Abusing the ‘qualified immunity’ provision to terrorize ordinary people

One of the truths of law enforcement is that if you give police extra powers that are supposed to be invoked only in extreme situations, they will find ways to use those powers more routinely, either to enrich themselves (as we have seen with civil asset forfeiture) or to show off their power and might, as we seen with the use of surplus military style equipment that has been distributed to local police departments. SWAT team that are supposed to be used in extremely dangerous situations are instead used indiscriminately because police love the drama and visibility of SWAT raids. It looks good on the nightly news.
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Deconstructing Mooch-speak

We see that the new White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci has claimed his first high-profile victim. White House chief of staff Reince Priebus has been fired and replaced by the head of Homeland Security John Kelly. If you are keeping score at home, others who have departed within six months include the national security adviser Michael Flynn, deputy chief of staff Katie Walsh, press secretary Sean Spicer, and press aide Michael Short. The scale of this kind of turnover does not happen by chance. It happens because of rot at the very top.
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Meanwhile, in other news …

While all attention has been focused on the Obamacare repeal drama, Russia has finally retaliated against the US for president Obama’s expulsion of Russian diplomats and seizure of properties that he did in the waning days of his tenure.

Russia has retaliated to new US sanctions by telling Washington to cut its diplomatic staff to 455 and barring the use of some properties.

The new US embassy staffing level would be the same as at Russia’s embassy in Washington.

The Russian foreign ministry also said it was seizing holiday properties and a warehouse used by US diplomats.

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Obamacare repeal is not yet dead

In the wee hours of this morning, the US Senate voted down the ‘skinny repeal’ of Obamacare bill and then adjourned for the August recess without having achieved their goal of starting the process of dismantling Obamacare. The final vote was 51-49 with three Republicans (Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and John McCain) joining all 48 Democrats in voting against the measure. As one could have predicted, McCain has hogged media praise for his gosh-darned maverickiness in voting against his party at the last minute while Collins and Murkowski, not to mention the 48 Democratic senators who have long held firm, are largely ignored.
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Now that’s some serious straight shooting!

Ryan Lizza reports on the bizarre phone conversation that he had with the new White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci that has ricocheted around the media. Scaramucci seems to not have outgrown his frat boy days because he likes to be known by his nickname of ‘the Mooch’. What kind of adult actually revels in such an adolescent label? I bet even Henry Winkler hates to be called ‘the Fonz’. But no doubt the Mooch is a great fit with his frat boy boss ‘the Donnie’ and they are always snapping towels at each other and giving each other noogies and wedgies.
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The weird Trump-Sessions-Mueller dance

Constitutional lawyers and political historians are going to have a busy time with the Donald Trump administration because it is shattering conventional norms of behavior on an almost daily basis. This is not a trivial matter. The laws that supposedly govern the actions of elected and unelected government officials have quite wide interpretations and it is custom that often limits how they should be applied. With this administration, customs and norms are being cavalierly ignored.
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