The Poolish - Very Fine People Edition, 7 July 2024

The Supreme Court's dismantling of American democracy continues, and more news

It’s Fourth of July weekend! What a way to cap off a couple of really tough weeks for American democracy but to light some fireworks and blow up a fraction of the country. Some of you might feel inclined to actually blow up more of it than is legally permitted, but you must fight those urges because only one person is above the law now and it’s not you. Here’s some stuff that happened recently:

The Supreme Court's Dismantling of America Continues

The nine unelected bozos of the US Supreme Court, three of whom Donald Trump planted to carry on his Presidency by proxy through what he assumes to be a temporary hiatus, are rolling out their latest round of precedent-smashing decrees like a shit-stained red/brown carpet for their incoming orange king. Since they can’t kill Roe any harder, let’s take a look at what they’ve decided to take their anger out on so far this year:

They’ve crippled the government’s ability to stop corporations poisoning you

Ah, gotta love that free market radicalism! Breathe it in, it smells like leaded petroleum. The court has thrown out what’s known as the Chevron rule. Without it, federal government agencies lose a lot of the power they had to regulate anything, instead throwing most of these regulatory decisions back to the states and the wealthy companies that may have these state governments in their pockets.

I mean come on, who could possibly know better about what’s best for you regarding tobacco than Big Tobacco, who has it right there in their name?

I hope you live in a state whose governor believes in the germ theory of disease! Even if so, you should also hope you have a government that puts principle above money, because…

You’re allowed to bribe officials now

Given the comical amount of outright bribery that Justice Clarence Thomas has been engaged in—enough bribery to earn an entire John Oliver episode—it was only a matter of time before the court was going to need to address it one way or the other, so they’ve done it in the least shocking way possible: By giving it the stamp of approval!

According to SCOTUS, it’s now 100% kosher to grease the wheels of democracy by paying off public officials as long as the payment occurs after they’ve done whatever it is you’re paying them to do.

See, it’s apparently only a “bribe” if the money changes hands before the favour, otherwise it’s a “gratuity,” a bit of wacky temporal semantics that doesn’t seem to make a lick of difference in literally any other quid pro quo arrangement. But it’s very important to make that distinction during this round of decisions because otherwise eyebrows would rise about all the free shit that they’re about to get for overturning Chevron.

It goes to show that the court isn’t beyond manipulating the rules of time and space to suit themselves, because…

It’s now illegal to be homeless

In an interesting ruling that should be termed the “extracting blood from a stone” decision, the SCOTUS has decided that it’s now reasonable to fine people for being unable to afford a home.

Framed as a measure to get the homeless off the streets and out of sight, it overcomplicates the very simple premise that the best way to do that is to get them off the streets and into a home.

The court had previously ruled that you can’t make it illegal to be homeless in an area without shelters because forcing people to go somewhere that doesn’t exist was deemed to violate the laws of physics, which typically supersede the Constitution. Instead, they have decided to solve the situation utilising the type of canine logic exemplified by this meme:

Of course when the homeless are unable to pay the fines they will likely wind up in prison, which will cost taxpayers a phenomenally larger sum than it would to give them houses. It’s okay though, because the wealthy people who lobbied for this decision won’t foot that bill.

Recipient of Tesla Brain Chip Cautiously Optimistic About Inevitable Disaster

Noland Arbaugh, the first human recipient of Elon Musk’s Neuralink brain chip, has opened up about what it’s like to have a experimental brand new piece of technology lodged in his frontal cortex by the designer of a polygon-shaped car that breaks if you breathe on it.

For reasons that, come to think of it, are probably also explained by the brain chip, Arbaugh is oddly calm about the fact that he’s the first non-monkey primate to test a device that has already killed a hell of a lot of simian predecessors. He also revealed that it would be technically possible for somebody to hack into and obtain control over his body now, which seems like one hell of an example of lede-burying by a man who may or may not himself now be classified as a Tesla.

Though the risk of being insidiously puppeteered by a black hat villain are relatively low in Arbaugh’s specific case, as he’s still a quadriplegic, he could theoretically be made to say some really silly things, like that you should invest in Tesla shares. Nevertheless, tests on a number of ill-fated animals have apparently proven that an able-bodied human would theoretically be able to be piloted remotely by someone with the skills and knowledge of the technology.

Somebody, for example, who works for Neuralink, has an obsession with control, and an insatiable ambition.

Somebody needs to ask Elon whether he knows anyone like that and take them off the project immediately.

Arbaugh, with an optimism that’s as laudible as it is baffling, trusts that some kind of regulations will be put in place to reduce the likelihood of human-puppet-related crimes before the technology is in widespread use.

We can perhaps rest assured that such concerns are being taken seriously as evidenced by Mr Musk’s repeated requests for private one on one meetings with the President of the United States behind closed doors with strictly no cameras.

Canadian Officials Applauded For High Profile Illegal Immigrant Arrest