It’s unclear whether it’s the fact that people may use the internet and technology without having any real grasp of what their use entails, or that they just don’t care. But with the advent of chatbots, people are seeking legal, medical, sexual, and other interactions that involve their most intimate and personal thoughts, queries and acts. And people believe it’s just between them and their chatbot. It’s not.

On New Year’s Day, Jonathan Rinderknecht purportedly asked ChatGPT: “Are you at fault if a fire is lift because of your cigarettes,” misspelling the word “lit.” “Yes,” ChatGPT replied. Ten months later, he is now being accused of having started a small blaze that authorities say reignited a week later to start the devastating Palisades fire.

Mr. Rinderknecht, who has pleaded not guilty, had previously told the chatbot how “amazing” it had felt to burn a Bible months prior, according to a federal complaint, and had also asked it to create a “dystopian” painting of a crowd of poor people fleeing a forest fire, while a crowd of rich people mocked them behind a gate.

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It’s not that it was credible when Trump said he would be “honored” to fund SNAP so 42 million Americans, including 16 million children, wouldn’t go hungry, except that he didn’t think he had the lawful authority. The general notion that lawful authority entered into the calculus didn’t pass the sniff test, but the specifics were outright ridiculous given the alacrity with which Trump scrounged up money to pay the military.

But after Judge John McConnell, twice, ordered payment, thus conclusively establishing that lawful basis that so concerned our law-abiding president, it seemed that there was no way, no conceivable way, that the President of the United State of America, could stand up and fight against feeding starving children. Remember the old lawyer joke? Continue reading →

It’s not as if the Tesla Corporation is going to hand Elon Musk a trillion dollar coin and wish him a good day, but the shareholders of the corporation have approved a compensation package that could, ultimately, pay Musk a trillion dollars. Does that mean he’ll perform 1000 times better than if he was paid a measly billion? Maybe. On the one hand, the shareholders, who are the owners of the corp, think so. On the other hand, can there ever be such a thing as too much, even if the shareholders approve?

At Tesla, based in the Austin, Texas, area, shareholders have largely bought into a winner-takes-all version of capitalism, agreeing by a wide margin to give Mr. Musk shares worth almost a trillion dollars if the company under his management achieves ambitious financial and operational goals over the next decade.

Notably, it’s not for a year, but over ten years. Also notably, it requires that Musk meet goals that seem almost impossible to meet. Then again, it would be foolish to count Musk out when it comes to reaching ridiculously improbable goals. That he’s accomplished what he’s accomplished thus far might have seemed ridiculous improbable a decade ago, yet here we are. Continue reading →

Former Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall opens with an observation that should send chills down the spines of those of us who remember how the public bought into such flagrantly unconstitutional legal maneuvers as civil asset forfeiture weaseled its way into acceptability. When imposed, the marketing pitch was that it would only be used “to take the profit out of crime” for drug kingpins and mobsters.

Who doesn’t hate drug kingpins and mobsters? Who doesn’t want to take the profit out of crime? And so Americans shut their eyes and believed it when they were told it would never happen to them, never be abused, never be used to take cash from travelers. After all, we weren’t drug kingpins or mobsters. We now know better. Continue reading →

Today is the midterm midterm election day, when judges in Pennsylvania, governors in New Jersey and Virginia, mayor in New York City and a referendum in California, are on the ballot. What, if anything, will it mean?

Usually, elections that don’t involve federal positions don’t garner much interest and attention, but today’s election is being touted as a referendum on Donald Trump’s first year in office. The New Jersey gubernatorial election pits a third timer Trump sycophant against a lackluster Democrat whose foremost claim to the office is that she flew helicopters in the Navy. The Virginia Democrat is tainted by the attorney general candidate’s text messages about killing the children of his opponent, which she failed to condemn, while the Republican opponent is just plain wacky. Continue reading →

Trump says his administration is the most transparent ever, which of course doesn’t make it so or true, but he’s got a point at least with one very significant aspect.

If there is a word that describes the second Trump administration, it’s brazen. While I certainly hold open the possibility that dark deeds are being done in secret, one thing that is remarkable is how open and obvious he is with his self-dealing.

David French goes through the litany of deeds in which Trump has, and continues, to engage, which in any other world would be damningly corrupt, ending in impeachment, prosecution or at minimum, denigration by his party and supporters. And yet, the MAGA faithful and Republicans in Congress don’t seem to be mildly miffed, no less outraged. Continue reading →

There are a number of issues raised by Trump’s demolishing the hundred-year-old East Wing of the White House and building the world’s largest catering hall, to be known as the Trump Ballroom, whether or not the Trump name is chiseled into the limestone in very large letters. But the purported virtue, that it won’t be built with taxpayer dollars but with donations, raises an issue itself.

Why, one might wonder, would anyone want to donate a few mil to the cause? Because they love America? Perhaps. Because they love Trump? Maybe. Or it could be that they want to buy Trumps favor or buy off Trump’s anger. We’ve already seen corporations settle frivolous claims by Trump personally that put huge sums in Trump’s pocket when the corps need government approval for their deals. We’ve already seen Trump demand retribution against his “enemies,” to those who refuse to bend to his will. Trump has hardly been shy about favoring those who buy his love and using the power of government to damage those who make him angry or sad. Continue reading →

A senior at Livingston Manor High School posted a picture of himself lying on the ground next to a car with another student kneeling on his neck, giving the thumbs up. The picture was taken off school grounds and outside school hours. It did not go over well.

The context of the picture is significant: The day Leroy and his friends took and posted the picture, a jury had just begun to deliberate in the highly publicized trial of Derek Chauvin, a Minnesota police officer, for the murder of George Floyd. The picture is undeniably reminiscent of footage of Chauvin next to a police car kneeling on George Floyd’s neck, killing him. The other students involved in the picture—the student who took the picture (Student B) and the student posing with his knee on Leroy’s neck (Student A)—both acknowledge this resemblance, and Student A testified the resemblance was intentional.

The school punished Leroy, asserting that the image, which Leroy left up for about seven minutes but was captured by another student and left up for about seven months, cause substantial disruption. Continue reading →

The official explanation for the government, by Jonathan Hornok, chief of the criminal division of the DC U.S. attorney’s office, withdrawing the sentencing memo for Taylor Taranto was that it had been “entered in error.” That is a lie.

In their sentencing papers, Mr. Valdivia and Mr. White wrote that Mr. Taranto had been among the “mob of rioters” on Jan. 6 and that he had promoted conspiracy theories concerning the attack. Mr. Taranto was charged with trespassing and disorderly conduct for his role in the Capitol attack, but those charges were dismissed as part of the blanket clemency that President Trump granted to all of the nearly 1,600 people accused of taking part in the riot.

In an extraordinary move, the Justice Department withdrew the sentencing papers on Wednesday afternoon, noting in a federal court database that they had been “entered in error.” Hours later, new sentencing papers were submitted that kept the same recommendation for a 27-month sentence but expunged all references to Jan. 6.

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Chaired by Kentucky Republican James Comer, the House Oversight Committee released a 100-page report entitled “The Biden Autopen Presidency: Decline, Delusion, and Deception in the White House.” It did not speak well of Joe Biden’s mental acuity toward the end of his presidency.

The House Oversight Committee on Tuesday released its long-anticipated investigative report on former President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s cognitive condition, accusing his inner circle of concealing a mental decline and claiming, without evidence, that he was so impaired that he could not make his own decisions.

The 100-page report, entitled “The Biden Autopen Presidency: Decline, Delusion, and Deception in the White House,” concludes that many of the executive actions Mr. Biden took, including pardons of his family, should be considered “void” because there is no record that he made the decisions himself.

The issuance of pardons is one of the preclusive acts of the presidency. For better or worse, the Constitution gives the president the sole power to grant pardons as he sees fit. Continue reading →