Tag: law

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privacy regulation too much government

All Your OS Are Belong to Us

California, law, Operating System, OS, privacy

The always-wrong California legislature has unanimously passed — and the state’s always-wrong governor has signed — legislation to compel makers of computer operating systems to verify the owner’s age. The information from Linux, MacOS, Windows, iOS and Android would then be transmitted to the software (“apps”) running on each respective platform.

Reclaim the Net observes that in a “different timeline, wiring an age-surveillance layer into the boot sequence of every computing device in California is an idea that would have died in committee.”

AB1043 doesn’t require any upload of government ID or facial scan, just that the user report age when setting up the OS. I am not relieved.

All the shmexperts eager to erode our privacy say that requiring web surfers to type a number into a box to report age is insufficient. If California’s new law is allowed to stand, perhaps in part because it seems fairly innocuous — any plucky 12-year-old could type “89” when ordered to report age — would the politicians stop there?

Some kind of ID verification would be mandated sooner or later. Then use of fake IDs would lead to calls for biometric confirmation. Etc.

Reclaim the Net explains that Linux distributions don’t even have a way to comply with the silly California law. Decentralized Linux exists for people who don’t want to be surveilled when doing their computing, and “there’s no entity to mandate, no account system to modify, no API to build.”

These and many more objections appear to me to be just common sense — now illegal in California.

I’m Paul Jacob.

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free trade & free markets litigation regulation

Free to Advise

New York, law, lawyers, guilds, AI, labor, licensing

People should be free to talk to each other about whatever they want as long as they’re not thereby conspiring to rob and murder and so forth. They should even be able to give advice.

Including legal advice. 

New York State disagrees. 

The Institute for Justice is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to let the non-lawyer volunteers of a company called Upsolve keep giving advice to people facing lawsuits to collect debt.

As IJ explains, New York State is trying to “protect people from hearing advice from volunteers” who have relevant training. The point is that the First Amendment “doesn’t allow the government to outlaw discussion of entire topics . . . by requiring speakers to first obtain an expensive, time-consuming license.” (That Upsolve’s advisors have relevant training is relevant but also superfluous. Even untrained talkers have the right to talk, obviously.)

In 2022, a federal district court agreed with the plaintiff that its volunteers have a First Amendment right to speak and let Upsolve operate as litigation continued. Then a court of appeals ruled against Upsolve. Now IJ and Upsolve hope that the U.S. Supreme Court will step in and put an end to the nonsense. 

We know what this is about: politicians catering to lawyers who don’t want less expensive sources of legal advice out there competing for customers. 

It’s certainly not about protecting those who would have one fewer resource to turn to were this one taken away.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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initiative, referendum, and recall

Initiative Killers

parchment limits, term limits, citizen's initiative, law, politicians

“Almost nothing is more sacred for the voters,” says Sam Reed, former Secretary of State in Washington State, “than their right to petition to change laws or to refer laws to the voters.”

He reminded members of the Senate State Government and Elections Committee that “the initiative process is utilized by progressives, conservatives, and nonpartisan individuals. . . . For over 100 years, the initiative process has served our citizens well and any changes made to it must be justified.”

Reed argues that the changes in Senate Bill 5973 (as well as in House Bills HB 2599 and 2260) are in no way justified.

“The stated reason for this bill is to stop fraudulent or forged signatures from being counted. But that’s already being done. Besides substantial penalties deterring such actions, the Secretary of State is extremely diligent and reviews every petition sheet and every signature and any that are even remotely questionable are set aside and never counted.” This means that “all of SB 5973’s requirements will substantially burden the Secretary of State’s already overworked staff and the citizen signature gathering process without any added benefit.”

The bills add more requirements that end up being more burdensome on an already high-hurdled petitioning process.

“All aspects of the proposed bill (SB 5973 / HB 2599) impose severe restrictions, limitations, and onerous requirements on circulators and ballot measure campaigns,” adds attorney Nicholas Power, pointing out that the bill’s intent section “admits there hasn’t been any fraud for 12+ years.”

What’s really going on with these bills?

Politicians generally don’t like citizens creating laws any more than they like citizens limiting their terms in office. It really cramps their style.

So, they want to kill the initiative. Instead, let’s keep cramping their murderous style.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Accountability defense & war national politics & policies responsibility U.S. Constitution

The Irresponsible vs. The Unaccountable

war, law, Congress, military

Six Democrats in Congress — Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin, U.S. Representatives Jason Crow of Colorado, Maggie Goodlander of New Hampshire, and Chris Deluzio and Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania — caused quite a stir, recently, producing a video “to speak directly to members of the Military and the Intelligence Community.” 

What did these former military and intelligence agency vets-turned-congressmen tell our current soldiers and spooks?  

“You can refuse illegal orders.”

While that’s true, and important . . . what orders are they talking about? 

Perhaps the continued bombing of ships in the Caribbean and killing of crews, all on accusations by the White House that these are drug smugglers — without any check or real accountability — is such a case.*

Yet, these powerful senators and representatives are not making it.

Instead, they’ve not even identified one breach. And by refusing to identify any of President Trump’s specific orders, their call devolves into second-guessing the chain of command and encouraging dissension in the ranks, dissuading military personnel from always being “at the ready.”

Further, these wielders of legislative power in Washington have taken no serious action to protect the Constitution nor promoted any legislative action to hold executive action accountable. 

Instead, they pass the buck to the soldier (or CIA analyst) to determine the legality of orders on the fly.

As Haley Fuller wrote at Military.com last week, “[A]sking individual service members to make on-the-spot legal judgments without guidance can put them at enormous personal risk.” 

Was this Democrat video “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!” as Trump posted on social media? I don’t think so. 

It is, however, tragically emblematic of the complete and total abdication of responsibility by these pretend leaders in Congress. 

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* Reminds me of President Obama’s policy of killing American citizens abroad by drone strikes without, as even he acknowledged, any real process of checks and accountability. Thank goodness for Sen. Rand Paul’s 2013 filibuster raising concerns about this unaccountable power to execute. 

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partisanship U.S. Constitution

Constitutional Defects

Trump, filibuster, law, nuclear option

“It is now time for the Republicans to play their ‘TRUMP CARD,’ and go for what is called the Nuclear Option — Get rid of the Filibuster, and get rid of it, NOW!” 

That’s what President Trump posted on Truth Social back during the shutdown, adding, “WE are in power, and if we did what we should be doing, it would IMMEDIATELY end this ridiculous, Country destroying ‘SHUT DOWN.’”

This was prior to Democrats, off-year election over, suddenly deciding to agree to the same deal to reopen the government that Republicans had been offering for weeks.  

The 60-vote supermajority the United States Senate needs to end debate and vote on legislation is a small-r republican measure, not a small-d democratic one. Reasonable people can disagree over its merits, certainly, but I like the greater consensus it requires. 

What I don’t like is that the party in control of the Senate can at any time change the filibuster rule in any way it wishes, including ending it altogether. 

Rules shouldn’t be this easy to junk. 

Make the Senate filibuster not just a rule, but constitutional law. 

Another major matter of constitutional change is sorely needed. The stability and independence of one of the three branches of the federal government, the U.S. Supreme Court, hangs by a thread.

The number of justices, now nine, is nowhere set in the Constitution. 

Congress and the White House, when held by the same political party — even short of 60 votes in the Senate, because they could simply end the filibuster — could immediately add ten new justices.

Or 20. 

And then confirm all the president’s picks.

All something Democrats mused about doing years ago: packing the High Court with many new justices to magically engineer a new Democratic Party majority on the SCOTUS. 

The number of justices, like the Senate’s super-majoritarian filibuster, aren’t written in stone.

But should be.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob. 

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crime and punishment government transparency privacy

Transparency, Weaponized

Jeffrey Epstein, law, transparency, privacy

Transparency is usually a good thing. But so is privacy. And so, too, are limits on government power. 

Which bring me to the Epstein files — or, more accurately, those files bring me here. 

“I don’t think we’ve had a scandal like this in this country,” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) offered yesterday on Meet the Press, “and what we’re asking for is justice for those survivors.” 

I want justice, too — that is, the prosecution of any crime grand juries honestly believe was likely committed. 

By anyone! No matter how powerful that suspect might be.

On the other hand, the Epstein File Transparency Act, which will be voted on this week in the U.S. House of Representatives and for which Khanna is a primary sponsor, “would require the Justice Department to declassify and release all files pertaining to the prosecution of the late sex trafficker, Jeffrey Epstein.”

The public has a right to know! 

But does it? 

And if so, does that ‘right’ mean we permit the federal Department of Justice to use prosecutorial power to grab incriminating evidence on “suspected criminals” and then weaponize and deploy that information not to prosecute a crime in a court of law, but rather to publicize the damaging dirt discovered in the court of public opinion?

From then-FBI Director James Comey’s ridiculous public preening over the non-prosecution of Hillary Clinton in 2016 to the demanded release of the Epstein files today, we must be careful the DOJ does not become an opposition research firm for the party in power, using badges and guns. Or the world’s most outrageous doxxing scheme.

Our criminal justice system should do one thing and only one thing: Prosecute crimes.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment ideological culture

Rethinking What Safety Means

crime, safety, law, police, Washington D.C.

Joe Scarborough threw kindling onto the fire. 

In the context of President Trump calling up the National Guard to help police the streets of Washington, D.C. — “you’ll have more police and you’ll be so happy, ’cause you’d be safe” said Trump — Scarborough prompted Symone Sanders, a Democratic strategist, fellow MSNBC host, and wife of a former night mayor of the city, with cedar soaked in kerosene: “You don’t think more police makes streets safer?”

“No, Joe,” she said, helping Morning Joe viewers decipher her racial identity: “I’m a black woman in America.

“I do not always think that more police makes streets safer.” 

Before you have time to wonder whether she’s advancing the law of diminishing returns in criminology, she quickly goes on: “When you walk down the streets of Georgetown” — a predominantly wealthy and white D.C. neighborhood — “you don’t see a police officer on every corner but you don’t feel unsafe. So what is it about talking about places like South D.C., right, Ward Eight (if you will), that people say ‘we need more officers to make us safe’?

“I think we have to rethink what safety means in America.”

While adding more police officers to a peaceful society won’t likely decrease crime much, a violent community is another story. People in these communities need greater safety to live their lives. Without becoming a statistic. Law enforcement that is visible on the street can surely help.

But rethinking the meaning of “safety” won’t. 

So what’s burning?

Democratic hopes, maybe. We’ll see how Trump’s move to clean up the capital goes.

Yet, if he tries to use the National Guard in other cities without constitutional warrant, that’d go beyond mere policing, into police-state territory. 

Just don’t consult Democratic strategists for a “rethink” of such distinctions.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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litigation property rights U.S. Constitution

The Stealing Goes On

eminent domain, theft, law

“On March 24, 2025, the Supreme Court of the United States declined to take up the case of Bowers Development, LLC. v. Oneida County Industrial Development Agency Et. Al.,” writes Conner Drigotas, “a decision that allows the practice of legalized theft through eminent domain to continue throughout America.”

This is not good news, as Mr. Drigotas explains. “In that case, Bryan Bowers had asked the Justices to review a ruling from the Supreme Court of New York that allowed Utica city officials to take land on which he had a contract to build and give it to a different private corporation for a separate construction project.” Mr. Bowers had “hoped to stop government officials from using force to pick winners and losers in the construction industry.” But it was a no go.

Politicians and bureaucrats love to grab other people’s property, under cover of “the public interest.” But their “public interest” is nothing more than a thin disguise for helping some individuals (often contributors to politicians’ campaigns) at the expense of others.

“With their denial of Bowers, Justices continued to show support for one of the most hated and notorious decisions to come out of their lofty chambers: that of Susette Kelo v. New London, Connecticut,” explains Drigotas. The Kelo case, often mentioned here, remains the ruling precedent, the government’s license to steal. Its loose construction of what can be regarded as in “the public interest” is a big part of the problem. 

Sadly, the courts have so far refused to rein in government eminent domain abuse. And voters have little sway upon the judiciary. And our representatives, our first line of defense, have also declined to stand up for basic justice and decency.

What to do? Remember that your representatives will soon be on the ballot.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment Regulating Protest

Force Over Reason

illegal immigration, riot, deportation, borders, cultures, defense, law

L.A. is in flames again, with rioting, looting, attacks on police (with “commercial grade fireworks”) and against the much-despised ICE agents. At issue, they tell us, are the horrible things ICE does to illegal entrants into the United States — kidnap them, say; or deport them, as the government puts it — and this requires. . . .

Well, what does it require in response? Open battles with the feds? 

As in the 2020 BLM riots, rioters are attacking federal buildings, with attempts at violent entry.

This is no way to persuade Americans of much of anything — other than that force triumphs over reason. 

So little wonder that the U.S. president chose to meet force with force by sending in the National Guard. Trump’s explanation on Truth Social qualifies as Classic Trump (not New Trump): “If Governor Gavin Newscum, of California, and Mayor Karen Bass, of Los Angeles, can’t do their jobs, which everyone knows they can’t, then the Federal Government will step in and solve the problem, RIOTS & LOOTERS, the way it should be solved!!!”

Federalizing the Guard will be fought in court — like everything else — but it appears to be yet another case in which folks argue that President Trump does not have the lawful authority . . . only come to find out that Congress does constitutionally enjoy said power but unaccountably legislated it away to the president.  

Rita Panahi of Sky News Australia covered the mayhem in her “Lefties Losing It” segment. “And while the Mexican flag was proudly flying throughout these protests, the American flag was nowhere to be seen,” Ms. Panahi observed, “unless it was being set alight.” 

Protesters waving the flag of the foreign state they’ve fled?!?!? 

That’s not Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment national politics & policies

Trump’s Libertarian Promise

Ross Ulbricht, drugs, drug war, prison, law, Silk Road

“If you vote for me,” President-elect Donald Trump promised the delegates at the Libertarian Party national convention last May, “on Day One, I will commute the sentence of Ross Ulbricht to time served.”

That is eleven years so far. “We’re going to get him home,” insisted Trump. 

Mr. Ulbricht, a libertarian cause célèbre, was sentenced in 2013 to double life terms, without parole, plus 40 years. 

So, who did he kill? 

At 26 years of age, Ulbricht created the Silk Road online platform, “an anonymous e-commerce website.” Used by some folks, certainly, to trade in drugs and other illegalities.

On a Change.org petition urging presidential clemency (which I’ve signed), his mother explains: “Ross is a first-time offender” and “an Eagle Scout, scientist and peaceful entrepreneur,” who faced only “non-violent charges at trial. He was never prosecuted for causing harm or bodily injury and no victim was named at trial.”

That’s why she and many of us simply cannot stand the idea that now 40-year-old “Ross is condemned to die in prison.”

Dudley Do-Right — no. Trump to the rescue!

Indeed, it was a very smart political move, courting the Libertarian vote both by showing up and, specifically, by pledging to free Ross Ulbricht. Libertarians suddenly had a tangible reason to support Trump.

Will Trump keep his word? “I do think he’s going to free Ross Ulbricht,” Libertarian Party Chair Angela McArdle told Robby Soave on his “Rising” program.

I think so, too. I sure hope so. It would be refreshing to see the awesome power our Constitution gives the president to pardon crimes and commute sentences used for someone deserving of mercy. 

Rather than someone escaping justice.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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