Under orders from Donald Trump, the U.S. invaded Venezula and kidnapped its purported leader.  I certainly have no love for Maduro, and Venezula is probably much better off without him, but one question that comes immediately to mind:  how is this not an act of war and so not a violation of Article I of the Constitution that gives the power to declare war to Congress, not the president?

One argument you’ll hear, and if you’ve been following the news have already heard, is that the president has the right, indeed the duty, to protect American troups.  OK, sure; but so what?  What were the troups doing there to begin with?

Another argument you’ll hear, and if you’ve been following the news have already heard, is that Maduro was never the legitimate Venezulan leader.  OK, sure; but so what?  He’s certainly a citizen of Venezula.

A third argument you’ll hear, and if you’ve been following the news have already heard, is that we were simply arresting a probable criminal because Maduro has been indicted in New York for drug smuggling and several other related charges.  OK, sure; but so what?  As far as I know, he has never been indicted in Venezula.

We invaded a foreign country and abducted one of its citizens.  I ask again, how is this not an act of war?

I suffered through the watching of Trump’s press conference this morning (he’s clearly losing it*), and one thing that jumpped out at me is that the U.S. will remain in Venezula to oversee the transition of power.  Really?  That sounds like war to me.

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*He had trouble just reading from his script; and eventually succumbing to the need to make it all about himself, he veered off into how, according to him, he has reduced crime in America.  If Biden had given a speech like that, the press would have been all over how he’s no longer fit for office; but I guess, with Trump, that’s just old news.

The Supreme Court has declined to set aside a lower court ruling against Trump’s deploying the National Guard in Chicago.  SCOTUSblog has the whole story.  This could affect a similar case re Portland which has been on hold pending a decision about Chicago.

It was apparently a 6-3 ruling with Alito, Thomas and Gorsuch dissenting.

This was a shadow docket thing, so they could change their minds when the case comes up on the merits docket.  We’ll see…

One thing that jumped out at me, although it’s probably the least important point about the case, is the question of whether “regular forces” means the U.S. military or civilian police forces.  When I was serving in the USAF during the Vietnam war, “regular Air Force” was always meant to refer to career folks as opposed to reservists.

Ray Hartmann, U.S. Representative from Missouri’s First Congressional District (mostly the city of St. Louis), reports that my rep. from the 2^nd District, Ann Wagner (I’m not to blame for her, I promise), got a little confused. 😎

It’s so nice that Republicans are protecting us from those godless libruls.

I’ve been following SCOTUSblog lately because, given Trump’s total disregard for the law and Congress’ inability to do anything about it, I think that the judiciary is our last hope of avoiding tyrany.

There’s a case in North Dakota about gerrymandering away the Native American vote.  A federal district court ruled that a map drawn by the state legislature couldn’t be used and had to be redrawn; and when the state didn’t do it, ordered the use of a map drawn by the plaintiffs.  The circuit court reversed that on the grounds that the people affected by the map don’t have standing to sue (or something); and SCOTUS have put the reversal on hold pending review by the Supreme Court in its emergency docket.  Only three of the Gang of Six dissented, so maybe there’s still hope.

As expected, Amy Howe has the latest news and has more information about the issue in an earlier post.

In a “shadow docket” case, the Supreme Court have paused a lower court injunction that would have blocked Trump from unilaterally gutting the Department of Education.  It was an unsigned ruling, but we know how each justice voted beause Sotomayor wrote a scathing dissent that Kagan and Jackson joined.  If the Six like rule by executive decree so much, I can think of a few countries where the might be happier.

Amy Howe has the facts (without my editorializing).

Update:  HHS, too.

Oh, oh.  SCOTUS could decide some time next year that there are no limits on election campaign money at all.

Keeping our democracy depends on at least two of the gang of six being not entirely shameless.  There was some indication of that this last term, but not on any of the really big cases.

Update, 14:30−5:  Another SCOTUSblog post.

John Roberts is speaking to 4th circuit judges and saying that judges should care only about where the law leads, not about what the effects of the decision are.  Given that each justice’s vote on the really big cases that make the news can be predicted with a high degree of accuracy, I have trouble believing that he’s telling the truth.

St. Louis’ No Kings march seems to have gone well.  Our NPR station has a much better description than anything I could write.

Our MAGAt governor called out the National Guard and nothing happened.  One of my senators actually “blamed” the protest on George Soros.  (I couldn’t make that up.)  I’m laughing at both of them.

Trump has a really stupid idea (OK, he has lots of stupid ideas, but one in particular) about giving all the grants currently going to Harvard to tech. schools instead.

Now, money for vocational training is a Good Thing, and Robert Reich has a good take on that.  I was a really crappy student (mostly because I was lazy…I’m not proud of that, but facts are facts), and my highest academic credential is an Associate Degree in Electronic Technology from a proprietary technical school.  It was during my time there that I discovered computer programming, and I still remember the PDP-8 machine language. 😎

But that’s not anything that Trump cares about.  He’s just lashing out like a 2-year-old because Harvard told him “no”.  There are some signs that folks are beginning to see that, and we can hope that that’ll make a difference in the mid-terms next year—if we still have elections by then.