffs, that’s where my money goes.”

    I had to ask said person, where are they printing their books? The last price hike I had, via Amazon KDP, was a couple or three years ago, and came to a grand total of about four cents on each of my books. I chose to eat the cost; it wasn’t enough to bother the customers. There doesn’t appear to be any kind of price hike going on at KDP for print-on-demand, and while there’s no definitive answer available (as with all things Amazon related), it appears as if about half their paper is recycled (meaning we recycle it and turn it into more paper here in America), and the other half is “sourced from the cheapest domestic available,” which to me means whatever they have on hand but local if it’s not prohibitive. At the very least, it’s not enough to cost me more per book to print.

    Obviously I can’t speak for other companies, but I have to say… if Amazon, the Great Gouger, isn’t raising prices… well, I am going to guess no one else is either.

    When it comes to wood, I can speak a bit more authoritatively. In 2024, about 72% of our wood for building (lumber) came from domestic sources. That means it was sourced here in the good ol’ United States. That’s about to change, because of the tariffs on Canadian imports. The cost of new homes will go up. Currently, that cost is NOT up. And it is entirely possible to buy American lumber for making exterior stairs or other small projects. Does American lumber cost more? For the moment, that’s possible, though I couldn’t find an example of it. Once the tariffs kick in, American lumber will go up slightly in price (because we don’t have the huge forests that Canada does, and so we can’t be cutting down as many trees as they do and have it be sustainable), but it’ll still be less than wood from Canada.

    I just don’t get it.

    (more…)

            

  • I learned situational awareness very quickly one night at University.

    It was sometime after 2300, I was talking to a co-worker at the entrance to his cubicle. Since I was focused on our conversation, I wasn’t aware that somebody had walked up behind me.

    My first indication was when I felt somebody pulling my knife from my right hip pocket. Without thinking, I turned, blocked the arm holding the knife and started to punch my attacker in the throat.

    This is the sort of thing that happens when you are young, have been training in martial arts, and are scared you are about to be killed.

    Well, I pulled the punch because I recognized it was a cop. First time I’d seen a cop in the building in over 8 years of “living” there. Last time I saw a cop in the building.

    It made me aware. To this day, I never leave my back to an entrance or place where trouble might come from. I walk into a location, I choose a place with my back protected and clear sight of most, if not all, the exits. It is just me.

    Part of being aware, is knowing when it is time to be elsewhere. The clues are often right in front of you. Ally has seen me go from relaxed, to being on a hair trigger in just a few seconds. She’s seen me shift my stance, move, so I have cleaner shot lines. And I’ve never been in a situation where I needed to draw.

    One of the first places I learned to avoid, was groups of blacks. It just wasn’t worth the risk. It is never worth the risk.

    I lived for four years in a section 8 apartment complex. I wasn’t getting government assistance, but every unit in the complex was section 8 eligible, and most of the people living there were on section 8. In that complex, there were maybe three white families, including mine.

    The house across from us was a crack house. We invited the cops to observe from my office if they wanted to. They didn’t. The dealers had a 1-mile straight view to the only entrance to the complex. If the cops showed up, they had plenty of time to ditch the drugs and guns.

    I learned to avoid my neighbors. My kids’ bikes were stolen four or five times. Locked to a rack, locked in the shed. It didn’t matter. It was just something that happened.

    So here is the thing, before I was in middle school, I never considered skin color in my threat assessment. 1 week in high school in Calvert County, Maryland, and I did.

    I was coming from Rhode Island, we arrived in Maryland, my first day of school started with a 30-minute wait for the bus, followed by a 25-mile bus ride to the school. I was picked on every single day on that bus. I hated it. I hated going to school.

    I was able to observer a half dozen black kids get off the bus, head into a tar paper shack that they called home. We knew they were on welfare. We knew because the house looked like that, but there were often 2 or 3 new Cadillacs in the (unpaved) driveway.

    The gym teacher would open the locker rooms an hour before school started. Why? Because many of those kids didn’t take showers at home. They would take advantage of the school showers.

    The school system was using merit grouped classes. They were labeled A through F. In class A there were 30 kids. One black kid. In B there were 30 kids, I think 5 blacks. In Classes D and F there were 30 kids each, and no white kids.

    The school was at a constant low rumble of violence, never breaking out in shootings or knifings, but about once a week, some black kid would be expelled for starting a fight. Most of the targets of those fights were white kids.

    By the end of the first month, I was tired of being around blacks. For the following years that we lived in Calvert County, my parents shelled out money they couldn’t afford to, so that my brother and I could attend a private catholic school.

    I’ve been told that it is extremely racist to say “13 do 50”. Why? Because what it says is that while blacks constitute about 13% of the population of the United States, they account for around 50% of all violent crime. It might be all crime.

    It is actually worse than that. About 6.4% of the United States population, black males, account for over 50% of violent crimes.

    In reading the 2019 UCR, the raw numbers are 1,488,876 whites arrested for violent crimes. 779,089 blacks were arrested for violent crime. By the percentages, that 62.97% white and 32.95% black.

    Simplifying, if there is a pool of 100 people, 13 of them would be black, 4 others, and 83 white. There would be 51 women and 49 men.

    If that pool was pulled from those arrested for violent crimes, 51 would be black, 4 others, and 45 white. 73 would be men and 27 women.

    The next “math” would be to say what the odds of a violent crime being committed against you by white, black, or other. This is not as easy, it depends on the victim’s race.

    What is true is that where blacks congregate, there will be violence and crime.

    Here is the sad part of this, it is likely that most blacks are good people. The issue is so bad that even if they are good people, we don’t know it.

    We will often look at a bad cop getting away from it. Where are the good cops stepping up and putting a stop to the bad cop’s actions? It is difficult to find that person.

    We see blacks acting out. Where are the people from the black community stepping up and putting a stop to the bad actors? It is difficult to find that person.

    I’m tired of looking at a video of violence breaking out and seeing that it is blacks doing it. I’m tired of looking at looting videos, and before they even zoom in, I know that they will be mostly blacks. I’m tired of seeing kids and the elderly sucker punched by blacks.

    I think many of us are getting tired of it.

    My father used to say, “I’m color-blind by an act of congress.” When evaluating the sailors who served under him, he was blind to the color of their skin. He was taught to judge people by their character.

    He and my mother taught me the same. Judge people by their character. I want us to start moving towards an integrated society where I can trust the person beside me to act responsibly, regardless of the color of their skin.

            

  • Maybe Val’s version is better?

    Here’s the album version

    Regardless, it is one of the tracks from my youth that lives on.

            

  • I haven’t touched on the topic of what to drink when you’re enjoying your post-apocalyptic spam, so I think today I’ll go there. 😉

    There are several really tasty, easy to make drinks for when you’re doing a lot of labor or it’s extremely hot, but you don’t have access to Gatorade or its equivalents. I would hazard to say that they’re much better for you, as well.

    Sekanjabin

    This is what we refer to as “Viking gatorade” because it was popularized by the Vikings. It originated in Persia as a mint based drink, but the Vikings played with it, and I played with it more. It is basically a simple syrup that you add to water to make it more palatable. The vinegar and sugar help balance your electrolytes, and the ginger makes it just “warm” enough (from your body’s standard) to drink even in very hot weather without causing yourself cramps. Just a note, the Vikings and Persians both added crushed mint to this. I don’t, so it isn’t included in my recipe. Feel free to add it to yours!

    Ingredients

    • 4 cups red wine or apple cider vinegar
    • 4 to 8 cups sugar/honey/sweetener/blend of choice
    • 2 tbsp minced or grated ginger
    • fruit of choice (I like lemon, strawberry, and blackberry, or a mix, but you do you)

    In a pot, add the vinegar. You can even mix red wine and apple cider vinegars for a different flavor if you like. Get the cheap stuff, by the by. This is not something where the vinegar has to be bougie. Bring the vinegar to a low boil, then begin to add the sugar, a cup at a time. I usually use four cups of a mix of sweeteners, but always use at least one cup of real sugar to help it become syrup. Stir in between, preferably with a wooden spoon. When all the sugar is in and has dissolved, add in your ginger, and your fruit. When it comes to fruit, you can use fresh, but frozen works better because it sort of dissolves in the vinegar. I’ve done it with fresh, though; just cut it up into chunks so the “meat” of the fruit is exposed.

    Simmer your fruit stew for a minimum of 20 minutes, and likely much longer.  You should reduce the amount of liquid in the pot by AT LEAST one third. It’s usually easy to tell, because it leaves a sugary ring on the edge of your pot. What you want is a syrup, not a liquid, so wait for it to really begin to thicken up. You want it to have the texture of a light corn syrup or maple syrup, but not be as thick as molasses. Allow your syrup to cool for several hours.

    Once it’s cool, strain the sekanjabin through cheesecloth or a lint-free towel, and store in jars. I usually purchase the apple cider vinegar that comes in a glass bottle (it’s cheap), and so I pour it right back into the bottle and put the diffuser thingie back in. That way I can easily shake out just enough to sweeten my water.

    To use, add about a tablespoon of syrup to 8 oz of water, stir, and enjoy. You may want to add a bit more or a bit less depending on both your tastes and the intensity of your sekanjabin. Store your sekanjabin at room temperature for up to a week, or in the fridge pretty much forever (I’ve never had it go off).

    Note: it’s pronounced seh-KAHN-ja-bin

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  • Judge Boasberg is a rogue judge. He has found himself as the judge of many cases dealing with Trump. For some reason, the magic lottery machine picks his name at “random” when the case involves Trump.

    While it is true that you should never attribute to malice that which can adequately be explained by stupidity, this guy is not dumb.

    He made it through Yale to be given a Bachelor’s. He then completed a Juris Doctor at Yale, then passed the bar. He was in private practice from 1991 though 1996. In 1996, he became an Assistant US Attorney for D.C. After 6 years, he was made an associate Judge at the Superior Court of DC. This is a “state” level court.

    In 2011, Obama appointed him a Judge of the District Court, District of Columbia.

    I don’t care what your politics are, you don’t make it to this point without having some level of smarts.

    So this is not something that can be explained away by stupidity, leaving malice as the most likely cause.

    Boasberg was slapped down by the Supreme Court in April. The Justices said that he did not have Jurisdiction in the case.

    He knew this. He knew it when the case came before him. He issued a Preliminary Injunction, called it a TRO, then allowed the administration only a short time to accomplish the impossible.

    Having been put in his place by the Supreme Court, he then proceeded to hold the administration in contempt of court for failure to follow his TRO.

    It works like this, a party requests a TRO, asking for something, “bring me the head of that troublesome priest.” The judge grants the TRO. Now, the party ordered to do bring the head refuses.

    They are now in contempt of court. They appeal, the Appeals court says, “you can’t order them to execute somebody.” The party no longer has to cut the head of that troublesome priest. They are still in contempt of court.

    That is the power of a judge.

    That is what Boasberg did. He gave a court order. That order was not followed out because it was not possible, nor was it an order he had the constitutional authority to issue. He has the case law to back him, though. He knew the administration would refuse, and therefore he gets to slap them with a contempt charge.

    Having found the administration in contempt, the administration appealed to the Circuit Court and requested an administrative stay by the district court.

    We are used to seeing this in Second Amendment cases, the district court finds for The People, the judge knows the state will appeal, he issues a 30-day administrative stay of their order to allow the state time to appeal.

    This judge denied the motion for an administrative stay.

    He ordered the government to assert they have custody of the people in CECOT. This means that the administration can be ordered to present any of them in court. If the administration does not assert custody of the deported Alien Enemies in CECOT, they must provide this rogue judge some other means of ordering them to bring terrorists before him.

    The only other option he “granted” was for the administration to offer up a scapegoat to be vilified and punished by this rogue court.

    Here and concurrently in the Court of Appeals, Defendants seek an emergency stay pending appeal of this Court’s Probable Cause Order. See ECF Nos. 80 (Probable Cause Order), 88 (Mot.), 89 (Mot. Br.). The Court will deny the Motion. The Court does not believe that Defendants have made an adequate showing on the merits, nor convincingly shown they will suffer irreparable harm in providing the information required by the Order. The public interest, furthermore, weighs in favor of permitting the Court’s contempt inquiry to proceed. See ECF No. 81 (Probable Cause Op.) at 2.

    Among other problems, Defendants’ arguments rely on a misconstruction of the Court’s directive. Having found probable cause that they committed criminal contempt, the Court required Defendants to choose one of two paths. See Order at 1. First, they can opt to purge their probable contempt and explain to the Court how they will do so. Id. In its Opinion, the Court observed that the “most obvious way” for them to do so would be by choosing to “assert[] custody of the individuals who were removed in violation of the Court’s classwide TRO so that they might avail themselves of their right to challenge their removability through a habeas proceeding.” Op. at 43–44. In offering the Government a chance to voluntarily assert custody of the people it placed in a foreign prison, then, the Order did not “forc[e] the government to successfully execute foreign diplomacy” in violation of the separation of powers. See Mot. Br. at 11. The Court expressly allowed, moreover, that Defendants could “propose other methods of coming into compliance.” Op. at 44. Whether to purge the likely contempt, and whether to do so by voluntarily asserting custody of those individuals in Salvadoran jail, is entirely up to Defendants. If they do not want to “make what was wrong, right,” Abrego Garcia v. Noem, 2025 WL 1135112, at *1 (4th Cir. Apr. 17, 2025), they can choose the second path: identify the individual(s) whose conduct caused the noncompliance. See Order at 1. Although the Opinion noted that the Court might eventually refer this matter for prosecution, see Op. at 44 (citing Fed. R. Crim. P. 42(a)(2)), we are not at that juncture. Their separation-of-powers arguments concerning any future prosecution(s), see Mot. Br. at 8–11, are therefore premature and misplaced.

    For the foregoing reasons, the Court ORDERS that Defendants’ [88] Emergency Motion for a Stay Pending Appeal is DENIED.
    — J.G.G. v. TRUMP, 1:25-cv-00766, (D.D.C. Apr 18, 2025) ECF No. 91