The Daily Parker

Would you just look at that:

Metra finally opened the inbound Ravenswood platform on the UP-N line after tearing down the previous permanent structure in July 2011.

For the first time since then, we commuters got a solid surface to walk on, shelter from the elements, and (for me, anyway) a 4-minute-shorter walk from Cassie's day care to the Leland Avenue stairwell at the far south end of the station.

They still haven't completely finished, however. The fully-enclosed waiting area with benches and heaters was locked this morning, and the ramp on the north side of Leland still had a plywood barrier. But boy howdy! We won't get rained/snowed/sunned on anymore!

I still want Bruce Rauner to stand on the "temporary" platform for 12 years so he understands what it felt like. Someday, when I'm running Purgatory...

I'm just over a week from performing with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at Ravinia in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte, so as I try to finish a feature that turned out to be a lot bigger than I thought, I'm hearing opera choruses in my head. Between rehearsals and actual work, I might never get to read any of these items:

• Jesse Wegman describes how to tell a political prosecution from a real one, which would be great except the people doing the political ones don't read the Times.
• Meaghan O'Rourke points to Greta Gerwig's Barbie movie as emblematic of the strangeness of modern American girl culture.
• Sci-fi author John Scalzi, who knows a thing or two about fictional aliens, does not think the US government is covering up details about real aliens, if for no other reason than the XPOTUS would have bragged about it by now.
• Via Bruce Schneier, the World of Warcraft sub-reddit embarrassed an AI-driven site by getting the site's AI to write about something that will never exist.
• The Post has an interactive history of changes to the Appalachian Trail.

Finally, New York City (and other urban areas) are experiencing a post-pandemic dog-poop renaissance. Watch where you step!

And now, I will put on "Dank sei dir Osiris" one more time.

I'm having a few people over for a BBQ this evening, several of them under 10 years old, and several of them dogs. I've got about 45 minutes before I have to start cutting vegetables. Tomorrow will be a quiet day, so I'll just queue these stories up for then:

• Not a group to pass up risible hypocrisy, Alabama Republicans have defied the US Supreme Court's order that they create a second majority-Black district in the state, preferring just to shuffle the state's African Americans into a new minority districts. This leaves African Americans with 27% of the population and 14% of the Congressional representation, and the state Republican majority wishing it could just go all the way back to Jim Crow instead of this piecemeal stuff.
• Surprising no one who understood that former Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker (R) cared less about governing than about enriching his pals (and himself), the Foxconn semiconductor factory that Wisconsin residents subsidized for $3 billion has not, in fact, created 13,000 jobs yet. Probably because it doesn't exist yet, and may never.
• James Hansen, who first warned in the 1980s that human-caused climate warming had already started and would accelerate if we didn't cut greenhouse gas emissions, thinks "we are damned fools" for needing to experience it to believe it.
• The Chicago city council plans to pass legislation raising the minimum wage for tipped workers to the general minimum wage of $15.80 per hour, up from $9.48 today. This doesn't address how anyone could possibly live on $32,000 per year in Chicago, let alone $19,000 a year at the lower wage.

OK, time for a quick shower and 15 minutes of doing nothing...

On my way downtown to hear Brahms' Ein Deutsches Requiem with some friends, I saw this notice, hung with a tragicomic level of incompetence, at the Ravenswood Metra station's 12-year-old "temporary" inbound platform:

What? We get our "new" platform that has been almost completed for the past 24 months on August 1st?

There’s only one brief note on the station info page, but otherwise…nothing. No ribbon cutting, no acknowledgement that the platform is opening 6 years late, no recognition that former Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner (R) cut funding to the project for four years, no one taking any responsibility for the 10-month delay between finishing almost everything and getting “the tiles” or whatever they were waiting for since last summer.

If they open the thing, I'll post photos on the 2nd. If they don't, I'll post derision.

In any event, the Grant Park Symphony had a wonderful performance of one of my favorite choral works, in perfect weather:

And walking back to the train, I was reminded how cool our architecture was in the 1920s:

It's Tuesday afternoon, and I think I'm caught up with everything in the way of me ploughing through some coding at work the remainder of the week. At some point, I might even read all of these through:

• January 6th Committee Special Counsel Jack Smith has informed the XPOTUS that he is the subject of a federal investigation, a clear indication that an indictment could soon follow.
• Abi Breland reports that far-right trolls haven't figured out how to cause misery on Meta's Threads app yet, but don't worry, they will.
• Via Molly White, the OPP arrested five men who allegedly kidnapped and beat up a man who calls himself "Ontario's Crypto King" after the victim squandered stole spent C$35 million of investors' money and only invested about 2% of the "fund" in actual cryptocurrency.
• Actor George Clooney and human-rights activist John Prendergast warn that the Wagner mercenary group continues to engage in state capture in Africa, destabilizing the continent and terrorizing millions of people.
• Activists in San Francisco have begun sabotaging unoccupied autonomous vehicles by putting traffic cones on their hoods.
• Phoenix hit 43.3°C (110°F) for the 19th day in a row, exceeding the previous record set in 1974, while Tokyo continues to swelter in 38°C weather.
• Residents on the south half of the 15-year Metra UP-N bridge replacement project—i.e., the half that still has 120-year-old bridges—have started frantically googling "adverse possession" after realizing that they will lose their back yards in the next three years, just like we on the north side did 7 years ago.

Finally, North Korean troops detained a US soldier after he intentionally crossed the demarcation line in the Joint Security Area, apparently after deserting while en route to the US for unspecified disciplinary measures arising from a separate incident. When I visited the JSA in 2013, a tour guide told me that this happens occasionally, and the North Korean army rarely gives the person back. Not sure life in a North Korean prison beats an other-than-honorable discharge from the US Army, but what do I know?

Just a few items for my reading list:

• The Supreme Court's Republican majority have invented a new doctrine that they claim gives them override any action by a Democratic administration or Congress.
• John Ganz thinks all Americans are insane, at least when it comes to conspiracy theories.
• Chicago's Deep Tunnel may have spared us from total disaster with last week's rains, but even it can't cope with more than about 65 mm of rain in an hour.
• Oregon's Rose Quarter extension of Interstate 5 will cost an absurd amount of money because it's an absurdly wide freeway.

Finally, for those of you just tuning in to the multiple creative labor actions now paralyzing the film industry, the Washington Post has a succinct briefing on residuals, the principal point of disagreement between the suits and the people actually making films.

Former football coach and mediocre white guy Tommy Tuberville (R-MS), currently fighting for the Dumbest Person in Congress title against several of his Republican colleagues in the House and Senate, has continued his one-man blockade in the Senate against confirming the promotions of general and flag officers across the US military. As a consequence, for the first time in a century, the US Marine Corps has no Commandant:

[Commandant General David] Berger, whose four-year tour as the Marines’ top officer came to an end, was supposed to hand the reins over to Gen. Eric Smith, who has been nominated for the job. Instead, Smith will run the Corps on a temporary basis while he waits for Senate confirmation, thanks to the hold. Because he’s not confirmed, Smith will have to hold off on making any making strategic decisions for the service. He will also simultaneously serve in his current position as the Marine Corps’ No. 2.

Tuberville, an Alabama Republican and Senate Armed Services Committee member, placed the hold in protest of the Pentagon’s new policy that pays travel expenses for troops if they cannot obtain abortions in their state. He has also voiced frustration that President Joe Biden has yet to reach out to discuss the matter.

The senator’s procedural holds mean that senior officers across the military are unable to move their families to their new assignments, and in many cases are losing out on the pay raises that promotions entail.

Berger is the first of four members of the eight-member Joint Chiefs of Staff who will begin retiring this year. With the hold in place, half the chiefs, the leaders of the Army, Navy and Marine Corps, along with the chair, will have no confirmed successor in the seat to replace them.

Obviously the US Marine Corps can function with only an acting Commandant for a while. But because Tuberville has stopped almost 300 promotions to O7 and above, critical lower-level posts have gone unstaffed as well. (Let's just forget for a moment that arcane Senate rules, specifically designed to halt legislative business far beyond the "cooling saucer" envisioned by the founders, allows this to happen.)

Yesterday, US Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) had this to say about the Coach:

This hold is unnecessary, unprecedented, and, at a critical time in national security, it is driving the U.S. military to a potential breaking point. It is also an affront to the military and their families, who so many of us just lauded for their sacrifices during the Fourth of July festivities. My colleagues thanked them profusely, but do not recognize that they are professional officers who deserve consideration, not as political chips but as men and women of our services.

Those of my colleagues who support this unprecedented delay are themselves politicizing the military by the very nature of their actions. These promotions have always been confirmed by unanimous consent very soon after being reported to the floor or, on the rare occasion, a single overwhelming vote without cloture. But now, in refusing to confirm these promotions, the uniformed military, previously and appropriately shielded from partisan politics, is being thrust into the midst of politics. This behavior was once reserved only for individual political appointees, civilian political appointees on specific matters of dispute, usually with some reasonable or negotiable outcome. No more. It seems it is ‘‘my way’’ or no way at all. And that is a sad demonstration of individual hubris.

The Senator from Alabama often says if we really wanted these generals and admirals, we would just vote, but I would like to explain that. The Senator is not allowing a simple vote; he is demanding cloture first on every nomination. So we asked the Congressional Research Service what it would take to process 251 nominations with cloture. They estimate to file cloture on all the nominations being held, it would take approximately 5 hours. Then 2 days later, the Senate could start voting.

It will take approximately 668 hours to confirm all these military nominations. That is 27 days if the Senate works around the clock, 24 hours a day. If the Senate just did military nominations for 8 hours a day, it would take 84 days. So ‘‘just vote’’ is not an answer. This is not a feasible solution to this issue.

Right now, a number of military officers who were planning to retire are on an indefinite hold because they have no one confirmed to take their jobs. Others want to go to new commands but cannot for the same reason. Their families cannot move to their new homes. Their children cannot get ready for a new school. Their spouses cannot take new jobs.

This is not a game. These are real lives that have been upended. Due to the pure obstinacy of the Senator from Alabama, the Senate is, in effect, holding thousands of loyal members of the U.S. military and their families in limbo. I believe we owe them more than that.

Hear, hear. This isn't a game to anyone but Tuberville. But it's kind of what we'd expect from a mediocre old white guy from Alabama, isn't it? Except...weren't the Republicans the party of military preparedness a few years ago? I guess we have always been at war with Oceania after all...

New York Times columnist and former Supreme Court reporter Linda Greenhouse summarizes the frightening success of the Religious Right under the Roberts court:

Yes, democracy survived [the Supreme Court's 2022-23 term], and that’s a good thing. But to settle on that theme is to miss the point of a term that was in many respects the capstone of the 18-year tenure of Chief Justice John Roberts. To understand today’s Supreme Court, to see it whole, demands a longer timeline. To show why, I offer a thought experiment. Suppose a modern Rip Van Winkle went to sleep in September 2005 and didn’t wake up until last week. Such a person would awaken in a profoundly different constitutional world, a world transformed, term by term and case by case, at the Supreme Court’s hand.

To appreciate that transformation’s full dimension, consider the robust conservative wish list that greeted the new chief justice 18 years ago: Overturn Roe v. Wade. Reinterpret the Second Amendment to make private gun ownership a constitutional right. Eliminate race-based affirmative action in university admissions. Elevate the place of religion across the legal landscape. Curb the regulatory power of federal agencies.

By the time the sun set on June 30, the term’s final day, every goal on the conservative wish list had been achieved. All of it. To miss that remarkable fact is to miss the story of the Roberts court.

It’s worth reviewing how the court accomplished each of the goals. ... Precedents that stood in the way were either repudiated outright, as the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision did last year to Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, or were simply rendered irrelevant — abandoned, in the odd euphemism the court has taken to using.

Likewise, the court has not formally overruled its Chevron decision. Its administrative-law decisions have just stopped citing that 1984 precedent as authority. The justices have simply replaced Chevron’s rule of judicial deference with its polar opposite, a new rule that goes by the name of the major questions doctrine.

But how to tell a major question from an ordinary one? No surprise there: The court itself will decide.

But of course, the Supreme Court doesn’t stand alone. Powerful social and political movements swirl around it, carefully cultivating cases and serving them up to justices who themselves were propelled to their positions of great power by those movements. The Supreme Court now is this country’s ultimate political prize. That may not be apparent on a day-to-day or even a term-by-term basis. But from the perspective of 18 years, that conclusion is as unavoidable as it is frightening.

Last weekend I discussed the just-ended term with a friend who's a practicing attorney. We lamented the right-wing march of the Court under Roberts on social issues, but we also discussed another aspect of the Roberts court that doesn't get as much reportage.

Under this Republican Court, series of other cases has systematically made it harder for smaller litigants to get access to Federal courts. These seemingly minor procedural changes may actually cause much more damage to our country than the clearly-out-of-step decisions that will start getting thrown out when the pendulum swings back to the center in a few years.

Ah, ha ha. I'm kidding. Absolutely no one on Earth found anything surprising in the two decisions the Court just announced, except perhaps that Gorsuch and not Alito delivered the First Amendment one. Both were 6-3 decisions with the Republicans on one side and the non-partisan justices on the other. Both removed protections for disadvantaged groups in favor of established groups. And both lend weight to the argument that the Court has gone so far to the right that they continue to cause instability in the law as no one knows how long these precedents will last.

Let's start with 303 Creative v Elenis, in which the Court ruled that a Colorado web designer did not have to create websites for gay weddings, on the philosophy that religiously-motivated anti-gay bigotry is protected under the First Amendment:

The decision also appeared to suggest that the rights of L.G.B.T.Q. people, including to same-sex marriage, are on more vulnerable legal footing, particularly when they are at odds with claims of religious freedom. At the same time, the ruling limited the ability of the governments to enforce anti-discrimination laws.

The designer, Lorie Smith, said her Christian faith requires her to turn away customers seeking wedding-related services to celebrate same-sex unions. She added that she intends to post a message saying the company’s policy is a product of her religious convictions.

A Colorado law forbids discrimination against gay people by businesses open to the public as well as statements announcing such discrimination. Ms. Smith, who has not begun the wedding business or posted the proposed statement for fear of running afoul of the law, sued to challenge it, saying it violated her rights to free speech and the free exercise of religion.

I actually might agree with the very narrow outcome of this specific case: I don't think someone should be forced to create something they morally oppose. That said, I fear, as do many others, that people will see this as license to scale back anti-discrimination measures against all marginalized groups. And this is why I think the case is going to be a problem for a generation. I'll read Gorsuch's opinion over the weekend, hoping that he resisted the urge to fill it with Federalist Society-approved obiter dicta. But I expect to see more litigation on anti-discrimination statutes as a result of the ruling. It's part of the Republican strategy to erode hard-won rights by creating fear and doubt in marginalized groups, and it's working.

The other ruling (Biden v Nebraska), also pitting the Republicans against everyone else in the free world, killed the President's program to waive about $405 billion in student debt that hundreds of thousands of low- and middle-income borrowers owed to the Federal Government. The Court found the thinnest of pretexts to allow the State of Missouri just enough standing to keep the case from evaporating entirely, and then rug-pulled all those people for whom $10,000 might be the difference between poverty and continued daily meals by saying the President exceeded authority granted him by Congress to "waive or modify" the loans:

The court has rejected the administration’s expansive arguments in the past. The court lifted a pandemic-era moratorium on rental evictions put in place by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It threw out a coronavirus vaccination-or-testing mandate imposed on large businesses by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. And in a ruling unrelated to the pandemic, it cited the “major questions” doctrine to limit the Environmental Protection Agency’s options for combating climate change.

The legal battles have left millions of student loan borrowers in limbo. More than half of eligible people had applied for the forgiveness program before it was halted by the courts, with the Education Department approving some 16 million applications.

Biden’s debt relief program has been a divisive issue on Capitol Hill. On June 7, Biden vetoed a Republican-led resolution to strike down the controversial program and restart loan payments for tens of millions of borrowers. The measure passed the Senate with the backing of Sens. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.), Jon Tester (D-Mont.) and Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.). Despite Biden’s veto, the resolution shows the likely difficulty of getting any future debt relief plan through Congress.

This, like yesterday's affirmative action decision, shows the Republican majority gleefully rolling back all the things they have hated ever since Lyndon Johnson had the gall to give those people civil rights in 1964. They firmly believe in the ability of everyone born on second base to get a home run even if it means everyone else strikes out, because (and I'm really not making this up, if you dig into what these people have written) they deserve it. (Best Tweet of the day, from the ever-scathing New York Times Pitchbot: "Opinion | Without the burden of affirmative action, Harvard can finally become a true meritocracy—by Jared Kushner and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.")

The good news—in the most general sense as the 6-3 split will continue to be very bad news in specific for years—is that this kind of reactionary behavior by the right wing tends to flame out in a generation or so. It's the desperate clawing back of gains made by the lower orders to hold onto inherited privilege for just a little longer that happens when the old guard know they're on their way out. We've seen it in the US before, and in the UK, and in lots of other times and places.

Unfortunately, undoing the damage the revanchists cause hurts like hell. The next 10-15 years are going to suck for a lot of people.

Some stories to read at lunch today:

• The Supreme Court unanimously rejected the US Postal Service's requirement that a religiously observant letter carrier deliver packages on the Sabbath. Since Justice Alito (R$) wrote the opinion, I'll also have to read Justices Sotomayor's (I) and Jackson's (I) concurrence.
• Of course, as Josh Marshall predicted, the Court split along partisan lines in a decision that essentially abolishes affirmative action for college admissions, which will likely reverse the gains that African American students have made over the last 40 years.
• Alex Shephard wonders if the XPOTUS's whole classified-documents disaster came out of his "perhaps world-historically, pathetic and abject" existence.
• The I-95 bridge collapse outside Philadelphia caused a spike in SEPTA ridership and renewed interest in a new subway line.
• National Geographic, struggling to remain afloat after its acquisition and rapacious mismanagement by Disney, has laid off all of its remaining staff writers.
• James Fallows annotates a recent Toronto air traffic controllers conversation with a FedEx MD-11 whose left thrust reverser deployed just after takeoff.

Finally, our air quality has improved slightly (now showing 168 at IDTWHQ), but the Canadian smoke may linger for another couple of days.