As I say almost daily about software development standards, consistency is not its own virtue. Consistency is only good when it is around good practices, good morals.
The conservative justices came to the bench with a hit list and they are not only indifferent to the harm they cause but eager. Couching this harm in terms of legal minu…
As I say almost daily about software development standards, consistency is not its own virtue. Consistency is only good when it is around good practices, good morals.
The conservative justices came to the bench with a hit list and they are not only indifferent to the harm they cause but eager. Couching this harm in terms of legal minutiae is a contemptible lie, and the almighty Constitution comes from a world so unlike the present it may as well be from some medieval European dukedom. It comes from a world where slavery was unquestioned, a world without nuclear weapons, machine guns, satellite surveillance, television, anesthetics, a germ theory ... or abortion.
I don't give a flying rat ass for consistency. I want government to create a fair and just society where people can lead reasonably stable and secure lives and have at least some chance of fulfillment.
So if I understand it, you support 9 unelected people in making law from the bench, so long as you agree; but find it outrageous if they do so and you disagree.
What is hypocrisy, other than inconsistency? One set of rules for you, and a different more favorable rules for us. Perfectly OK, so long as it advances your personal concept of social justice (a fair and just society where people can lead reasonably stable and secure lives and have at least some chance of fulfillment).
What I would question is whether that philosophy of justified hypocrisy has ever created or sustained such a society. How stable is a society where everybody gets to be inconsistent if it serves their subjective sense of fairness? Where there is no binding underlying charter restricting the power of a simple majority to impose their will on the minority - or indeed guaranteeing any semblance of democracy?
If I'm misunderstanding your position, I'm open to hearing more nuance. But at the moment, this seems to be very consistent with the worst approaches of both the right and the left.
I believe that basing a society on concepts like the rule of law, and equal rights under an evolving charter, and aspiring to have the same rules for everybody, will turn out to be different in substantial aspects from consistent indentation rules for code.
I want to note here that I do not see democracy as a solid heuristic for creating wise policies; often the results can be very unwise or unintelligent. The primary values are in partially closing a feedback loop where the folks feeling the consequences of a policy have ongoing input into what that policy is (versus being rules by an autocrat who can isolate themselves from such consequences), and in obtaining buy-in (functional legitimacy) from the populace based on their ability to vote and to change the government at a later time, thus allowing adaptive changes in government direction with a peaceful transfer of power. Democracy is a heuristic not for wisdom, but for relatively stable cooperation among people with differing opinions. And blatant hypocrisy (disdain for consistent application of the rules) is sand in the gears of democracy.
As I say almost daily about software development standards, consistency is not its own virtue. Consistency is only good when it is around good practices, good morals.
The conservative justices came to the bench with a hit list and they are not only indifferent to the harm they cause but eager. Couching this harm in terms of legal minutiae is a contemptible lie, and the almighty Constitution comes from a world so unlike the present it may as well be from some medieval European dukedom. It comes from a world where slavery was unquestioned, a world without nuclear weapons, machine guns, satellite surveillance, television, anesthetics, a germ theory ... or abortion.
I don't give a flying rat ass for consistency. I want government to create a fair and just society where people can lead reasonably stable and secure lives and have at least some chance of fulfillment.
So if I understand it, you support 9 unelected people in making law from the bench, so long as you agree; but find it outrageous if they do so and you disagree.
What is hypocrisy, other than inconsistency? One set of rules for you, and a different more favorable rules for us. Perfectly OK, so long as it advances your personal concept of social justice (a fair and just society where people can lead reasonably stable and secure lives and have at least some chance of fulfillment).
What I would question is whether that philosophy of justified hypocrisy has ever created or sustained such a society. How stable is a society where everybody gets to be inconsistent if it serves their subjective sense of fairness? Where there is no binding underlying charter restricting the power of a simple majority to impose their will on the minority - or indeed guaranteeing any semblance of democracy?
If I'm misunderstanding your position, I'm open to hearing more nuance. But at the moment, this seems to be very consistent with the worst approaches of both the right and the left.
I believe that basing a society on concepts like the rule of law, and equal rights under an evolving charter, and aspiring to have the same rules for everybody, will turn out to be different in substantial aspects from consistent indentation rules for code.
I want to note here that I do not see democracy as a solid heuristic for creating wise policies; often the results can be very unwise or unintelligent. The primary values are in partially closing a feedback loop where the folks feeling the consequences of a policy have ongoing input into what that policy is (versus being rules by an autocrat who can isolate themselves from such consequences), and in obtaining buy-in (functional legitimacy) from the populace based on their ability to vote and to change the government at a later time, thus allowing adaptive changes in government direction with a peaceful transfer of power. Democracy is a heuristic not for wisdom, but for relatively stable cooperation among people with differing opinions. And blatant hypocrisy (disdain for consistent application of the rules) is sand in the gears of democracy.