Don Dechert

I have GOT to hope the court says “OMFG WTH … NO!”

Preponderance
Beyond a Reasonable Doubt
Clear and Convincing

… is not the right order.

Sixty percent! Legit wild.

I dislike weighing in on stupid and pointless discourses, but the idea that you cannot target retreating troops is one of the most grating topics that people bring up.

You retreat so you can conserve combat power and come back to fight from a better position the next day and kill your adversary.

main economic message from
the president is that you will be poorer and you will like it

U.S. Plans to Scrutinize Foreign Tourists’ Social Media History

The United States continues down the road to pariah state. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/09/t...

And the reason DOD wants the survivors of the boat strikes sent anywhere but the U.S. —> they don’t want to have to defend their summary execution campaign in court.

Massie, looking at NATO: "somehow, the Warsaw Pact returned"

Was that trial judge a former prosecutor? That's the only world where that makes sense.

WHAAAAT?

Inside the Pentagon’s Scramble to Deal With Boat Strike Survivors

NEW: Pentagon lawyers asked State Dept. if US could send survivors of Trump's boat strikes to a notorious prison in El Salvador. Then Pentagon pushed to have survivors sent anywhere but the US — to prevent any US court cases. Gift link to our @nytimes.com story: www.nytimes.com/2025/12/09/u...

Probably a lot of institutional tales at the Pentagon of how SCOTUS abandoned DoD by deciding GTMO habeas cases. Something I'd chalk up to institutional culture, although one wonders how long that will be around given DoD's current state.

Everyone involved in sending people to CECOT should be charged with crimes.

Man, I remember that being a divisive example in Int'l Law class. Really highlighted difference between retreating but legal targets & hors de combat.

To review:

Sincerely : formal

Best : neutral

All the best : positive

All the very best : can we be friends???

Regards : from hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee

Aside from killing off tourism, really is a sop to nativism and a walled off garden of white supremacy.

Sort of think that Kleindienst was wrongly decided in terms of deference to the Executive to make this decision.

Professors who teach/students who have taken Statutory Interpretation, what casebook/readings do you use? It's not offered at NW so I'd like to get an idea

I wasn't aware it was its own class; I tended to think it was offered as bi-product in statute heavy classes with focused topics like Fed Tax, Immigration, or Bankruptcy.

man what the fuck is going on with the economy that this is where we're at

YOUR STUDENTS ARE NOT YOUR CUSTOMERS.

Get the fuck out of education if that's the way you're talking about them.

This is a serious misunderstanding I've seen people have when they think 'AI weapons' is that they assume that because they can access ChatGPT on their phone that ChatGPT is *running* on their phone.

It is not, it is running in giant data-centers with huge numbers of bespoke GPUs.

Faculty in the News: Prof. Richard Painter; NYT logo

@rwpusa.bsky.social’s 2024 brief, Trump v. U.S., was linked to and quoted in a @nytimes.com article, “Must the Military Disobey Unlawful Orders?” Prof. Painter’s brief said that presidential immunity coupled with the power to pardon crimes would be a recipe for wholesale lawlessness. z.umn.edu/axpv

to quote myself on this

Have to admit being slightly curious about state anti-terrorism laws, as they, even more than the PATRIOT ACT, seem like fear reactions aftet 9/11 and these sort of declarations seem like lordly proclamations intruding on federal areas.

Got a new piece out today analyzing the Trump 2025 NSS from the perspectives of white nationalism and conservative ideas about sovereignty.

Check it out!

This makes facially neutral policies--like poll taxes and literacy tests--that we know were adopted for discriminatory purposes legal. Organizations can now simply claim there was no discriminatory intent regardless of outcome. It's unconstrained institutionalized racism.

the true believers around nixon genuinely saw him as some kind of embodiment of the people and thought that congressional attempts to corral his authority were illegitimate on that basis. straight line from them to the executive power fetishists on the supreme court.

This is good. Enough with the Wilsonian crap that there's a single national will and that the president has some mystical connection to it. The Framers were wiser than that, and the Constitution they wrote makes no sense unless we accept that.

der sprechzettel aus moskau scheint eingetroffen zu sein…

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker did a lot, including blowing up collective bargaining for public employees. We can debate Walker’s motivation, but he certainly kneecapped public sector unions in a way that benefited Republicans. We can look at some evidence about effects. Walker’s changes improved the quality of teachers but also led to more gender discrimination in salary, which is part of what standardized pay systems and unions seek to prevent.

There is currently a push to move to at-will public employment, based on the claim that some states did this, and the results don't seem too bad. I think a) the evidence is just not great, and b) look closely, there are states where changes resulted in discrimination and political retribution.

At will? Whose will? Removing independent agency heads is part of a broader assault on a nonpartisan government

New, from me: by embracing unitary executive theory, the Supreme Court is moving towards making all public employees fireable at the will of the President.

This will not just hurt government competence, it will aid democratic backsliding. 🧵
donmoynihan.substack.com/p/at-will-wh...

There is no monstrous grift Jimmy Fallon won't run cover for