Law

Culture, Law, Liberty

Thin-Skinned in Whitefish Bay (and Places Nearer and Farther)

by JOHN ADAMS • 07/27/2021 • Comments

There’s a story in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel about complaints against public speech in Whitefish Bay that’s illustrative of threats to free speech in small towns, including Whitewater. In Whitefish Bay, a group called Bay Bridge placed an anti-racism sign in a designated space at the public library. The sign drew the ire of some Whitefish…

America, Crime, Insurrection, Justice, Law, Sen. Ron Johnson

Country Over Party

by JOHN ADAMS • 07/19/2021 • Comments

Courts, Crime, Law, Wisconsin

Probably Not the Headline the Wisconsin Supreme Court Wanted

by JOHN ADAMS • 06/30/2021 • Comments

Todd Richmond of the Associated Press reports Former drug smuggler can practice law in Wisconsin, state Supreme Court rules: The 4-3 ruling reverses a decision from the Wisconsin Board of Bar Examiners to block Abby Padlock from becoming an attorney in the state. According to court documents, Padlock became a drug smuggler to earn money so…

City, Courts, Crime, Law, Walworth County, Wisconsin

Wisconsin Supreme Court Grants New Trial in State of Wisconsin v. Alan M. Johnson

by JOHN ADAMS • 06/16/2021 • Comments

Alan M. Johnson was convicted in Walworth County of first-degree reckless homicide in the death of his brother-in-law. (Johnson’s late brother-in-law is identified in today’s high court opinion as ‘K.M.’ The events of the case took place in Whitewater, and the Walworth County trial was before Circuit Judge Kristine Drettwan.) Johnson appealed his conviction, and…

Bigotry, Culture, Education, Law

Responsibility for Students, Patients, or Clients

by JOHN ADAMS • 03/12/2021 • Comments

Yesterday, Georgetown Law fired an adjunct law professor after publication of a Zoom call in which she deprecated the abilities of many of her Black law students. See Georgetown Law professor terminated after ‘reprehensible’ comments about Black students. Here’s the most objectionable part of her remarks from the video call: “I hate to say…

CDA, City, Conflicts of Interest, Development, Economy, Free Markets, Law, Laws/Regulations, Local Government, Regulatory Capture

Texas (But Not Only Texas): Regulatory Capture

by JOHN ADAMS • 03/10/2021 • Comments

Regulatory capture is a simple concept: it applies when regulatory agencies become dominated by the industries or interests they are by law required to regulate. These agencies begin to act to benefit particular incumbent firms or people in the industry they are supposed to be overseeing. The concept is also sometimes called agency capture or…

Federal Government, Immigration, Law, Migrants, Trump

Psaki Reminds on Federal Immigration Policy

by JOHN ADAMS • 03/05/2021 • Comments

White House press sec. Jen Psaki: "We don't take our advice or counsel from former Pres. Trump on immigration policy." https://t.co/kdimldYgxN pic.twitter.com/ohsrECEXfZ — ABC News (@ABC) March 5, 2021

Elections, Law, Legislation, Republicans, Voting Rights, Wisconsin, WISGOP

WISGOP Moves to Restrict Voting

by JOHN ADAMS • 02/24/2021 • Comments

Across America, Republicans are doing all they can to restrict voting access after Trump’s decisive loss in the presidential election. (Ceaseless lies won’t make up a 7-million-vote margin.) The WISGOP is no exception to this trend. Molly Beck and Patrick Marley report Republican lawmakers seek to overhaul voting in Wisconsin, including new rules for absentee…

City, Elections, Fair Maps, Gerrymandering, Law, Wisconsin

Wisconsin Counties Backing Fair Maps

by JOHN ADAMS • 01/14/2021 • Comments

The fight against gerrymandering will be a key political issue statewide (and in Whitewater) over 2021-2022. See Probable Wisconsin Political Issues for 2021. Both of the counties of which Whitewater is a part have supported resolutions in favor of fair maps. For more information, visit the Wisconsin Fair Maps Coalition to help end gerrymandering in…

Alt-Right, America, Authoritarianism, Congress, Herrenvolk, History, Law, Mendacity, Trump, Trumpism

Confederates, Copperheads, and Conservatives

by JOHN ADAMS • 01/11/2021 • Comments

It’s an understatement to say that a democratic society that endures a violent mob seizing its capitol building is a society in distress. We find ourselves in the twenty-first century facing movements as malevolent and mendacious as the nineteenth century’s Confederates and Copperheads. Karen L. Cox writes What Trump Shares With the ‘Lost Cause’ of the…

Conspiracy Theories, Covidiocy, Elections, Fellow Traveler, Law, Never Trump, Presidential race 2020, Sen. Ron Johnson, Wisconsin

Ron Johnson Attracts Attention

by JOHN ADAMS • 01/05/2021 • Comments

The Never Trump conservatives at the Lincoln Project aren’t going away: they have lingering Trumpism in their sights. U.S. Senator Ron Johnson – who accepts every conspiracy theory but rejects Wisconsin’s certified electoral votes for president – has caught their attention. .@RonJohnsonWI I wanted to let you know what we are talking about at @ProjectLincoln…

America, Elections, History, Law, Liberty, Never Trump, Presidential race 2020, Resistance, Trump, Victory

2020: ‘But Not Just That’

by JOHN ADAMS • 12/31/2020 • Comments

Tim Miller – who is always worth reading, writes of 2020 as The Worst. But Not Just That. These paragraphs resonate: Most importantly, 2020 will always be the year that we joined together and toppled the greatest threat that our fragile union has faced in many decades. Turning out more people to vote against the president-strongman…

Crime, Law, Politics, Trump, Trumpism

Trump and 2024

by JOHN ADAMS • 12/16/2020 • Comments

Trump may now float the prospect of a 2024 run, but his manifest deficiences are also political impediments. An ideology along the lines of Trumpism will go on (and require relentless opposition), but Trump, himself, faces a legal and economic reckoning. See Man and Movement.