I saw something to the effect of, she could be impeached by the county's legislative body but that would take a long time.
But surely there is some mechanism for dealing with elected officials who just refuse to follow the law and perform the tasks they were elected to do, right?
Jailing for contempt of court, I guess.
I have a related question - what's the mechanism for making a legislative body comply with a court order?
Oh, it would have to be the state legislature. So yes, contempt-of-court sanctions are the most practical (perhaps over time they could be amped up to prohibitive and forcing resignation).
She should say: "I'd like to have Kentucky on my side, but I must have God!"
My outrage is on such a random hair trigger lately. Huge terrible things (the Dupont story) just get a shrug and a refusal to learn about something so depressing. This stupid clerk makes me want to scream. Do your STUPID JOB, you stupid CLERK!
If you say that in a British accent, it sounds like "Clark." Which doesn't help at all, but I found it amusing to read it that way.
There are several ways to force her hand, but nothing happens quickly. the Judge has issued an Order to Show Cause why she shouldn't be held in contempt, scheduled for Thursday morning.
Criminal charges (official misconduct?) are apparently also in the works, but these things take time. Twitter is damned near instantaneous, courts and prosecutor's offices and legal filings are still glacially slow. I was quelle surprised the contempt hearing was scheduled so quickly
I think that sitting in a cell on a contempt charge is perfect. Yeah, she's totally willing to die for the cause yadda yadda yadda, and she'll bask in the limelight for a day or two. But two weeks? Four weeks? Three months? No, she'll cave long before that and moot the issue by resigning. Then a week or two of appearances on Hannity and O'Reilly, etc, accompanied by a well publicized GoFundMe campaign.
I think that sitting in a cell on a contempt charge is perfect.
Yes, I agree. Apparently stiff fines are also a possibility. But no doubt she has wacko supporters who would pay her fines, so that wouldn't reach her at all.
1/4: yes, the normal mechanism is that she could be impeached by the state legislature, which won't here because a majority of them support her.
No, she'll cave long before that and moot the issue by resigning. Then a week or two of appearances on Hannity and O'Reilly, etc, accompanied by a well publicized GoFundMe campaign.
Followed in short order by the Republican nomination for Vice President.
The ACLU has specifically requested that she not be jailed, I think, because they're aware that having a god-fearing clerk hauled off is bad optics. So there could be fines, but like JPJ says, it's not clear how effective those might be. But she does have to stay in Kentucky in order to achieve her obstruction, so it's not like she's not suffering.
Does she live near the Dupont factory? Kentucky is really taking a beating this week.
Yeah, I think jailing her would probably be too martyr-making. It sure is maddening, though.
Where by maddening I mean it makes me feel like a Tex Avery cartoon of infuriation. Eyeballs aoogaing outwards, smoke coming out of my ears, etc. Fuck her and her smug mug.
In a very real sense, jailing her would be making her live in a locked, confined space against her will.
On the upside, a big enough GoFundMe-paid fine would represent a large transfer of wealth from tax-hating people to the government*, which is a win-win from my POV.
*Federal, right? She's in contempt of Federal court orders, so the money goes directly to Uncle Sam Obama ACORNISIS.
Also irritating: she is a Democrat.
"...she is a Democrat."
Holy hell. Really? How do you turn out an anti-LGBT Democrat these days?
That's impressive.
Looks like she was elected for the first time last year, succeeding her nine-term mother, and she was employed by the same office for 26 years.
If she really wants to be a martyr for Christianity, I say feed her to the lions.
AFAIK, local and state party affiliations took longer to shift than national in areas that went from solidly Democratic to Republican, but she seems like a real outlier.
Her mother was pregnant with her for 81 months?
20: Have you been to central Pennsylvania? She's an outlier, sure, but she's got a decent amount of company.
Anyway, central Pennsylvania starts on the far side of the Squirrel Hill Tunnel.
Wow, I haven't thought about Sam Kinison in about 20 years.
The mortuary necrophilia bit is what I remember there.
I always remember him yelling at missionaries feeding starving kids in Africa (and yelling at the kids too)
26: on my last trip back from my parents I decided to take the slow scenic route, driving US 22 the entire way. High point of the trip was the dude flying a Confederate flag on a huge flagpile. Better yet, he was out in front of it on a riding mower, downing a beer. Really hitting all the stereotypes, not 50 miles from Gettysburg.
(reads 20) Oh, I assumed this was about stereotypical behavior. The rural mountain-and-valley counties in Central PA are some of the most solidly Republican in the state. If you're looking for conservative Democrats, try Fayette County out our way.
The talk about not wanting to make her a martyr seems backwards to me. She has already decided, and her supporters have too, that she is a martyr. That particular stripe of Christianity has the power to make literally anything unpleasant a form of martyrdom, or even things that aren't unpleasant at all ("happy holidays!"). And because their whole goal is to fantasize about being dramatically right and noble and persecuted when other people aren't they don't particularly care one way or the other about whether she actually suffers even a slight inconvenience - it wouldn't make her more of a martyr because they'll make her out to be one no matter what. Even publishing her name in the paper was enough.
Imposing actual, genuine consequences like jail time or requiring her to publicly apologize to the people she turned away would, if anything, undercut her status, because sudden actual consequences have a tendency to snap some of the less demented of them out of their silly fantasy fun and back into reality in a "Oh, um, I didn't realize there would be consequences.." sort of way. (Plenty of them will keep right on indulging, of course. But that's what they're doing right now.)
Because why should the other thread have all the fun?
I swear, the next person who tells me I'm going to hell is going to get the pacifist atheist version of something really ugly, at minimum a very disappointed glare. I heard her on the radio talking about how she's willing to face the consequences of her decision but they'll have to face the consequences on judgment day and, as a reflex, yelled FUCK YOU! loudly enough that my throat hurts.
I had something for this.
Wal-martyrdom!
That was it.
According to a Facebook post my cousin shared, the clerk has multiple divorces. Which happens, of course. But really is far more explicitly prohibited than teh gay.
I don't know how carefully my cousin screens his news, so I'm going to just assume he is right.
Wal-mart jokes: great. Lincoln jokes: unremarkable.
38: The multiple divorce thing has been pretty widely reported, appears legit. I think the story is that god forgave her because she was born again since the divorces, or something like that?
I'm also on team send her to jail, who cares about martyrdom. So the Fox News crowd gets something else to be outraged about for a while, and she ends up with a little more wingnut welfare. Small tradeoff for enforcing the law in this case. No idea what's going to happen on Thursday but scheduling a hearing so quicky--and ordering Davis and her deputies to appear personally--seems like a promising development. I suspect Davis wasn't actually in contempt until today, when two of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit tried to get a license from her (the injunction issued a few weeks ago only prohibits Davis from enforcing her "no licenses" policy against the plaintiffs who brought the case, so while she's clearly been violating the law in the interim, she apparently wasn't violating the court's order).
In completely unrelated news, it was reported tonight that badminton is more stringently graded than eg acrosport. I find this hilarious.
She could write: "Letter from a bigot in jail"
45 was obviously in reference to badminton.
Sadly the French really missed the PLO in calling a shuttlecock le volant, so boring.
It seems like a reasonable political strategy to find causes that will whip up the opposition, distracting them and consuming their donations, while minimizing the actual impact of whatever they've gone apeshit about.
49. Your autocorrect is really weird.
Presumably she signed some sort of contract of employment, and presumably that contract stipulated that she should do her job in accordance with the law of the land, so if she hasn't been fired or at least sent on gardening leave, I can only suppose that her bosses support her.
Nice job, bosses, hanging the person at the bottom of the heap out to dry, even if she is a raving bigot.
If I understand this correctly, she's a directly elected official. Her boss can't fire her or make her stay home.
She's not at the bottom of the heap, she's at the top of an extremely small heap.
For a bigger picture, numbers form Freedom to Marry via Greg Sargent:
In Alabama, there are 67 counties. 54 counties are issuing licenses to everyone.
In Kentucky, there are 120 counties. 118 counties are issuing to everyone.
In Tennessee, there are 95 counties. All are issuing licenses.
In Mississippi, there 82 counties. All are issuing licenses.
There are 64 parishes in Louisiana. All are issuing licenses.
In Georgia, there are 159 counties. All are issuing licenses.
In Texas, there are 254 counties. All are issuing licenses
See, a woman's gotta make a living, she's shown initiative in rising to the top of the competition, over 14 other county clerks, for publicity and wingnut welfare. Why do you hate the innovators and job creators?
First you get the jello salad, then you go to the picnics, then you get the votes, then you get the power, then you get the women, but only one at a time in serial marriages.
54: Thank you! "Still not Alabama" is faint reassurance but sometimes it's all you've got.
"Not quite as good as Mississippi" is another way to put it.
Watch out, Mobes. My yelling-FUCK-YOU muscles are in good shape!
Anyway, I'm doing my part to not create more gay marriages here. It could be worse!
I find this "don't make her a martyr" concern bizarre. The point here is not to find a way to punish her that her value system couldn't somehow make a virtue of, but rather to let homosexual couples in her county get married. Just fine her and/or put her in jail until she leaves her post, and replace her with someone who will respect the laws.
One really great thing about decisively winning a battle against the right-wing is, you no longer have to care what they think about it. If she wants to feel like a martyr, let her. Who gives a shit?
50 is true. And it's an especially good idea when, like in this case, it's an issue where openly and aggressively supporting one side of it hurts them overall.
I could be wrong but further to 61.1, isn't she rejecting all marriage licenses at this point just so no one can slip through? That may have changed and I don't feel like looking it up because I'm going to have a good day today.
I would endorse 61. Also, stop electing dog catchers. It's stupid. And it creates situations like this.
64: We elect soil inspectors too. I've wondered about that after the DuPont article especially, but they generally run unopposed.
54: Right
So the one temporary futile resistor should be if anything encouraging and celebratory in her singularity, and a very strong indication of the decline in bigotry. Yet she is the opportunity for sputtering rage.
So she isn't interesting, but the outraged who demonstrate their preference for a politics of a spectacle of grievance, no matter how distant from real oppression, as in 13/~800 problem areas, absurdly overstated in that 54 only shows problematic states, which aren't actually problematic...this focus on the intolerable unbearable sight of a single individual exception...this is interesting.
In other crucial news of the day:"Khloe Kardashian Shares Shocking Waist Training Pic"
What did Jesus say about impounding stray animals? Was he pro-leash law?
61: I think she should be jailed for contempt just because she's really obviously in contempt of court and that's not a good thing to have your lower officials become habituated to. But I don't think you can figure the fight is won and that you can stop thinking about politics. Public opinion on a national level has shifted and the courts have switched, but there are thousands of counties with similar elected officials and I'd bet that because of the way the population is distributed, a majority of them could easily elect a similar clerk.
Yeah, jail her.
Looks like the whole staff is coming to court, so maybe the judge can get someone in the office to issue licenses. In which case, a fine is probably adequate.
||
Mikulski is now on board with the Iran deal, so it's going to go through. The TVs at my gym have been showing anti-Iran deal ads for weeks now, but they seem to be playing mostly on Fox News, which seems pointless since the audience already hates everything Obama does. I do wish I could be beside Pamela Geller when she gets the news that it's going through. I think her reaction would be very entertaining.
|>
I can't get the phrase out of my head from Burrows' Thanksgiving Prayer about "decent church-going women, with their mean, pinched, bitter, evil faces."
That's probably just the leaders. Regular Iranians don't seem to look like that.
One guy in the couple most prominent in the news stories was a student of my dad's! And their attorney is a junior high friend I've kept up with a little!
And YES to 61.2
I had the pleasure, in the context of a pointless fb conversation with a friend of a friend, of getting to say to someone blathering about the gay thought police telling her what to think about marriage, "think whatever you want. You have lost."
72: The preacher at the church I attended as a teenager once gave long sermon about how Christians shouldn't go around looking like they've been "sucking on persimmons." I've never heard of a persimmon before, and much of the rest of the audience was similarly confused. By the end of the sermon we were glad that we'd never encountered this evil fruit.
"decent church-going women, with their mean, pinched, bitter, evil faces."
Some of us just have Resting Mean Pinched Bitter Evil Face.
Damn gay thought police always trying to cheer me up.
71: Do you think they are actually surprised? This isn't all theatre?
78: It might well be, but putting up ads costs money, so presumably they think they are affecting something or other. If they know they can't kill the deal but are doing it anyway then I have no insight into what they are thinking.
It's all theater. Many powerful Republicans actually know that the deal is a good thing, which is why they agreed in the first place to an arrangement where their approval, while still required, was going to be very difficult to deny.
Which plays into Trump's Revolt of the Rubes thing, but I don't think the Republican leadership has figured a way out of that yet.
Keeping the issue alive for future elections? The more het up about Iran people are, the more useful it is next year.
"think whatever you want. You have lost."
Oooh, I'm going to use that one a lot.
|| I'm going to Tucson in a couple of weeks, and will have evenings free. What, friends, do you recommend? |>
81,83: It makes sense in that the base needs regular red meat to keep their blood pressure up, so maybe it's just a matter of feeding the beast they created.
It is kind of funny watching them lose control of the base.
Apparently, talking shit about Phoenix is popular.
It makes sense in that the base needs regular red meat to keep their blood pressure up
The anti-Iran deal ads feed the larger Republican narrative that Democrats are weak on defense, no? It's to help toward success in the 2016 elections, not particularly with respect to the Iran deal itself.
88: Yeah, maybe they are trying to establish the Iran deal as Munich Agreement II in order to try to hang it on Hillary or whoever wins the Dem nomination.
72 is so apt.
This thread is now the perfect conjunction for the invocation of the Gayatollah Abu-Labs and his superkoranic fellatio power.
75: I probably have a geographic obligation to stick up for persimmons too. The ones that are not sour are good! Persimmon bread is tasty. But the texture is a bit gelatinous and the giant seeds can be awkward.
I've never tried one, but fallen persimmons are disgusting to step on. They smell vaguely like dog shit.
As bad as gingko? That's my whatever-the-opposite-of-a-gold standard is. Around here I don't see urban persimmons, so it's never been an issue.
89: Yeah: setting the stage for a public disdain of politicians who voted for and/or supported it.
Speaking more broadly, and domestically, to the OP: Republicans are making great strides in smuggling libertarianism into conservatism -- it's been apparent for some time. Maybe it was always there and I didn't notice; I'm not a scholar of these things. I've been struck, though, by recent mentions of the Lochner era. The linked piece is not at all the first I've recently seen (Ian Millhiser, maybe, had something not long ago).
It would be fun if the judge sentenced Davis to jail until she complies, and then Democrats managed to write her into victory in subsequent elections.
Millhiser. He's written many things on this.
85: Let me ping kayak; in the meantime you can search archives for "Tucson kayak". Tohono Chul park is very lovely, but I'm not sure if it's open late. I am blanking on the name of the really good restaurant we went to.
85: What part of town will you be in? There is stuff to do downtown around the university, and stuff to do up in the northern foothills, and an annoying dead-zone drive between the two.
If you get free before dusk and can get to the north side, one of the very best evening things to do this time of year is take a short hike up one of the mountain trails and watch the sun go down. Bottle of wine optional.
ogged, you are a perverse fellow. This whole thing is another challenge via RFRA toward the proposition that private rights trump public laws.
Blarrgh! I'm with E.Messily that it's insane-making. No fun, no fun at all, until the assholes leading that parade face the fact that, per Smearcase, they have lost. I've changed my mind: I initially thought that throwing the KY clerk in jail was a bad idea, but fuck that shit. The US follows the rule of law.
I was wondering who was behind the KY clerk's protestations, who were her advisers and legal counsel. It's Liberty Counsel, an offshoot of Liberty University, Jerry Falwell's outfit. Hilarious.
99. North, generally. My work is in Oro Valley, but I'll have a car.
Totally OT, but I was not aware that having had an abortion meant automatic excommunication from the Catholic Church. Huh.
102: I recommend the start of Pima Canyon trail (Google "Iris O. Dewhirst Pima Canyon Trailhead" for access point) for low-impact desert wandering.
There is lots of eating. "Vivace," "North," "Tavolino" are fancy restaurants up north. For less fancy, very good Mexican food, Rosa's on Fort Lowell. Excellent Japanese at Yoshimatsu on Campbell.
Bars, student life, etc. cluster around University Avenue next to campus, and also around Fourth Avenue. El Charro and Cafe Poca Cosa are the two storied Mexican places in the area.
Maybe putting up ads is cozy payola?
Political consultants get paid as a percentage of the ad buys, no?
I am with 68. She needs to be thrown in jail for contempt of court because she currently epitomizes contempt of court. I liked this summary of the situation by one of my lawyer buddies.
https://twitter.com/ShoesThenPants/status/639220080027521024
103. Explicit Christian condemnation of abortion goes back to the Didache, a sort of rule book for Christians which is generally dated to the late 1st century. So it's fairly solidly founded in the Christian tradition, although Didache doesn't say anything about excommunication in any context. Abortion is also forbidden in the original version of the Hippocratic oath. Modern people who defend abortion rights, including me, just have to suck this up.
[You could have a debate about what was seen as abortion in antiquity. Aristotle believed that ensoulment occurred 40 days after conception for male fetuses and 90 days after conception for female fetuses, so that abortion before that time was wrong but not murder. This was the official Christian view from Augustine to the 16th century, after which the current line began to predominate.]
Right, but it's the excommunication that's a surprise for me also. Probably because it did depend on the bishop and I never lived where a bishop had that rule.
Or rather, that it was some sort of excommunication that regular reconciliation wouldn't work for. Because sometimes any serious sin is referred to as excommunicating yourself, but you could just go to a priest for reconciliation.
I just got sucked into reading a bunch of translations of Exodus 21:22-25. It's the bit that's cited by liberal Christians as proving that abortion is a matter of property, not life:
King James (1611):
22 If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman's husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.
23 And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life,
24 Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
25 Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
And a little clearer in the Revised Standard Version (1952):
22 When men strive together, and hurt a woman with child, so that there is a miscarriage, and yet no harm follows, the one who hurt her shall be fined, according as the woman's husband shall lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. 23 If any harm follows, then you shall give life for life, 24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25 burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
After the American religious right decided to make an issue of abortion in the early 1970s we get the New King James Version by Tyndale House, a conservative Christian publisher (1979):
22 "If men fight, and hurt a woman with child, so that she gives birth prematurely, yet no harm follows, he shall surely be punished accordingly as the woman's husband imposes on him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. 23 But if any harm follows, then you shall give life for life, 24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25 burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
I remember conversations at our church when I was a kid about whether to adopt the New International Version or the Revised Standard Version. NIV has the 'premature birth' language and RSV the 'miscarriage' language. I did not appreciate at the time what was going on, but it was clearly the first shot in the skirmish that turned our previously non-denominational church baptist.
That's all the protestants. As far as I recall, chris is right about the Catholic line.
Aristotle believed that ensoulment occurred 40 days after conception for male fetuses and 90 days after conception for female fetuses....
Aristotle, Aristotle -- where the fuck did you come up with this stuff?
113: Yeah, the Catholics don't fetishize scripture quite the way conservative protestants do.
That and they don't really worry so much about what the English translations say.
109 -- sort of, though the current Catholic condemnation of abortion is based on natural-law reasoning, not tradition, while rejecting Aristotle's version of natural law on this issue (which as you say held sway for most of the years the Church has existed, and which also resonates in Roe v Wade but whatever). Protestant hostility to abortion mostly dates to 1973, at least as a major thing.
114/5: through careful observations*, some of them a bit disturbing. Like most of the times when he seems to say something that is odd it's not clear why he observed what he did/whether he was the one doing it himself or reporting someone else's observations/how much of it was 'generally known' stuff or stuff he heard from midwifes/how exactly he was interpreting what he saw.
The "first principles" thing is just Russell being cute and trying to talk up science as he saw it, despite having very little idea what actually happened at the time.
*He seems vaguely dubious of it but one of the two reasons is the claim that the quickening occurs sooner for male fetuses than female ones. Also there's this bit which, I can only assume, came about from examining cases where miscarriages happened for different reasons or he just wasn't as great at sexing fetuses (which, given the sizes involved, wouldn't be too hard to believe):
In the case of a male embryo aborted at the fortieth day, if it be placed in cold water it holds together in a sort of membrane, but if it be placed in any other fluid it dissolves and disappears. If the membrane be pulled to bits the embryo is revealed, as big as one of the large kind of ants; and all the limbs are plain to see, including the penis, and the eyes also, which as in other animals are of great size. But the female embryo, if it suffer abortion during the first three months, is as a rule found to be undifferentiated; if however it reach the fourth month it comes to be subdivided and quickly attains further differentiation. (History of Animals, bk VII part 3)
Protestant hostility to abortion mostly dates to 1973 some point after 1979 at least as a major thing.
Though from Tennessee, this story is on topic.
Off topically, Karl Dönitz's face is too small for his head. I never noticed before, but now I can't not see it.
Apparently, Hamilton County Tennessee is an actual populated place, not some small town.
122 -- were you flipping through the Donitz centerfold picture spread in Modern Nazi magazine?
I was reading about the Battle of the Atlantic on Wikipedia, as one does from time to time.
I would like to describe the sensation of Sichuan peppercorns as being like touching your tongue to a vibrating object*, but it feels like such low-hanging fruit. Since I write for the Dan Savage/massage parlor paper, it's not as if I can tell myself that my readers' minds aren't in the gutter.
*based on an actual experiment in which the subjects did precisely this, and uniformly identified 50 hertz as the frequency of the sensation
through careful observations*
Didn't Aristotle famously say that women have fewer teeth than men?
It's possible he never bothered to count the teeth in a woman old enough to get wisdom teeth.
129: Just for publishing an incorrect finding about teeth?
This is the bit though:
Males have more teeth than females in the case of men, sheep, goats, and swine; in the case of other animals observations have not yet been made: but the more teeth they have the more long-lived are they, as a rule, while those are short-lived in proportion that have teeth fewer in number and thinly set.
It's in one of the books where he just kind of goes down the list collecting and organizing facts and observations. This bit happens in the middle of talking about teeth at great length. So, yeah it's still one of those observations by whom/where did that come from? bits but not evidence for anything else. A lot of people assume that there's some general social/historical explanation for why the women that surrounded him might have had fewer teeth, but he also has a lot of reports of stuff other people have made observations of, some of which is, to be kind, unreliable.
130: He actually does go straight on to talking about wisdom teeth, but he says they show up at roughly the same time for everyone (around twenty years old, but occasionally a lot later and it's painful when that happens, basically) so it's possible but he definitely knew they were a thing so who knows.
True story: I was walking along the street the other day and was startled to see a whole group of people with alarmingly bright teeth walk past me. Then I looked at their shirts and saw it was a group of future dentists.
Or maybe dental techs. I don't know what all they get up to in the dental school.
Still, it looked like they used radium for toothpaste.
Looks like Davis gets her martyrdom.
The judge specifically said he believed a fine would not compel compliance since outside groups would raise the money.
It's going to be hard to take care of that long of hair in jail.
But at least she'll get a more flattering outfit!
139 What, did her GoFundMe crack $2?
The judge specifically said he believed a fine would not compel compliance since outside groups would raise the money.
It's like he read my comment!
Anyway, I hope she enjoys her martyrdom.
So.. what is her eventual goal here? Is the idea that she/her lawyers think that they'll back down, or is she just high on the idea of being a martyr and will sober up after a bit of time in jail and quietly agree to the deal?
I kind of hope that the Judge gets tired enough of this that he withdraws the deal, though.
what is her eventual goal here?
To milk as much attention as possible.
But if so I'm not sure this is a good play: "Kim Davis still in jail" is a going to wear thin as a national story pretty soon. And while I'm sure the right is casting around for their sympathetic oh-my-religious-rights-oh-noooo person she really doesn't seem like a very good choice for that. She'd have been better off being forced forced! to sign the things and making that the big hassle than sitting in jail over it. (That's not to say it isn't her goal, but if it is we're likely to see her back off pretty quickly.)
I wouldn't rule out the possibility that she really thinks signing a gay marriage license will condemn her to an eternity of torment in hell. Which is probably worse than being jailed for contempt.
More likely is that she's getting very bad advice from her lawyers, who stand to gain the most here, and are likely telling her (or failing to disabuse her of the notion) that she will win in the 6th Cir or SCt, or that the Ky legislature will come to her rescue.
148.1: But in that case, the relevant question is which is worse, being jailed for contempt or resigning?
Well, yeah. That's where 148.2 comes in. She clearly thinks she's going to get to go back to her job in the reasonably near future, and a few weeks/months cooling her heels is worth it to keep it.
This reminds me of a question I've always had. When Davy Crocket said, "You can go to hell -- I'm going to Texas," did he mean that in the "Six of one, half a dozen of the other" sense?
From every description it also sounds like she fits into the small-town/county-royalty category too, so I'm guessing the idea that she won't win is a bit foreign to her. She's just waiting for her social cred/influence/etc. to kick in and put her back on top. It's probably not going to, obviously, but it's not hard for me to imagine that, given the endless string of appeals and almost certainly questionably honest lawyers, she really does see this all ending up with her triumphantly walking out of jail and taking her justified revenge on those deceitful clerks who signed the forms when she was away.
The fact that the clerks all agreed to do it the second she was in jail, and pretty much openly said that they hadn't before because she made them not do it and they were scared of her, makes me think they have a more accurate picture of how all this is going to turn out.
Is there a chance of this getting to the Supreme Court and result in the intellectual bankrupts in the majority discovering an inalienable right to religious freedom that applies only to conservative Christian bigots?
I've totally come around on the sending her to jail question. Jail, hooray!
The Supreme Court already told her to fuck off, as I recall. But I can easily see the state passing some kind of Kim Davis Religious Freedom Act or something and then that making it up there.
155: they denied her application for a stay pending appeal, which itself isn't a great predictor for whether they'd take the case when it's ripe for review. But I think the chances of them ever granting review (much less ruling in Davis' favor) are very very small. I think the state legislature doing something like jiggering the duties of county clerks to give Davis an out is the most likely outcome here.
I wouldn't rule out the possibility that she really thinks signing a gay marriage license will condemn her to an eternity of torment in hell. Which is probably worse than being jailed for contempt.
She could resign on principle if that's her concern. Which is not as bad as being jailed for contempt. But is worse than being jailed for contempt AND becoming a right-wing celebrity.
Maybe she's been told regardless of the outcome she'll be able to make a good living with speaking gigs.
150 to 157. If she resigns she gives up an $80k/year job--I'm guessing there aren't a whole lot of $80k jobs in Rowan County that she's qualified for. So her choices are burn in hell; give up a good salary and hope the wingnut welfare makes up for it; or spend a little time in jail, seeing how much of that wingnut welfare actually emerges and waiting to prevail in court or in the legislature. With her lawyers--who really do gain from all the publicity--encouraging her to think there's a good outcome just over the horizon.
I assume she's still getting paid while she's in jail, and given the context I wouldn't be entirely surprised if she could get reelected in there.
Didn't Aristotle famously say that women have fewer teeth than men?
For a long time, Japanese women were not allowed to become sushi chefs because their hands were too warm.
[Also, something about Galen and women's livers?]
They have the same number of fingers. I think.
So, speaking of Ky but otherwise totally OT, a 17 year old girl who we know fairly well (who has babysat our kids a bunch of times, and also takes dance classes with my wife) has organized a "free the nipple" rally on sat in the park near our house. On the one hand, I totally support the cause and think it's great that she's engaging in political activism and I'd generally like to support her. On the other hand, despite my support of the cause, the idea of a middle aged man showing up at a rally to support a bunch of topless high school girls seems like it could easily be perceived less as support and more as lechery. (And forget other people's perceptions--I'm not sure I personally could avoid feeling lecherous.) She didn't personally invite me or anything--I read about the event in the newspaper. But it's definitely an even open to the public that they're generally trying to get supportive people to attend. So, I'm not sure what to do. Thoughts?
There is no non-lecherous way for you to go.
Maybe if you offered to bring snacks.
If you bring peach schnapps and cigarettes, you'll probably get arrested.
You can order a pizza for them, from afar.
Of course 165 is right. But it also didn't answer the question.
Why do nipples need freeing exactly? Or a rally on their behalf? I mean NTTAWWT but the notion that you would be attending as a statement of deep political principle is about as plausible as ... well, there is really nothing less plausible than that.
My wife is busy and can't go. I'm actually happy to see 165/168. I was worried that my feeling that way was somehow sexism on my part. (Do I think women's breasts are inherently sexual? Would it be lecherous for me to go to the park with topless high school boys there? Etc. That's sort of the whole point of the rally.) But...
"Ladies, I'm here because I'm a feminist. And I brought pizza."
"Free the nipple"? This is political activism? Is there a less important political issue anywhere in the world? Could there be?
Why would we want to deprive ourselves of the frisson of seeing a freed nipple, which is surely what would happen with some mass European-style emancipation. I say no, the nipple must not be free, so that its freedom can be glorious. America!
177: Free the non-pokey bit of the areola.
It's not, like, feeding the hungry or something but there's something valuable in scraping away at all the bullshit gender crap out there. I mean, "getting to walk around without a shirt on when it's hot" doesn't sound like a big deal, but "not shaming people breastfeeding infants or insisting they wear complicated coverings or whatever" would be awfully nice and that's essentially the same thing, only they'd have to really commit to it in a potentially unwise way.
But also yes it would be a bit sketchy. Maybe if you showed up without your shirt on too?
I see I'm the only one here actually trying (and, admittedly, failing) to give useful advice.
181 before seeing 180, which may also count as an attempt at useful advice.
So, I'm not sure what to do. Thoughts?
My thoughts can be summed up in one word: No.
"Place the Nipple into a Seven Year Period of Indentured Servitude."
If you bring peach schnapps, cigarettes and KY, you're probably a Minneapolis police officer.
Oh hey, I was wrong: she recently turned 18. Does that change anyone's analysis?
180 doesn't count. He can't help himself.
Given that I have a documented history of not wanting to wear a bra but being concerned that my nipples are showing, I might as well mention here that I will be having a bilateral mastectomy with immediate reconstruction, around the same time as Heebie has her own mastectomy. After everything heals, I'll probably get nipple tattoos.
Free The Nipple at Huffington. There is a site, but I don't do big video at this time of night
This is political activism?
I don't have any problem with this, and approve. The personal is political, all the way down. It is connected to breastfeeding. It is a collective action against structural and institutional oppression.
I like it much more than kvetching against an isolated and ineffective homophobe. Checked the Slate comments on her incarceration, and even on that troll attracting site, she has little to no support.
Also if I showed up I would have my kids with me, which makes it either more or less creepy, but I'm not sure which.
(No need to rush in with condolences--people at the other place covered that! I just wanted to update y'all, given that many of you have at least seen artistic renderings of said breasts.)
On the other hand, despite my support of the cause, the idea of a middle aged man showing up at a rally to support a bunch of topless high school girls seems like it could easily be perceived less as support and more as lechery. (And forget other people's perceptions--I'm not sure I personally could avoid feeling lecherous.)
Follow your dreams. You can reach your goals. I'm living proof. Cheesecake! CHEESECAKE!
All the best, Robot. Quite a thought to get used to in a relatively short time.
I don't have any problem with this, and approve.
I rest the case that I made -- briefly, but I like to think not ineloquently -- in 184.
Definitely go as Enlightened Dad, urple. Ask who wants to jump rope with your kids.
170 seems like a perfectly nice suggestion too. I agree that you definitely shouldn't go. It doesn't particularly help the cause, and you feel uncomfortable about it.
I bet sending a pizza delivery guy increases the skeeziness more than sending urple.
The very best thing you can do is arrange for a busload of people from a local senior center to be there.
Also, what 194 said. (I'm not on your Facebook)
191: If they're boys, it's traditional to start with "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls."
200: In a very real sense, senior citizens don't even see nipples.
I approve of the FtN movement mostly as a movement, but no, I don't think this is a guy's movement and wouldn't attend a rally.
But I'm a separatist anyway.
Go and carry a sign reading, "Rowan County Thanks You for Your Support of Unrestrained Heterosexuality."
203 reminds me, I got bifocal contact lenses today. I'll stop joking about teen boobs now.
I've had bifocals for two years now.
I should have had bi or trifocals for decades now, but I hate them and they're expensive and I don't like being dependent on a pair (as in breakage)...so I have multiple sets of eyeglasses. One for reading, one for driving during the day, one for driving at night, etc.
I see nipples.
Nobody has bifocals anymore, Moby. They're now called "progressive lenses."
Mine are called Moist Multifocal lenses. Didn't see that coming, did you?
You, too, mcmanus, sound like a candidate for "progressive lenses." If that wouldn't offend your delicate, hair-trigger political sensibilities.
211: What's with the "Moist"? Ew. Again I say: No.
Good wishes for smooth surgery(ies) and healing, J,Robot!
They're contact lenses. I'm not really sure how they work.
I'm not really sure how they work.
Yeah, me neither. The last time I went to have my contact lenses prescription filled, just a couple of months ago, the optometrist (an emigrant from India, if I may mistake not) warned me of the hazards of my "Caucasian eyes." Apparently I should be wearing sunglasses in July and August, which I never I do. Had never heard my eyes described as "Caucasian" before; I'll admit I found it a wee bit odd. He was very polite about it, though: I didn't feel judged, or anything like that.
You know, I hadn't thought of it before, but going to a rally of topless teenagers in Kentucky with Urple and Bob McManus is def a bucket list item.
"Caucasian eyes."
He meant "light colored." Once a middle-easterner referred to my ex as "blonde" (she has dark brown hair) when she just meant "white."
The whole thing is probably just a sting to see which teachers from her school show up.
I don't worry about sunglasses because the sun really doesn't bother Pittsburgh very often.
Pause ...
teofilo and others who are wise re linguistics, is this computational linguistics olympiad outfit legit?
That's the north am version. Just turned the kid loose on the website and he's completely smitten. Will these people send him down blind alleys or are they knowledgeable nutters?
Thanks in advance!!!
Play ...
219: And if your bucket list includes 'Bizarro, Internet-inspired ways to bring my illustrious legal career to an ignominious end that, in the end, weren't even worth it,' you should totally go for it!
That would probably destroy three great legal careers if the guy who keeps bob out of jail can't find a new client.
223: Looks legit to me. I've never heard of it before and don't recognize any of the names of people involved offhand, but they seem to mostly be affiliated with respectable institutions, and the sample problems I looked at seem like a reasonable approach to introducing kids to linguistics.
He meant "light colored."
Yeah, I know. And he showed me scary, high-tech images of sun damage to light-coloured ("Caucasian") eyes, and he only wanted what is best for an eye, because he is a professional.
When Caucasian eyes are smiling,
Sure, 'tis like a morn in Spring,
And we have Moist Multifocals to deal with
that misty-eyed nonsense.
Yeah, I know
I had a sense that I was mansplaining, but I didn't let it stop me.
Oh please. Like I'm going to worry about you mansplaining to me. When you know I can always tell your mother...
I thought you could look at the sun as long as it is not an eclipse.
Stupid rarely used Android tablet.
Seems that GoFundMe earlier this year barred campaigns "in defense of formal charges or claims of heinous crimes, violent, hateful, sexual or discriminatory acts", so they can't raise money there.
I tried to see if it was happening elsewhere; Indiegogo had one but it was deleted.
I'm sure the rightwingers will come up with their own crowdfunding platform for this sort of thing once all the existing ones ban it.
I've never met a form of sun protection I wasn't instantly enamored of. Although eyeballs low on priority list as don't wrinkle. I sort of wish I could use contact lenses because so much better peripheral vision but they don't agree with me.
226: thanks! Wrenched him from some sort of Armenian alphabet quiz to come to the dinner table, he's hooked.
some sort of Armenian alphabet quiz
դա մի խոհարար գրքույկ!
Or they could open a store to support their efforts. Call it "Big Ots"
He just walked me through how he cracked, crazy!
cracked IT, as in Armenian alphabet. This phone!
Apparently not a good candidate for contact lenses, something about the combination of nearsightedness and astigmatism. My ophthalmologist, who's an American of Indian ancestry, says my pale eyes are characteristically slow to dilate, so she gives me an extra dose. Leaving her office a few weeks ago, I needed sunglasses because of the dilation. The strip of film that slides behind your glasses worked fine.
I think I seldom need sunglasses because my lenses already diffuse light considerably, being quite concave. My wife and both my kids, whose eyes are brown have contacts and therefore need sunglasses too.
I got bifocals around age forty, about twenty plus years ago. I've always had the progressive, blended kind that don't show the bifocal area with a sharp discontinuity. I probably use the transition area a lot while using the computer.
Regarding eye cancer, don't forget the lesson of Oliver Sacks.
Re: 238
We* are working on an A :rmen /ian paleography / prosopography teaching site, with illustrations from lots of cool manuscripts. Should launch next year.
* some academics, but the tech side is being done by people from 'my' team (and me).
Got audited by the IRS, and realized I did my 2013 tax return wrong, but not nearly as wrong as the IRS thinks I did (misread a consolidated 1099 form and accidentally underreported my income). But, it turns out the financial company reported gross amounts but not costs or realized gain for some stocks, so the IRS assumes I earned WAY more money than I actually did. I'm super annoyed at myself that I did my taxes wrong, but also way annoyed I got a tax bill for half my income. Had about 10 heart attacks before I figured out how the IRS got their figure, and why it was triple my actual income.
[This is boring and irrelevant to everyone, but it was traumatizing for me and actually kind of difficult to figure out, and I'm proud I stopped hyperventilating long enough to analyze pages of sales transactions and actually figure it out, so I thought I'd brag about it to strangers on the internet]
238, 247
That sounds pretty cool. My boyfriend's uncle invented the first Armenian language word processing program, but I think it was just for personal use.
248 is fucking awful. I'm glad it worked out.
You should definitely go, urple! If you're feeling self-conscious about it, you should have a few drinks beforehand.
Why do you hate Armenian word processors, Walt?
Aaaand...I'm pretty sure my new income is not taxable! Since I'm in the lowest tax bracket, long term capital gains are taxed at 0! My adjusted taxable income is increased by, like, $70. Thanks Obama!!
Didn't Aristotle famously say that women have fewer teeth than men?
And one of the authors of Genesis apparently thought men have fewer ribs than women*, so it evens out in the end.
189. J, best of luck with all that. Do you get to specify your new bra size for the reconstruction?
Echoing 249.
*I read a thing which argued that in some original version Eve was created from Adam's baculum, which would a. involve a more appropriate body part and b. be a just so story for why human males don't have bacula. It's a lovely idea but I don't believe it for a minute.
I'm not on the other place some I'm sending you some good wishes from right here, J, Robot.
---
253.last is great.
Ditto on 249.
I've met people who think men do have fewer ribs than women.
This might be one of those situations where the median or even the mode is a better stat.
On topic: marriage licenses issued.
I think the NYT is throwing all kinds of shade at her husband.
Off-topic: Salmon comes on Obama's shoe. Unless you consider it on-topic because you think gay marriage will lead to legalization of human-fish marriage.
A woman needs a man like a shoe needs a fish.
So Davis really plans "to stay in jail 'as long as it takes' until a law was passed that gave county clerks like her the option not to issue marriage licenses that violated their religious convictions"? Alright, I guess.
The best possible outcome would be that she sits in jail until the next election, gets voted out of office and then gets unceremoniously released. But I suppose that's too much to hope for.
Does a public official being held in jail for contempt of court for not doing their job still draw their salary while in jail, or is forfeiture of the salary part of the sanction for contempt? (Because if it's not, it should be.)
I didn't pick up 259 at all... It seemed like the article went out of its way to make him sound sympathetic.
I don't know how that works with elective office. I know, not that I asked, if I'm in jail for three days, I can be fired for not showing up at work. Unless I planned ahead and called it "vacation" or found a unethical doctor to write a note saying I'm sick.
264: I figured the description of his clothing was unneeded except to say "redneck" and that describing somebody as "self-employed" without saying at what type of work was a standard way of saying "lazy".
I base the second of those assumptions on the lyrics of "Taking Care of Business."
I'm pretty sure she still gets paid, just like they can't fire her without legislative action or if she's guilty of a crime. Contempt charges aren't enough. The prosecutor is considering charging her with something like abuse of office which would do it.
I kept hearing about how she couldn't be fired at the earliest until January since KY legislature doesn't reconvene until then (and even then she'd probably have enough support to prevent impeachment.) Now it's turned and her desire for a law can't be addressed until January at the earliest (and might not pass or might be vetoed.)
Davis' husband stood outside the courthouse on Friday morning, holding a sign that read, "Welcome to Sodom and Gomorrah." He said his wife was in good spirits after her first night in jail, adding she had no plans to resign and was prepared to remain in jail for as long as she felt necessary."We don't hate these people," he told reporters. "That's the furthest thing from our hearts. We don't hate nobody. We just want to have the same rights that they have."Give me a minute while I pick my jaw up off the floor.
WTF kind of legislature doesn't meet until January?
Plenty of state legislatures here have 60 or 90 day terms.
Anyway, lots of state legislatures were originally set up so that you could be a member and still farm.
Moby, when you learned in school about the unicameral legislature, was there any reference to Thomas Paine and what an ideological idea it had once been? Or was it all about efficiency, etc.
I remember thinking in Am. History that what with Bryan and Grangers, Nebraska was a pretty radical place then.
I don't think there's a problem with legislatures that cover small populations and don't have a lot of business only sitting foe a few weeks in the year. It saves public money, and in theory it could make them open to people who aren't full time politicians. But there should be a mechanism for calling them into session in extraordinary circumstances.
Not that this is necessarily an extraordinary circumstance. Let her rot in jail.
re: 275
I was thinking that a lot of these legislatures cover populations the size of a medium sized EU country, though. But yeah, if it's Alaska ...
274: It was all about efficiency and George Norris. Bryan wasn't mentioned that often, possibly because of the whole evolution thing but more likely because he lost three presidential elections. The Grange didn't come up in that regard. I can't recall it being mentioned at all.
275: There is a mechanism for calling them into special session, but, as you say, no reason to think it'll be invoked here.
275, 276: Certainly all the legislators in Nebraska had other jobs. I think all governors can call special sessions. Also, some work on two year cycles, with a short session on year and a longer one (for the budget) the next.
According to a guy who owned a house I used to rent a room in, the house was built for WJB's brother. If that's true, he would have been very disappointed by the cabinets there in the early 90s.
275: They've called special sessions before for various reasons but the governor has said he doesn't consider this important enough to be worth the cost or inconvenience.
Not my unit. It was cut up into five or six flats.
And today, they're set up so you be a legislator and still practice law or develop land or sell cars or whatever privileged occupation you might have.
275, 276 -- Ours meets for 90 days in odd numbered years. Committees will meet a few times over the interim between sessions, so there's usually some thought that's gone into the major bills that come up in the session.
The gov can call a special session, but people don't want to do that for bullshit issues.
Thanks, everyone. My understanding is that I will tell the plastic surgeon my desired new cup size, but that he or she will decide during the "swap" surgery which implant works the best with my frame.
Best wishes for everything to turn out as well as possible.
On WJB, it's important to note that his opposition to Darwinism was focused on Social Darwinism, the form that presented itself to him and his public, and which was undoubtedly a vicious ideology in its heyday. This point is very well made in his remarkable closing argument, which was never delivered, but which I recommend reading.
There was a post about this at LGM some years ago, which may still be searchable in their archives. Also a fine essay by Merrilynne Robinson.
Ronald Fisher was just beginning the work that put Darwinism on a scientific basis, and transformed statistics at the same time when Bryan was active. The issue looks different to us now.
I once, probably drunkenly pitched the idea of a play-within-the-play, intersecting with Inherit the Wind in the fashion of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead's intersection with Hamlet, bringing out the backstory and real issues that that play trivializes.
282. I only learned recently that the US only adopted the gold standard formally in 1873, just 23 years before *that speech*. It had always been represented to me that bimetallism was some kind of crazy off the wall ideology, when in fact it was simply a call to revert to the status quo of less than a generation before, and made as much sense in context as talking about the failure of the Euro today.
My understanding is that I will tell the plastic surgeon my desired new cup size, but that he or she will decide during the "swap" surgery which implant works the best with my frame.
This would make me uneasy! I keep reading all these accounts of women ending up bigger than they intended.
I think my understanding of the free silver movement went from "look at those wacky 19th centroids, marching in the streets about currency!" to "still seems kind of weird to hang your platform on, but not Ignatius Donelly weird, and also understandable given economic conditiong".
Also, I posted 282, but accidentally checked remember personal info before clicking post, then unchecked and and my personal info disappeared, which is not what I expected.
somehow I corrected conditiong to conditiong. I swear I re-wrote that word, thinking I'd fix it.
288: I know that now, but I can see how it would be really hard to put into an 8th grade text book. Anyway, they named the hospital after him.
288, 289 -- that's right, and it's also worth noting (I learned this from John Emerson) that the populist party member the Scopes trial was Darrow, not Bryan. Bryan was a Democrat who coopted some populist ideals, Darrow had helped to organize the Illinois populist party.
I actually had some fun talking the kids through the currency/tight money v. loose money issues, along with opposition to Social Darwinism as a motivation for Bryan's opposition to the teaching of evolution generally, when they had to read "Inherit the Wind". One of those nice "This whole story actually makes more sense when you know a little more" moments.
There are histories of the American Populists that basically say, in academic terms, fuck Bryan and the Democrats and their fucking fusion for fucking up the Populist movement in 1896. I cleaned up the language a bit.
Our always-surprising convergence continues.
You try losing three presidential elections and see how popular you are after that.
Mitt Romney at 300 is the new Kobe at 100.
William Grieder makes the case in Secrets of the Temple that the Populists had a reasonably sophisticated proto-Keynesian view of the economy, more sophisticated than the hard money views that led to the Great Depression.
https://twitter.com/mattblaze/status/639866193239744512
If you want it to be creepy, attach a card saying, "Roses are red, violets are blue. I'm too old to see that much of you."
I think pretending you never heard of it unless she mentions it directly to you is best.
305.2 is sound advice. But if she ever does mention it you should be supportive so I'd suggest you exclaim, "hooray!"
Inadvertently found myself in the middle of the topless rally. It went ok. There were enough adult women that I did not feel as lecherous as I had feared. Very good turnout.
It's good they're getting lots of exposure for their cause.
Nobody inadvertently finds themselves in the middle of a topless rally they asked about attending or not. Also, if you can't feel lecherous toward adult women, that's a problem for heterosexual, adult men.
Or you're using a really narrow definition of "lecherous", I suppose.
"Lecherous", 2050 definition: to lust after someone either under the age of consent or known to be intimately unavailable.
309/312: honestly. I thought the rally was in the park, which I scrupulously avoided. It turned out that the rally started in the park but was actually a parade down the main arterial street in my neighborhood. I was walking home from brunch and inadvertently ended up in the thick of it.
I wouldn't believe that from many people, but I will from you.
Also the preceding comments make me think maybe I don't actually know what exactly the word "lecherous" means.
It really comes in handy for lots of situations aside from those involving minors.
Kim Davis' Letter From A Carter County Jail is impossibly obnoxious.
