I didn’t think that the smoke alarm would go off just because I fired up the hibachi in the kitchen!

Actually, I have two examples of the Law of Unintended Consequences to share with you today. The first you likely already know. As our own dear Ursula Faw reported recently, Supreme Court Justice Kavanaugh had to abandon Morton’s Steakhouse with his family before dessert due to protesters screaming and yelling outside.

It was reported that Morton’s Steakhouse was furious with the disruption to their operations. I think that what Morton’s was really furious about was that if Kavanaugh keeps coming in there, they’ll start to lose customers who don’t want their $300 dinners interrupted by protesters.

Personally, I would like to apologize to Justice Kavanaugh from the bottom of my heart. I am truly, deeply sorry that the protesters didn’t chase your lame ass out before the soup and salads arrived! But don’t blame me! I warned you ass clowns two weeks ago that no matter how cloistered and entitled you felt, sooner or later, you’d bump into real Americans, and the outcome wouldn’t be pleasant.

Damn, that felt good. So much for the appetizer, here’s the main course. Earlier today Teri pointed out to me a Twitter link to an article that’s almost impossible to believe. But apparently it’s true.

A day or so, a Texas Highway patrol officer pulled over a woman for traveling in the HOV Lane. For those of you unfamiliar, it’s normally the far left lane of an expressway, marked with a solid white line, with a white diamond and the words HOV Lane every 500′ or so. Years ago, during the gas shortages, they used to be known as Carpool Lanes. They require at least 2 occupants to use them, even for passing purposes.

When the trooper got to the window, the woman politely asked him why he had pulled her over? He replied that she was traveling alone in a lane requiring at least 2 passengers, which was against the law. At which point she blew him away. Oh no officer, I’m 34 weeks pregnant. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, and Texas just passed a law that says that a fetus is the same as an actual person. You people can’t have it both ways. The cop complimented her on her originality, and handed her the ticket.

I’m going to deviate for a moment here, and put my judicial robe on. Hey, my column, my rules. On the one hand, I find the woman not guilty of violating the HOV Lane law. After all, the law is the law. On the other hand, I find her guilty of being a fucking moron! After all, the whole idea of the HOV Lane is to save multi passenger vehicles time, right? Depending on how far that woman was going, she could save about 5-20 minutes by using the HOY Lane. She blew at least half of that when the cop pulled her over. And now she’s going to have to spend anywhere from 2-5 hours sitting around in a courtroom waiting for her case to be called. If she loses, she gets a stiff fine, and points towards driving school. And if she wins, she gets off scot free.

Believe me, I know her. I was married to one of her for almost 20 years. They’re smarter than anybody else. If she gets off, she’ll go right back to using that goddamned HOV Lane, and she’ll keep right on using that HOV Lane, and she’ll likely keep piling up more and more moving violations, meaning more dead time in court. And maybe the next judge won’t be so sympathetic.

Here’s my larger point. Get ready for more and more of this insanity. GOP controlled legislatures are running around like a bunch of 5 year olds who found a bag of Snickers in the cabinet. They are running around, bouncing off of the walls, trying to outdo each other in passing the most restrictive abortion laws. Without consideration for the legality of them.

There are already various trigger laws, as well as newly passed laws that are mired down in state courts, for reasons ranging from violation of due process to personal freedom laws already enshrined in that particular state’s constitution.

This is what happens when state governments stop trying to write legitimate laws, and instead start writing ideological wet dreams. That simple fact alone means that these laws are going to remain front and center in the media all the way to election day, and keep the pro choice activists motivated. Don’t touch that dial.

 

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20 COMMENTS

  1. I find it ironic that the very “justices” who are screaming about perceived “invasions of their privacy” are the very same ones who think it’s A-OK for the government to invade the privacy of a woman’s personal health decisions.

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        • HOV appears in the article 4 times. HOY appears one time. 4 our of 5 ain’t bad. I long ago stopped mentally proofreading the articles on this website and instead, just enjoy the gist of the points. The clever name-calling is hilarious and not vicious like you’d get from Trumpety Dumpety Wumpety.

          • And then there’s my case I type with my right index finger and there ARE typu’s whoops! 🙂

          • When the article was first published all of the post said hoy. It was corrected. I know about Murph and his vision issues. I try to help out on editing when I can . I love Murph. I was just trying to help.

    • These justices just ruled that there is no such thing as a constitutional right to privacy. I don’t know what right he thinks is being violated by people protesting him.

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          • Their biggest concern was foreign influence – of people still loyal to the Crown coming here and gaining power. So they amended the Act five or six years later and again a couple of times prior to the War of 1812 if memory serves. One has to bear in mind that some of our founding fathers and many of the original states were slave owning. In fact, Virginia was both the largest and richest state and slavery was of paramount importance to them so it’s no surprise they wanted the status quo of select white people being allowed to become citizens of our new country. Because slavery was already falling out of fashion in Europe!

  2. Long overdue to eliminate “lifetime” appointments, period. Why the hell are these Supreme Court Judges given a free pass for life? Not chosen by “WE, The People”. But rather by the President. The entire system is a joke. No longer separation of Church and State….nope, I guess that part of the Constitution is in the dumpster. BTW….anyone seen the stats of how many children are already in foster care?? Child Abuse cases? Those going to bed hungry every night?

    Makes NO sense to say you are a “pro life” unless you plan on taking these babies in, feed, clothe, nurture and keep them for their “lifetime”……..it’s all religious bulllshit.

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    • The idea behind lifetime tenure for federal judges was simple – by removing them from electoral politics they would rule based on the laws and the Constitution rather than political trends. So the idea wasn’t necessarily a bad one BUT it came with those damned unintended consequences. However, as with something like the Electoral College (which in part at least was supposed to prevent someone EXACTLY like Trump from becoming President) there was an assumption that those elevated to such a position would be honorable and uphold their oath and make every effort to faithfully discharge their duties – in their case to be guided only by the Constitution and the law. And the escape valve of impeachment (and removal from office if convicted by the Senate) applied to judges/Justice lest we forget although it’s seldom been used. It’s safe to say that those who created our system of government would be horrified to see how politicized SCOTUS and the federal judiciary have become.

    • I saw stats on FB showing the number of kids currently in foster care. Figures were mind boggling. My suggestion was that each of the anti-abortionists foster or adopt a child. I’m sure they started lining up as soon as the agency doors opened.

  3. People from Israel,Africa,and Central and South America are not real Americans. They’re people who showed up after the fighting,after the starving,after the building to glom onto the success of real Americans. You’re pieces of shit,basically,that no one else in the world wanted. You should be happy that real Americans let you live in their country,but instead you’re out acting like spastic toddlers whining about imaginary oppression while a lot of real Americans have to choose between cancer treatments and feeding their families because you sent their jobs overseas and hollowed out their neighborhoods and sold off what was left of their industry to multinational corporations which you are either the witting or unwitting footsoldiers of.

    There is not a single billionaire hedge fund manager who disagrees with any of your political beliefs.

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    • Wow. A lot to unpack there but let me start at the end of your comment. Just who was it that opened up China to us and the rest of the world’s markets? Not a Democrat, but rather Nixon and his SecState Kissinger. Who was it that trashed the farm policies put in place by Carter that promoted the ability of family farms on land that had been owned for generations to expand their capability to export food to the rest of the world and instead ushered in the era of takeover of those farms by corporations? Reagan – NOT Democrats. Who created the policies that shipped our electronics industry to Japan (and eventually other countries) and helped them gain market share for their automobiles in the U.S.? Again it was Reagan and not the Democrats. (To be fair our major auto manufacturers, especially GM cut quality at the same time making it easier for Japan’s and other’s rise of market share) Who gutted unions in this country while shipping all those jobs overseas and pushed working and middle class Americans onto that steep downhill slide? Reagan, followed by Bush 41. Ok, so Clinton worked with the GOP to pass NAFTA. He was after all liberal in some respects but still a product of the old “southern” Democrat south and more conservative on many economic issues than people (on both sides of the aisle) wanted to acknowledge then or now. However it was also during his tenure that we had the only period of the past fifty years where working class and middle class Americans held their own – and both the debt and deficit got reined in. Then came Bush 43 and MORE manufacturing got shipped overseas!

      So fuck you and your crybaby it’s all Democrat’s faults on that score.

      As for what I can only interpret as outright racist, White Supremacist beliefs your contention that it was only white Europeans that fought for our independence or to win the War of 1812 is flat out wrong. A fucking LIE. Yes, some Native American tribes fought for the British, but some fought for us in both conflicts. Black people both slaves and free men also fought alongside whites, in the too few units that would allow them to do so. And, going back long before that let me remind you that good ole England was more than happy to get rid of many of the early settlers of the American colonies. Even some of the “tonier” ones! Jokes about asking England pretty-please will you take back your Puritans and England saying no fucking way go back almost as long as they’ve been here. It’s worth noting that our founders were so wary of their attitudes they specifically and in multiple places proscribed religion from our politics in our Constitution!

      Your “Real” American bullshit is a pile bigger than a herd of dinosaurs could drop. You are no more American than I am (btw I’m an old white guy) and MY pussy of a grandfather (on my dad’s side) who was sooooooo fucking proud of his Klan shit (he refused to carry his membership card in his wallet because he didn’t want it to become worn or soiled. It remained on his dresser in pristine condition till the day he died. After he was buried and with my grannie’s approval I took it into their bathroom and tore it to pieces in front of her and dropped it in the fucking toilet. Then ushered her out so I could sit down and take a nice big SHIT on it before flushing it down into the sewer. Something I’d happily do to whatever membership card you might have to whatever white power group you cleave to) BOUGHT his way out of the Army rather than have to go to fight during WWI. He wasn’t at all happy my dad volunteered the day after Pearl Harbor, or that my aunt became a WAC as soon as she was able to do so.

      But my point is that people of all manner of races/ethnic makeup and religious beliefs fought, bled and died to create and build this country. And it was literally fucking SLAVE labor that built the White House and the Capitol! As I said, many wanted to fight in our wars but weren’t allowed to do so but those who were in fact allowed to did so, many with distiction.

      So fuck you and your “if it weren’t for us white Europeans this country would never have been shit” attitude. I for one am ashamed that YOU get to call yourself an American.

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      • So people from ‘Central’ America or South America aren’t ‘Americans’? I suppose that makes people from Germany, France, Belgium, etc non- Europeans

        ps – there no such place as ‘Central’ America – it’s North America from the North Pole down to Panama and South Americ down to the tio

    • Thank you so.much for summing up the bigotry and hatred and historical illiteracy of Trump supporters. You said the whispered part most Republicans try not to say publicly–only you used a bullhorn while firing your gun.
      My maternal great grandparents immigrated from.Ireland at the turn of the century. One paternal ancestor, also from Ireland, served in the union Army as a blacksmith. Dad’s,mother is the descendant of Russian Jews who fled pogroms. I guess I don’tvdeservecto.live here by yourcstandards.
      My husband, who served in the navy for 23years defending your right to hate everybody, is descended from both Sitting Bull and General Miles,who captured him.
      If I had a,tome machine, I would send you back to 1935so you could vote for someone who thought a lot like you: Adolph Hitler. I am sure an SS uniform would look great on you.
      Consider moving to Antarctica where there won’t be anything darker than you except seals,and penguins.

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  4. It’s a good point about the state legislatures passing laws Willy Nilly not thinking about how the courts will respond.

    I could be wrong but I figured that was why President Biden hasn’t done more executive orders because they can also be taken to court and nullified.

  5. I’ve been waiting for the first HOV challenge. I’d like to see every pregnant woman follow suit.
    Further, from my reading of HIPPA, they can’t even legally compel her to reveal private medical info, like the state of their uterus.
    Cops start seeing countless unaccompanied women in the HOV Lane, they’ll fold like a cheap suit.
    And ladies, don’t worry about not being pregnant if you have to show up in court. You don’t have to prove you were pregnant at the time of the ticket; they have to prove you weren’t.

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  6. “and she’ll keep right on using that HOV Lane,” – but only when she’s pregnant.

    It’s quite possible she only did it as a protest in the first place. We’ll see. If she gets a good civil rights lawyer to take the case, she could well win.

    Sure, when they drafted the law, they didn’t intend to include a fetus. But that isn’t in the law. I applaud her for calling attention to their hypocrisy. And I hope her case forces a change, hopefully to the fetal personhood law, but if not, to the HOV law. They cannot have it both ways.

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