Get the Ricochet app
Ricochet will work fine in a browser on your mobile devices, but for the best experience please download our app.
If you don't read the newspaper, you will be uninformed. If you do read the newsaper, you will be misinformed. – Mark Twain
Quite a choice. Twain is right. If you don't read the papers (today the media, in print, broadcast, and electronic form) you would be uninformed about the Supreme Court decision that permits the Federal government to remove barriers at the Texas border and the state of Texas's response to that decision. If you do read the papers you would be misinformed about its significance.
What the Supreme Court did was lift a stay preventing the Federal Government from removing border barriers erected by the state of Texas. The stay was part of a case brought by Texas to prevent the Federal agents from cutting and removing razor wire barriers at Eagle Pass. The case is ongoing. The only thing the Supreme Court decision did was permit the Federal government to continue removing barriers until the case is settled. It imposed no duties or action on the part of the state of Texas.
Abbott's reaction was to issue a statement declaring Texas was under invasion, and that Texas, under his leadership would take all appropriate actions necessary to stop that invasion. He cited the pertinent parts of the Constitution permitting him to do so. Then he stated as part of those actions, Texas would bar Federal agents from access to the razor wire. If they cannot get to it, they cannot cut it.
The press immediately made this out to be a Constitutional crisis. (Or going by the reactions of the press, a CONSTITUTIONAL CRISIS.) That is misinforming their readers. It is not a Constitutional crisis. Not yet.
Greg Abbott and Texas are currently acting within the letter of the law. Both the Texas and US Constitutions give him the right to defend Texas against invasion. It is possible in the future courts might rule Abbott has exceeded his authority, but right now he is acting legally. All of Biden's huffing and puffing is just that. Bluff. He cannot on his own whim order the arrest of Texas law enforcement authorities blockading Federal access to the park. (Even the Border Patrol Union agrees he cannot.) At this point it is up to the Biden Administration to go to the courts and demonstrate Abbott has exceeded his writ.
There is no Constitutional crisis because no laws have been broken yet on either side. Despite what the press is broadcasting. A Constitutional crisis could emerge in the near term, if Biden begins issuing illegal orders and Federal agents follow those orders. That has not happened - yet. As Barak Obama once observed, "Never underestimate Joe's ability to . . ." It could happen.
Could Post Turtle Joe go to the courts and get his way? Possibly, but that process will take time. If he does win it will likely be in the runup to the 2024 election, and would be unpopular, adversely affecting his chances for reelection. Biden does not want that. Even if Biden does prevail in that round of court cases, Abbott will find another legal way to block the border, unaffected by previous court orders. He always does. Then the legal dance start over.
My original point remains. Based on what you read in the papers you can easily believe this is Fort Sumpter 2.0 or the Siege of the Alamo, Take 2. It is not. It is a typical, if consequential, legal disagreement between state and federal authorities about the limits of their powers. It has the potential to spin out of control. As I quoted last week, "history is littered with wars which everybody knew would never happen." But it has not yet.
How does someone manage to stay informed without being misinformed? Read the papers (or their modern equivalent). Just don't stop there. Explore alternative media. Go to original sources. Spend time researching what is said. It is work, but nothing worthwhile is achieved without work.
Discussion (11)
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
The mainstream media is filled with lazy, so-called journalists. The most interesting thing about this story is that what I call the line cops, the Border Patrol in Texas have said they have no desire, nor are they going to cut or remove the razor wire in the Eagle Pass Park.
That may change but just like police officers in some US cities there is a big divide between line cops, admin cops, and elected officials to include the Border Patrol at the Federal level.
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
Timeless.
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
Excellent summary of the current situation, as I understand it from listening to various news and opinion sources. I haven’t read the decision, but I agree that the best way to be informed is to “Go to original sources,” or as my law professors advised: “read the text.”
We don’t have usually time to do that, but we are still blessed to have a courts that do business out in open where original sources are available for anyone to read. As for the enforcement of existing laws, we are apparently not so blessed.
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
This post is part of the Quote of the Day group writing project on Ricochet. The rest of the month is open for contributions if you’d like to signup here.
For QOTD regulars and any other members who read QOTD posts: do we need to continue having a signup sheet? I have noticed some members like to arrange posts around a quote, or several, without designating it a QOTD post. That seems to me to work well enough and potentially draws readers who don’t seek out the QOTD posts. And in the case of this post, @She decided to write this and sign up on the same day. I’m in favor of encouraging such spontaneity.
If any of you are QOTD signup sheet loyalists, would you be willing to take in the role of signup manager?
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
This post itself is awash in misinformation. Federal law has been violated with impunity by the Biden administration. And federal officials have been ordered to violate federal law. The border patrol officials cutting the razor wire then stood aside as illegal immigrants paraded past them through the gaps in the wire. Abbott has violated no law or court order but Biden has done so as a supposed matter of policy. It is not that he has failed to enforce the law: The problem is that he has intentionally violated it. The SC ruling supported the Administration’s effort to violate federal law.
The legal arguments don’t get to the point on that at all. The whole of the SC process is a kabuki process that has asserted federal supremacy to violate federal law and vitiate any State sovereignty on the question. It is egregiously wrong. The serious legal discussion ended with a solid and correct decision by the 5th circuit. But even the 5th circuit decision said nothing about the wholesale violation of federal law by the administration. Sort of like Victorians adjudicating a case of rape without mentioning sex or rape. Or federal officials approving mobs burning federal buildings. No wonder the SC made no statement. It didn’t have a case for its decision, which appears to reflect the injudicious pique of the Chief Justice at having to deal with the issue. Or he couldn’t pass up an opportunity to put a thumb in the eye of those not on board with elite opinion on open borders. As for the “nothing to see here” view of Seawriter, over half the Governors of States think there is indeed something to see here. I am not so sanguine and dismissive of this situation as Seawriter. Washington as a whole has been looking away from the illegal action on the border since Reagan did his disastrous deal on amnesty forty years ago. Joe Biden has incited, aided and abetted, and committed wholesale illegal action on the border and raised that illegal activity to unprecedented levels, endangering the nation and its citizens in myriad ways. It is long overdue that we stop whitewashing what is going on there. Blood meridian, indeed.
You're seeing five of eleven comments. Sign in, or join for just $5 per month, to read them all and add your own.