The design idea of “counter-constraint” is to create things in such a way as to get around some constraint – for example, open source hardware works without patents or copyrights.
A brilliant example of counter-constraint is Italian designer Enzo Mari’s “democratic furniture” manual, autoprogettazione? [PDF], which explains how to make beautiful furniture out of unfinished lumber and nails, made almost entirely with squared-off cuts (no fancy mitering or curves that you can’t easily make with a handsaw).
The folks at Crapfutures have been building many of Mari’s designs (shown above, a ping-pong table), and using the projects to talk about counter-constraint in design practice.
In a Thursday night interview with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, Kellyanne Conway defended Trump’s travel ban with what she would call “alternative facts” — the rest of us would call them lies.
Trump’s top adviser spoke of the “Bowling Green Massacre,” which she said was carried out by two Iraqi refugees.
She slammed the press for not covering the tragedy, which is why, Conway maintained, most people don’t know about it.
However, as the Washington Post notes, such a terrorist attack never occurred in Bowling Green, Kentucky.
Conway seemed to be referring to the 2011 arrest of two Iraqi citizens living in Bowling Green who were charged with attempting to send money and weapons to al-Qaida. Read more
Conway is full of “alternative facts” — dismissing the truth while promoting Trump administration hires and policies.
Yesterday, Conway tweeted praise for Trump’s appointment of Gina Haspel to be second-in-command at the CIA, calling her the “first female” to serve in that role.
As former CIA spokesman George Little pointed out, that simply isn’t the case — Obama appointed Avril Haines as deputy director of the CIA in 2013. Read more
Here’s a relatively significant post script: today, the useless White House Press Corps didn’t ask Trump spokesliar Sean Spicer A SINGLE QUESTION about this.
Icecube sez, “Are you concerned about your online privacy? Do you shield your laptop from view of others? Do you use various means of hiding your IP address? Do you use any encryption at all like PGP? That means you are probably a terrorist according to the FBI. These are just some of the activities that are suggested indicators of terrorism according to a flyer being distributed entitled ‘Communities Against Terrorism’ You can find a PDF version here entitled ‘Internet Cafes’”
Lawblr side of Tumblr, here. I don’t think anybody even understands how terrifying this is. If the Executive can ignore the Judiciary, then we have a full-on Constitutional Crisis on our hands. Our country immediately falls apart. The only options for enforcement of judicial orders are 1) U.S. Marshals (which are ordered around by the Judiciary but ultimately still a part of the Executive as part of the Department of Justice), in which case we have an ACTUAL ARMED CONFLICT BETWEEN TWO BRANCHES OF GOVERNMENT, or if the Marshals refuse to comply, 2) the Governor of the state, say Virginia, sends in the National Guard of the state, which leads to AN ARMED CONFLICT BETWEEN A STATE MILITIA AND THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
In case you weren’t getting the picture, let me be blunt and dramatic: this is literally Civil War-level shit right here.
And Trump has been in office a week.
This is fucking terrifying.
I spent the day at SeaTac (Seattle-Tacoma International Airport). We got very little done because CBP refused to talk to us at all. When one of the attorneys with us annoyed them so much that they finally answered their office door (she literally knocked on it for 10 minutes straight), they directed her to the press release on their website (side note: I don’t know if there even is a press release on the CBP website). They told her they don’t care how many attorneys show up, they don’t take orders from attorneys or judges. Senator Patty Murray showed up just after 4:00 & CBP refused to talk to her, too. I will repeat that: Customs and Border Patrol refused to talk to a sitting United States Senator. They refused other senators at other airports, too, according to a WaPo article I read earlier.
I had to return to Portland tonight because I have work tomorrow. ACLU & International Refugee Assistance Project attorneys will be back at SeaTac tomorrow at 5:30 a.m. (including my law school bestie, I am so proud).
There were 13 people detained at SeaTac yesterday who were secretly transferred to a detention facility in Tacoma, so the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project is working with attorneys to straighten that right out.
Basically: Shit is going down, y’all. The women I went up with today? Both were Arabs. One was from Pakistan, the other was from Lebanon (a Christian, a Muslim and a Jew walk into an airport…). When I asked them if I was overreacting by feeling like this was a coup-in-progress, they said no. That’s precisely what this is.
I thought we had a coup-proof system. I was mistaken.
Keep fighting the good fight, lawyers. And if you’re in Portland, I’ll see you at Perkins-Coie tomorrow at 5:30 for the L4GG meeting.
At Dulles, CBP has been stonewalling four members of the US House of Representatives, the governer and attorney general of Virginia, and Senators Cory Booker (NJ) and Mark Warner (VA)–the latter of whom chewed out the head of CBP in person. No dice. Not even with a federal court order telling CBP at Dulles, only them, and them in particular to give detainees access to lawyers.
And they’re pulling an old trick from the national-security handbook that’s been used to evade the courts on issues like domestic surveillance: “Lawyers and advocates still didn’t know how many people were being held in the secondary inspection area at Dulles or what their immigration status was, which led to a catch-22: Attorneys couldn’t file for contempt of court without having proof that legal residents were being detained and not being given access to lawyers, but they couldn’t get proof without getting access.” (x)
At least two VA reps have found out (via friends and family) about constituents being detained at Dulles, at which point CBP released them in order to dodge the access-to-lawyers issue. The representative for my district is on the warpath–and also on the House Oversight Committee. Here’s hoping these fuckers get slapped with contempt of court so hard their ears ring, then get hauled in front of a committee hearing to see if they want to try their chances with contempt of Congress.
All of which doesn’t even get into the Monday Night Massacre clusterfuck inside the executive branch, when the acting attorney general of the United States refused to make the DoJ defend the lawfulness of the immigration order in court. And was summarily fired and replaced with someone more compliant. So here’s also hoping the Senate puts Jeff Sessions through absolute hell on his role in all this before they vote to confirm him as AG.
US District Judge Andre Birotte Jr (Central District of California) heard a plea from 28 Yemeni-born US citizens, and ruled that:
1. Defendants and their officers, agents, employees, attorneys, and all persons acting in concert or participating with them, are ENJOINED AND RESTRAINED from enforcing Defendant President Donald J. Trump’s January 27, 2017 Executive Order by removing, detaining, or blocking the entry of Plaintiffs, or any other person from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen with a valid immigrant visa;
2. Defendants, and Defendant United States Department of State in particular, are hereby ENJOINED AND RESTRAINED from cancelling validly obtained and issued immigrant visas of Plaintiffs;
3. Defendants, and Defendant United States Department of State in particular, are hereby ORDERED to return to Plaintiffs their passports containing validly issued immigrant visas so that Plaintiffs may travel to the United States on said visas; and
4. Defendants are hereby ORDERED to IMMEDIATELY inform all relevant airport, airline, and other authorities at Los Angeles International Airport and International Airport in Djibouti that Plaintiffs are permitted to travel to the United States on their valid immigrant visas.
However, the Customs and Border Protection agency has seemingly abandoned its commitment to lawful conduct, having refused to comply with earlier court orders, and also refused to meet with Senators, Members of Congress, and attorneys representing people in detention or facing deportation.
I spent the day in serious fear that Trump was staging a coup, but even in my darkest hour, I had a niggling sense that it was also possible he just didn’t have a fucking clue.
Cornell Political Scientist Tom Pepinsky makes the case for Trump the Weakling.
Let me explain how observational equivalence works with an example. President Trump may have brought Steve Bannon into the NSC because he is consolidating power and intends to sideline all regular establishment players in the formulation of American foreign policy. Or he might have brought Bannon into the NSC because he is so isolated that he needs someone who he believes he can trust, and everyone in the foreign policy establishment is dragging feet and dissembling. The former is a sign of strength. The latter is a sign of weakness. Both have the same observable implication.
Another example: the swift release of President Trump’s Executive Order on immigration without much advice or feedback from the affected bureaucracies may be evidence that the administration is completely centralizing control within the office of the president. Or it might be because the administration does not understand standard operating procedures in a presidential administration. Or it might be because they worry that they have lost the narrative, need to do something, and a gross Nazi is calling the shots. Again, only the first is a sign of strength. The latter two are signs of weakness. All three of the same observable implications, but have radically different interpretations.
