Open Thread – 8/24/2010

 Posted by at 1:04 am  Personal, Politics
Aug 242010
 

Yesterday I kept up with replying to comments and returning visits.  I expect no trouble continuing that today.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today it too me 4:54.  To do it, click here.  How did you do?  It’s a real dawg!! 😉

Short Takes:

From LA Times: A U.S. district judge on Monday blocked the federal government from funding all research involving human embryonic stem cells on the grounds that it violates a 1996 law intended to prevent the destruction of of human embryos.

The judge was a Reagan appointee.  It will be years before the judiciary can be balanced again.

From Washington Post: Former Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel (R) will throw his support behind Rep. Joe Sestak’s (D) Senate candidacy tomorrow, the latest in a series of out-of-state surrogates getting behind the Pennsylvania Democrat.

Hagel was one of the last principled conservatives to be driven to the sidelines by the current wave of Republicans without authentic values.

Cartoon: from Cagle.com

24bagley

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  6 Responses to “Open Thread – 8/24/2010”

  1. Tom Harper says:
    August 24, 2010 at 11:09 am

    That cartoon sure sums it up. Food and drug safety, clean air, clean water — deregulation is the gift that keeps on giving.

    Good for Chuck Hagel. As you said, “one of the last principled conservatives to be driven to the sidelines” by the ‘baggers and birthers.

  2. Lisa G. says:
    August 24, 2010 at 11:43 am

    I have no doubt that that ruling will be overturned by some rational (activist) judge.

    A Repub supporting a Dem? I don’t think I’ve seen this in my lifetime? WTF is the world going rational?

    Tainted food will always be around as long as we have factory farms that cut corners on safety.

  3. SoINeedAName says:
    August 24, 2010 at 1:39 pm

    I think the SCOTUS ruling in Chevron v NRDC will be the undoing of Lamberth’s injunction:

    Essentially, Judge Lamberth claims that all ESC research cannot be funded because it requires scientists to build upon previous research that involved the destruction of an embryo, but it’s difficult to square this decision with Supreme Court precedent. Under Chevron v. NRDC, judges are normally supposed to defer to an agency’s reading of a federal law unless the agency’s interpretation is entirely implausible, and the Obama administration quite plausibly read the Dickey-Wicker Amendment to only prohibit federal funding of the actual destruction of an embryo — not federal funding of subsequent ESC research.

    Source:
    http://thinkprogress.org/2010/08/23/stem-cell-lamberth/

    … AND from a law professor:

    First, from a legal standpoint, Lamberth’s ruling is quite vulnerable; it’s not on solid ground at all.

    (snip)

    Because of the Chevron rule of deference to agency statutory interpretation, Lamberth has to find that this is the only possible (and reasonable) interpretation of the statutory language — and so he does, finding that the statute unambiguously means what he says and nothing else. But — to me — that’s really unconvincing. It seems to be that yeah, one reasonable person could read the statute as Lamberth does — but a different reasonable person could have no trouble concluding that person B, in my hypo above, is not conducting “research in which a human embryo [is] destroyed.” And in that situation, under Chevron, the government has to win. So I’d say that Lamberth’s ruling is vulnerable to reversal.

    Source:
    http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2010/08/one_law_profs_opinion.php#more?ref=fpblg

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