BOAT RACE

I’ve watched a good bit of the World Cup, mostly for the drama and pageantry and excitement.  I was in Philadelphia’s Reading Terminal Market at noon on the day Brazil played Haiti, and the scene was full of fun and energy, with hundreds of yellow-jerseyed fans lining up for pork sandwiches and cheesesteaks and soft pretzels, and singing their team songs.  I can’t say I follow the game or root for a particular team, but I was prepared to be a soccer fan for a couple of months.

 

In other words, I wanted to like the damn thing, and I did at first, but the tournament, as run by FIFA, will offend any real sports fan.

 

I will not dwell on the suspension of U.S. star Folarin Bologun, and his reinstatement following a phone call from Donald Trump to FIFA President Gianni Infantino, except to point out the only conclusion one can draw from the incident---that FIFA and Infantino really don’t care what the world thinks of their integrity and honesty.

 

Regardless of the merits of the Balogun suspension, there was only one possible response to Trump’s plea that would preserve some hint or intimation or soupcon or suggestion that FIFA and Gianni were on the square---the appeal HAD TO BE DENIED, perhaps with an explicit statement that FIFA had been reviewing the suspension but that the process was terminated when the American President attempted to intervene in FIFA’s internal deliberations. 

 

Instead, Infantino, the guy who invented the FIFA Peace Prize and presented it to Trump last December, rolled over.  He didn’t care what his actions said about FIFA and himself.  Or perhaps, in a perverse way, he did.   There is a dictatorial, boss-man mindset in some dictatorial bossmen that doesn’t want to be viewed as fair or impartial.  They just want the world to know THEY are in charge and if you don’t like it, the hell with ya.  Maybe that is the explanation. 

 

But that’s the executives, and bureaucrats, and Trump, and politicians.  It’s not what happens on the field, right?  The problem is that what happens on the field is even worse.

 

Results of games have been pre-arranged, either by refereeing or by agreement of the teams.  The Algeria-Austria match, for example, occurred in the final round of the group stage where a draw would give each squad a single point and allow both to proceed to the elimination rounds.  With Algeria leading 3-2, the final minute of the game featured an absurd spectacle where seven Algerians gathered near the left sideline while an Austrian was permitted to head the tying goal into the net.  The refs then whistled the game over before any more action could occur.

 

Then there was Iran’s surprising elimination when they had taken a 2-1 lead with seconds left in their final match against Egypt.  Their winning goal would have advanced them into the elimination rounds, but it was taken down based on an offsides alert from the Video Assistant Referee (VAR).  The on-field referee did not make the call himself, and the VAR “proof” is still being disputed.  But taking down the goal sent Iran home, which is all anyone wanted, apparently.

 

And that is the fundamental problem with the officiating.  The goal removals and delayed penalty calls only benefit the good guys, the teams FIFA likes and that are “supposed” to advance.  Nobody wanted Iran in the tournament in the first place, and somehow they wound up getting screwed.  Coincidence?

 

And no one is “supposed” to win more than defending champ Argentina with its beloved aging superstar Lionel Messi.

 

In the round of 16, the Argentines faced Egypt, and with the clock ticking away in the second half, the Egyptians forced a turnover in their own end, took the ball all the way down the field and scored to go up 3-0, which would have been an impossible margin for Argentina to overcome.  The referee then reviewed the VAR footage from the other end of the field and decided Egypt had to be penalized for the steal that had happened 40 seconds before the goal was scored.   This took down the goal and allowed the Argentines to execute their “miracle” comeback.

 

In the next game, the quarter-final match against Switzerland, Argentina took a 1-0 lead into the second half.  The Swiss, however, began to dominate play and scored a goal to tie.  IMMEDIATELY after the tying goal, the ref threw out one of the Swiss players, leaving Argentina with an extra man advantage for the remainder of regular time and overtime.  With the Swiss offense hamstrung, Argentina won easily.

 

Defenders of world soccer and the status quo will tell you that VAR, with its embedded cameras and lasers, allows much more accurate officiating.  But as we have seen, that is not what it is used for.  Since the on-field ref maintains complete authority to use VAR suggestions or reject them entirely, the video is used only as CYA evidence by a referee who wants to go back in time to make a call he didn’t make when it happened.  The Egypt penalty that was discovered only after the team had driven the length of the field and scored a goal is ample proof of that.

 

“Boat race” is an archaic bit of slang that only ancient horseplayers like me remember.  Nobody uses it anymore, not even horseplayers.  It means a fixed horse-race.   For many years, the race after the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs was reputed to be a boat race, and it may have been.  It was the perfect time to cheat since, after the Derby, nobody was paying much attention. 

 

As a sports fan, I am appalled by the World Cup.  It appears to be a boat race for Argentina.   That doesn’t mean they will necessarily win it all, since France and Spain and England will probably not cooperate.  (It’s not like pro wrestling where the loser knows he is supposed to lose.) It does mean that FIFA and its officiating will do everything in their power to send Messi and company out in a blaze of glory.

 

Copyright2026MichaelKubacki

THE BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP CASE---CLARENCE THOMAS MISSES ONE

         “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.”  ---Fourteenth Amendment, Section 1

 

         On June 30, the Supreme Court released its decision on birthright citizenship, with Justice Roberts writing for the majority in upholding the interpretation that has been generally accepted for the past 160 years.  In a 91-page opinion by Clarence Thomas, three justices dissented.

 

         Commentary on both sides has been harsh, especially from the losing side.  I have seen Roberts’ opinion described as “absurd,” and Thomas’s dissent called “brilliant” and a “tour de force.”  I don’t think either opinion is especially insightful or wise, and I’ll tell you why.

 

         First of all, the proper interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment is not that complicated or open to varied meanings.  If we are “originalists,” which is supposedly what most of the Court is, all we do is look to the plain meaning of the words when they were written.  “Born or naturalized in the United States” is not at all fuzzy or ambiguous, and it means the same thing today as it did 160 years ago.  “Subject to the jurisdiction thereof” is also as clear as an azure sky despite the extraordinary efforts to muddy its meaning.

 

         We are talking about babies here, remember, because babies are the ones who get born.  We are not talking about their parents or the parents’ DNA or their nationality or homeland.  The ONLY question is whether the baby, the little guy or gal who got born here, is “subject to the jurisdiction” of the USA.  And of course the answer is yes.  He gets a birth certificate here instantly, and a social security number a few days later.  From the moment of his first breath, he is a tax deduction for somebody on their 1040.  If he is destitute, he is immediately eligible for welfare benefits here.  In a few years, he will be claimed by authorities in the education bureaucracy.

 

         In addition, there is no other jurisdiction with a claim on him.  Even if his parents are Guatemalan citizens, Guatemala will not even know he exists.  His parents may someday inform Guatemala they have a kid, and Guatemala may recognize the baby as one of theirs, but that may or may not ever happen.  All we know at the moment of birth is that the baby is a “person born…in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.”

 

         That should have been the Roberts opinion.  He should have taken my last three paragraphs and called it a day.  But Roberts blithers.  He often blithers, and it gets him into trouble.  Here, Roberts wanders off into an analogy about the English Common Law and what it meant to be a “subject” of the sovereign in 1608.  He has gotten endless grief and mockery for this, and he deserves it because, well, being a subject of the king of England in 1608 has nothing whatever to do with being a citizen of the US under the Fourteenth Amendment.

 

         Of course, Clarence Thomas does the same thing in his dissent.  Most of his “authority” is from academic articles and remarks by Congressmen (rather than from case law), but one case he cites multiple times is The Pizarro, 15 U.S. 227 (1817) which involved, believe it or not, the interpretation of a 1795 treaty with Spain and whether the ship was actually “Spanish” when it was seized by privateers.  It is certainly arguable that Thomas’s analogy is even less relevant than Roberts’ who-is-a-subject-of-the-king musings.

 

         The most troubling part of Thomas’s dissent, however, comes just after his citation of The Pizarro when he completely mischaracterizes the holding of The Slaughter-House Cases, 83 U.S. 36, a very important and often-cited Supreme Court opinion from 1873.

 

         First, Thomas writes, “This Court agreed: The Citizenship Clause ‘exclude[d] from its operation children of…citizens or subjects of foreign States born within the United States.’  Slaughter-House Cases, 16 Wall. 36, 73 (1873).”  Thomas Dissent, p.4.

 

         Interesting!  The ellipsis by Thomas conceals a world of meaning.  The actual language of the Slaughter-House opinion is this: “The phrase ‘subject to its jurisdiction’ was intended to exclude from its operation children of ministers, consuls, and citizens or subjects of foreign states born within the United States.” Thus does Justice Thomas subtly try to score points for his side with a proposition that no one really disputes: children of foreign ambassadors or consuls do not become US citizens just by being born here.

 

         Worse than this, however, is Thomas’s omission of the next paragraphs from the Slaughter-House Cases, which nail down the OPPOSITE of what Justice Thomas claims the case holds: 

 

         

“The next observation is more important in view of the arguments of counsel in the present case. It is that the distinction between citizenship of the United States and citizenship of a State is clearly recognized and established.

 

Not only may a man be a citizen of the United States without being a citizen of a State, but an important element is necessary to convert the former into the latter. He must reside within the State to make him a citizen of it, but it is only necessary that he should be born or naturalized in the United States to be a citizen of the Union. (Emphasis added.)

 

It is quite clear, then, that there is a citizenship of the United States, and a citizenship of a State, which are distinct from each other, and which depend upon different characteristics or circumstances in the individual.”

 

Slaughter-House Cases, 83 Wall. 73-4.

 

         There is one rather obvious reason to exclude these paragraphs---because they demolish Thomas’s argument that a person born in the USA must also be “domiciled” here to be a citizen.  According to the Slaughter-House Cases, the legal meaning of the 14^th Amendment could not be more clear: if you are born in the United States, you are a citizen.  It doesn’t matter where your domicile is. 

 

         This error is more than a little disturbing.  Claiming a case says the opposite of what it actually says is not a little thing.  This is the sort of mistake one might expect from an AI-addled first-year law student, but never from a man regarded as one of America’s greatest legal authorities.  I can only hope this misstatement is brought to Justice Thomas’s attention, and that he takes whatever steps he can to rectify the situation.

 

         Following the six pages of introduction, which concludes with the mistakes noted above, Justice Thomas presents a 45-page argument that citizenship under the 14^th Amendment REQUIRES that the person be domiciled in the United States.  I think the fact that this screed rolls on for 45 pages is itself evidence of its fundamental weakness, but there is a much bigger problem.  Not only do the Slaughter-House Cases explicitly hold that there is no requirement of domicile for citizenship to exist, but the 14^th Amendment itself includes no hint that domicile has any relevance at all. 

 

         The word “domicile” has been around for hundreds of years.  It appears in statutes and legal writings that long pre-date the 14^th Amendment.  Every person in Congress and in state legislatures who debated passage of the 14^th Amendment knew the meaning of the word.  I don’t know whether there was any debate over using the word in the text of the Amendment, but there could have been.  In any event, the people who wrote the 14^th Amendment could have used the word “domicile” and, for whatever reason, they chose not to.  Instead of “domiciled” in the United States, they said “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States, and that makes all the difference.  “Subject to the jurisdiction” is a very different standard from “domiciled.”  Justice Thomas is demanding that we import a different standard into the 14^th Amendment than the standard that is there.

 

         Being “subject to the jurisdiction” of a place is very easy. Almost everyone present in a place for any period is subject to the jurisdiction thereof.  (Exception: diplomatic immunity.)  Being “domiciled” there is much more difficult.

 

         To be subject to the jurisdiction of a place, you need merely pass through it.  If you run through a stop sign while driving through Florida, you may have to pay Florida a fine.  If you spend a night in Nevada and impregnate a woman there, you may be subject to Nevada law for purposes of child support.  You may even be subject to the jurisdiction if you never physically enter a place, but enter into a contractual relationship with someone there.  As the Slaughter-House Cases informs us, “subject to the jurisdiction” excludes almost nobody.  Simply being born here is usually enough to make you a citizen.  “[i]t is only necessary that he should be born or naturalized in the United States to be a citizen of the Union.“   Slaughter-House, 83 U.S. at 74.

 

         Thomas’s proposed “domicile” standard would exclude a large percentage of Americans who have been treated as citizens since birth.  Being “domiciled” somewhere is not easy.  “Domiciled” means you live there, for at least a substantial portion of your time.  You pay taxes there.  If you want to drive, you need a license from the government there.  You may be called for jury duty.  If there is a military draft, you may have to fight for the place.  Justice Thomas would change the common understanding of “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” and suddenly demand an enormous commitment of time and money and effort from those we have regarded as citizens for the past 160 years.   And all because he feels the word “domicile” should appear somewhere in the 14^th Amendment. 

         

             I think of myself as Clarence Thomas’s biggest fan.  Over the years, I’ve probably read half of his opinions.  His dissent in Gruter v. Bollinger, the affirmative action case, brought tears to my eyes.  I have told friends many times that 250 years from now, his opinions are the only ones that will still be read.

 

         This dissent, however (and I hate to say this), looks suspiciously like a results-oriented piece where the justice decides in advance what he wants the opinion to conclude and then drafts an argument to reach that conclusion.  I have never before seen a Clarence Thomas opinion that made me suspect such a thing.  The leftists on the Court do this all the time, of course.  Roberts also does it often, and he may have done it in this case.

 

         Thomas has certain prejudices, as all of us do, but they are not political in nature, and I’ve never read an opinion of his where I thought his political views tilted his legal judgment.  It would be a shame if, as we approach the end of his brilliant legal career, that began to happen.  

 

Finally, let’s go back to the beginning.  How did we get here?

 

         President Trump’s Executive Order, signed on January 20, 2025, put forth the most extreme position he could possibly have adopted on birthright citizenship.  For 160 years, Congress, courts, and presidents had understood and accepted that Section 1 of the 14^th Amendment meant that babies born in this country (with a few exceptions), were citizens.  Trump attempted to change that history by edict.

 

         There is nothing in our laws that permits a president to change unilaterally the meaning of a Constitutional provision.  Section 5 of the 14^th Amendment states that “The Congress shall have the power to enforce by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.”  But Trump wasn’t interested in that.  He decided he could personally reverse generations of legal meaning because he didn’t like the accepted interpretation.  And he probably believed that once his views became law, hundreds of thousands of people who thought they were American citizens would have to go “home” to places they had never even visited, like Mexico, Pakistan, and Syria. 

 

         If the concern is “birth tourism” or anchor babies, there is still nothing that prevents Congress from enacting “appropriate legislation” to address those issues and further the aims of the 14^thAmendment.  It is even possible that Trump alone could nibble around the edges of current law by Executive Order.  What he CANNOT do is what he did.

 

 This Supreme Court decision is no surprise.  What is surprising is that the decision was not unanimous. 

 

Copyright2026MichaelKubacki    

SENTENCING BOLTON

         “John R. Bolton…pleaded guilty on Friday to mishandling classified information in a case that could send him to prison for five years.” ---NYT, 6-27-26

 

         Of course, he’s not going to jail.  Guys like him never go to jail.  They’re too important, you know.  Insider traders in Congress never go to jail.  Fauci will never go to jail.  Hillary will never go to jail, or James Comey.  Even Sam Brinton never went to jail.  He was in charge of nuclear waste disposal in Biden’s Office of Nuclear Energy, and he was arrested THREE DIFFERENT TIMES for stealing luggage in three different airports (in Nevada, Minnesota, and Washington D.C.).  Brinton got probation and fines each time.

 

         There’s an argument that prison is pointless in these cases, and I get the argument.  These are not violent criminals, and once they are severed from public life, they probably pose no more danger to society or the body politic.  That’s why they get fined, and have to write apology letters, and make restitution, and do community service.  Bolton will probably have to do “community service,” and for self-important muckety-mucks like him, that normally means he will give a series of lectures to college students or work for a court-approved non-profit for some specified number of hours.

 

         I have a different idea.  People like Bolton, people who abuse the power they acquire through public office (whether elected or appointed), do so in part because of the arrogant conceit they are too smart and wonderful to ever face justice. These creatures need to be brought back to earth.  If we are not going to put them in prison, we can at least do that.

 

 On a nice summer day in 1961, at a posh country estate in Buckinghamshire, the UK Secretary of State John Profumo happened to see Christine Keeler emerge naked from a swimming pool.  He would come to know Ms. Keeler, a call girl, much better in the days and months ahead.

 

When the scandal broke, he stood in Parliament with the Prime Minister next to him and declared there had been “no impropriety” in his relationship with Christine Keeler.  This lie (rather than the affair itself), was his downfall.  In 1963, he resigned from Parliament and his other government duties.  There was no attempt to seek sympathy for his failures.  There was no interview by Oprah.  Instead, he volunteered at a charitable organization in London called Toynbee Hall, where he washed dishes and scrubbed floors until his death forty years later.  He never returned to public life.

 

I’m not suggesting forty years of drudgery for Bolton or Fauci or Pelosi or McConnell or Comey or Clinton or Brinton.  But how about a year?  Twelve months of it could put a much softer edge on the imperiousness and pomposity at the root of their crimes.  Scrubbing toilets can be a humbling experience and humility is primarily what they need.  Having an important position in Washington apparently makes you think you are a sort-of God.  Our criminal justice system can deal with that, if it is willing to. 

 

Copyright2026MichaelKubacki   

THE JEFFREY PROBLEM AND THE END OF THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION

         You don’t usually have to wonder very much about how Donald Trump feels about a particular issue.  He doesn’t like Iranian jihadis, for example.  That seems clear.  He also doesn’t like the Jew-haters who run most of our major universities.  He loves huge government programs and has no interest in cutting federal spending unless it is spending done by his political opponents. He maintains an intense dislike for leftist prosecutors, both local and federal, who brought charges against him to jail him or defame him, and prevent him from being re-elected president.  He resents the theft of the 2020 presidential election.  He strongly disapproves of the race hatred and discrimination embedded in DEI and affirmative action programs.  He thinks, for some reason, that tariffs are a powerful tool for economic growth.

         I agree with him on many of these things, and not so much on some.  But I feel I know where he stands.  He will occasionally say the opposite of what he believes for rhetorical reasons, or to further negotiations, or simply to bluster and confuse his enemies, but those tactics are easy to spot.  “Take him seriously but not literally” has always been sound advice when trying to understand Donald Trump.

         However, I don’t know how he feels about the Epstein saga, the millions of documents detailing Epstein’s activities, the legal pursuit of men who committed sex or trafficking crimes against underage girls, or the responsibility of the Department of Justice to track down those men and prosecute them.

         It would have been easy to handle this problem on January 20, 2025.  He could have issued an executive order, along with all the others he signed that day, instructing his Attorney General to review all the Epstein documents, redact identifying information about the girl victims, and publish the lot.  Doing that would have satisfied his MAGA base and millions of others who wanted some type of justice to be done.  He had promised, or at least suggested, he would do something like that.

         And then nothing happened.  Or rather a lot of things happened that never satisfied anybody.  And so the issue remains, sitting there, a turd in the Trump Administration punchbowl.

         AG Pam Bondi was supposed to deal with the Epstein problem and she never quite did.  In February 2025, in an interview, she was asked if there was a list of Epstein’s “clients” (buddies? co-conspirators?), and would it be released.  She replied that it was “sitting on my desk right now.”  Then, five months later, after repeated inquiries, the “DOJ” (and not Bondi personally), said there was no such list.   Around the same time, Trump called the ongoing controversy a “Democratic hoax,” and said it was being used by the Democrats to distract the public from all the accomplishments in the first six months of his administration.  Which was probably true, of course, but he could have ordered all the documents released to end the distraction.  And he didn’t.

         Then Congress stepped in and passed a bill ordering all the Epstein files to be released.  Trump even signed it, on November 25.  It ordered the DOJ to disclose all their Epstein investigation files, and in December 2025 and January 2026, somewhere around 3.5 million documents were released.  Todd Blache, who was Bondi’s deputy at the time, said there were 6 million documents being reviewed, which suggests there are still more than 2 million documents that have not been made public.

         The latest major development was the firing of Pam Bondi as AG on April 2.  She was replaced, for now at least, by Todd Blanche, her former deputy.  In his first press conference as interim AG, he was asked about the Epstein documents and stated that no more would be released.  And when asked about whether there would be prosecutions of men for sex crimes based on information contained in the files, he did not say it was impossible but made it clear no effort was being expended to build any such cases.  Ghislane Maxwell, Epstein’s general factotum, is still the only person prosecuted and jailed for assisting Epstein in his abuse and trafficking of young girls.

         And THAT, it would appear, is THAT.

         Trump himself has not commented on the current state of l’affaire Epstein (which he brought about with the Bondi firing), so we must assume he is content with it.  At various times he has said that Epstein’s victims deserve justice and at other times he has belittled the entire issue as fraudulent.  Now he has killed the investigation entirely.  I wonder why.  I truly wish I had some insight into his thinking here because, as I will explain, it probably will result in the effective end of his presidency.

         Obsessive Trump-haters (a category that includes the New York Times), will tell you, as they have for years now, that he fears his own sex abuse/pedophilia/scummy behavior will be revealed in the Epstein files and he simply wants to prevent the disclosure of evidence about his own crimes.

         These are not serious people.  Trump’s denials themselves mean nothing, of course, but if he had been banging 14-year-olds supplied by Epstein or other cronies, it would have come to light fifty years ago.  Guys aged 79 are not suddenly revealed to be pedophiles and rapists and sex scum.  It happens in their 20s and 30s and there are usually dozens of women telling basically the same story.  That never happened with Trump.

         Even more telling is the fact that these millions of Epstein documents were sitting (somewhere) in the DOJ for eight years of Obama and four years of Biden.  If there had been something that could have destroyed Trump’s reputation and his rise to power, it would have been leaked.  The Democrats in Washington and elsewhere around the country tried EVERYTHING to stop him.  They were willing to prosecute him anywhere, for anything, to stop him from becoming president.  They even rooted through Melania’s underwear drawer.

         So the people who think Trump is merely protecting himself (or even that he started the Iran War to distract the public from the Epstein issue!), well, I said above they are “not serious people.”  Actually, they are incapable of coherent thought, perhaps because of their consuming hatred for the man.  It makes them irrational.

         However, I don’t have a good explanation for Trump’s actions on the Epstein files over the past 16 months.  He could have ended this at any time by dumping all the files into the public domain.  He still could.  But he won’t.  And as for why he won’t, all I have is a theory.

         The richest guy I ever met was the CEO of a multi-billion-dollar corporation.  He had a wife and four kids, was married for decades, and had never been faithful to his wife.  He was a high-energy guy who never lost sight of the bottom line, and he worked 70 or 80 hours a week.  He once told me, “Women are pussies with garbage cans on top.”

         There are a lot of guys like him, and a lot of the men in the Epstein files live his lifestyle and share his views.   They work hard, they have tons of money, and they have no patience for timewasters or waiting in line at restaurants and airports.  They want to have sex with young attractive women or girls, but they don’t have the time or interest in wooing them and they lack the social skills to even attempt it.

         Donald Trump knows these men, who are professionals, businessmen, celebrities, executives, salesmen, financiers, politicians, bankers, and even a former prince named Andrew.  He knows hundreds of them, or even thousands.  And he likes them.  He likes them because they are “important” just like he is, and he doesn’t care much about their behavior.  They lie, but lying is part of what they must do.  They intimidate people to get what they want, and they may go up to the limits of the law (or even a bit beyond), but that’s just who they are.  They’re “tough guys,” again just like he is.

         He likes them.  He genuinely admires and respects them.

         He likes Bill Clinton, the serial rapist, sociopath, and co-conspirator in selling his wife’s Secretary of State office to any tyrant and torturer who was willing to pay him a million bucks for a fifteen-minute speech. “I like Bill Clinton,” says Trump.  “I like his behavior toward me.  I think he understood me.”

         He likes Putin too, of course.  I mean, how does anybody LIKE Putin?

         And Xi Jinping?  Trump calls him a “brilliant leader.”  He admires Xi’s strength and decisiveness.  “I got along with him great,” says Donald Trump.  The genocide of the Uighurs?  The dead-of-night purges of political rivals?  Having organs removed from prisoners and implanted into rich guys?  President Trump doesn’t talk much about some of Xi’s more unsavory activities, or maybe all that is part of the decisiveness and strength he admires.

         He even got along with Epstein himself for quite a while, until Epstein began to pursue the young daughter of a Mar-A-Lago member.  At that point, Trump dumped Jeffrey, not because he necessarily disapproved of him, but because he became a threat to one of Trump’s business relationships.

         And that’s the only theory that, in the world I see, fits all the facts.  Trump wants to bury (and has buried), the Epstein documents because there are lots of “important men” and “tough guys” that he doesn’t want exposed as creepy sexpests and sexual scumbags.  He likes them.  He feels it would be somehow unfair to expose them to public scrutiny.

         The problem is that none of his MAGA people or other Republicans agree with him.  The people who voted for Trump have always wanted the Epstein pedophiles and traffickers and sexual harassers to be exposed and prosecuted, and they assumed (from Trump’s promises), that he would do so.  Now that it seems clear he will not, much of his support will drift away.  On this one issue, he has betrayed almost everyone who supported him. He does not understand how important this is to the people who put him in office.

         I am a Trump fan.  I think he already has some wonderful achievements, and there may be many more.  But no matter how well he does in Iran, and how many Salvadoran rapists he deports, and how many useless federal employees he fires, and how many racist DEI programs he shuts down, and how strong the economy is, I am afraid that the 2026 mid-terms will be the end of Trumps agenda simply because he refused to follow through on his promise to blow up the world of Epstein and all his buddies.  Once the Democrats get Congress, the impeachments and the investigations and all the other phony outrage starts up all over again, and the Trump presidency will be effectively over.

Copyright2026MichaelKubacki

MORE…MOVING TO VEGAS

 

I’m a long way from a major league ballpark and since I don’t have cable, I don’t even get a lot of baseball on TV.

 

However, I live across the street from Majestic Park, a city facility in Las Vegas featuring twelve beautifully-groomed softball fields with screens, shaded metal bleachers, home-run fences, enclosed dugouts, protected enclosures for cameras and radar guns, and scoreboards.  The fields are different sizes because the girls who play there (it’s all girls), range from ages four through eighteen.  It’s in use year-round, though I am curious about what sort of action I will see when the temps hit 120 degrees.  I am told there are international tournaments, and I don’t know that for sure, but there can't be a lot of girl fastpitch facilities like Majestic Park anywhere in the universe.

 

I have taken to going over there in the evenings.  I plop down with my discreetly-concealed beers and watch the young ladies.  They are well-equipped and everybody has a nice uniform (fitted, and not cheap).  From ages 12 and up, the girls have individual walk-up music.

 

As for the coaches, I’m sure there are good ones and bad ones, but there are a lot of them, and they are all seem serious about teaching their girls and bringing home the bacon.  I haven’t seen any crazy ones yet, and I haven’t seen a serious argument or shouting match either.

 

You can get a footlong hot dog while you are watching, or some popcorn or fresh donuts or a soda or fresh-squeezed lemonade, and they do not cost what you would pay at Dodger Stadium.  On a pleasant evening, after the sun has dipped below the mountains, contentment abounds for the casual fan.

 

The parents are extremely well behaved, which leads me to believe there are strict rules about acceptable parental behavior.  Most of the moms chat with a girlfriend or two, and some have babies they are tending, while the dads talk to a buddy and sip from their insulated opaque metal containers, much like I do.   Most of the noise comes from the dugouts where the girls are chanting and singing songs and trashing the opposing pitcher.  They ARE actually kids after all.

 

Don’t get me wrong here.  This is not the Mets and the Pirates.  A lot of routine ground balls wind up in right field.  But every now and then, you will see a pitcher who can move the ball around the strike zone and then get strike three on a fastball in the dirt.  I’ve also seen a little porkchop of a girl put together a 10-pitch at bat with 6 foul balls and wind up with a walk, and I thought, “Wow, you just did a baseball thing, didn't you, honey?”

 

I stay until my beer is gone and then I head home.  Lately, however, I’ve started taking more beer.

 

 

*****

         I have written about Las Vegas and its hundreds of housing developments, each featuring dozens of identical structures in identical color-schemes, each landscaped in red gravel (my house) or perfectly green, weed-free bluegrass (Steve Wynn’s house).  Each clot of condos or apartments or duplexes, or whatever, has a soft, multi-syllabic name denoting its existential tranquility, grace and deluxeness to any poor sucker who can’t afford to live there but who can read the name on the coyote-proof barricade surrounding the compound.  I live in Legends.  Other people live in Sandstone Edge or Desert Creek or Tucson Trails.

         The problem is that there are so many of these charming enclaves that real estate guys are running out of names.  If you accidentally copy some other developer, there may be trouble.  There may be lawsuits.

         That’s where I come in.  All you need to do in order to name your project is consult my list below.  Pick one name from column A, combine it with a word from column B, and you will have a unique appellation for your construction that no one will ever accidentally copy or steal. 

A                                  B

Scrotum                  Ranch

Pedophile                Estates

Spleen                     Conservatories

Prostate                    Manors

Uvula                        Overlook

Phlegm                      Village

Bile                            Canyon

Offal                          Vistas

Smegma                     Reserve

Dung                           Hills

Mucus                         Trails

Scum                           Acres

Putrid                           Crest

Grotty                           Pointe

Rancid                          Meadows

Bunghole                      View

Copyright2026MichaelKubacki

 

ACCOUNTABILITY AT SCOTUS—NOT!

         On May 2, 2022, Politico published a draft of the Supreme Court opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, alerting the world that SCOTUS was about to overrule Roe v. Wade and declare there was no federal constitutional right to abortion.  Immediately, there were illegal and frightening protests at the homes of Supreme Court justices.  A short time later, there was an assassination attempt on Brett Kavanaugh.

         The official opinion was finally released on June 22, 2022, revealing that the Politico draft had been stolen and leaked from somewhere inside the Court.

         Outrage followed.  All the justices (or most of them, anyway), were stunned that such a thing could happen in such a collegial place where everyone respected the traditions and values of the Court.  There would have to be an investigation!

         And did Chief Justice Roberts turn the matter over to the FBI?  Were all the law clerks and administrative people interrogated?  Were all their recent movements and contacts and phone records examined?  Were they given lie-detector tests?

         Uh…not exactly.

         Roberts turned the investigation over to Supreme Court Marshal Gail Curley, whose job it is to supervise security at the court building, make sure the doors are locked and ensure that demonstrators don’t get too unruly.  There is no indication she had ever conducted an investigation before, and certainly not one of this importance.  Nevertheless, the Chief Justice chose Curley.  He would probably have been better off picking Moe or Larry instead. 

         On January 19, 2023, the court issued a statement that “the Marshal’s team determined that no further investigation was warranted” for the 82 employees they had questioned who might have had access to the Dobbs draft.  The Marshal had conducted “formal interviews” with all of them.   They all denied leaking the opinion and they all signed sworn statements attesting they were not the source of the leak. 

         Formal interviews?  Did everyone wear neckties?  Does “formal” mean you weren’t allowed to wear a t-shirt and shorts?  And what about the sworn statements?  Did Curley make them do a pinky-swear or just a regular swear?

         And that was the end of it.  No one was held responsible for breaching the centuries-old tradition of confidentiality at the Supreme Court and nobody ever will be. *

         What is infuriating about this particular dropped ball (one hates to call it a “cover-up” without more evidence), is that everybody who works on legal opinions at the Supreme Court knows who did it.  There are nine justices, each of them have four law clerks, and there are another 35 to 40 people who handle communications with outside lawyers and have some access to information about opinions.  That means this little guild consists of only 80 to 85 people.  They all know each other, they eat lunch with each other, they talk to each other about cases, they play basketball with each other, and they invite each other to their homes for dinner.  Justice Alito said in a 2023 interview with the Wall Street Journal that he “has a pretty good idea” who did it.  Of course he does.  They all do.  But this is Washington and nobody can be held accountable.  It would be rude.  People might talk about the leaker.  He might have trouble getting a multi-million-dollar job in a premier law firm.

         And now, largely because Justice Roberts would not hold anyone‘s feet to the fire for the worst leak in SCOTUS history, it has happened again.   Only now it’s worse.  Since everyone knows that a breach of confidentiality will not be punished, the leakers have multiplied.

         Two days ago, the New York Times published confidential memos the justices had sent to each other in 2016 concerning an Order from SCOTUS summarily halting Barack Obama’s climate change edict near the end of his presidency.  These  memos form the foundation of the arguments about the “Shadow Docket” the Court now uses to quickly reverse extra-legal orders of partisan District Court judges who rule that Trump policies be stopped immediately.  Allowing the orders of these rogue judges to stand would mean many months of delay before the appeal system could operate and a final ruling be issued by SCOTUS.

         It’s a completely partisan matter, of course.  The leftists on the Court knew Obama’s Order would have irrevocably changed US environmental policy before it could be legally overturned as being beyond his authority, and that was fine with them.  They wanted Obama to rule unchecked.  Now, however, they want illegal orders of District Court judges to remain in effect as long as possible and cripple Trump’s power to govern.

         That is why these leaks occurred.  The NYT and the leftists who work at the SCOTUS disapprove of the Shadow Docket and how it is being used to allow a fair hearing for Trump Administration policies, so they have stolen these documents and are trying use them as part of an “exposé” of the Court’s supposed deference to Trump.

         Good luck to them.  The problem of what should be done about illegal edicts by rogue judges or rogue executives will continue to be debated.  My point here is a different one---that the tradition of confidentiality and respect for the legal process has now disappeared because John Roberts didn’t care about it.

         Regarding the confidential memos from 2016, the NYT writes:

         “To better understand what happened next, the Times spoke to 10 people…who were familiar with the deliberations over the pivotal emergency order and who spoke on condition of anonymity because confidentiality was a condition of their employment.” (Emphasis added.)

         Ten people?  They didn’t ask twenty?  It is believed the Dobbs decision was stolen by a single person.  Now apparently, everybody will talk to you, at least if you are the New York Times.  It appears they can call up anybody at the Court and find out what Justice Alito said to Justice Thomas in the men’s room that morning.

         And it’s all because Justice Roberts didn’t bother to investigation the Dobbs leak. 

Copyright2026MichaelKubacki   

         

*I don’t think there is much doubt the leak of the Dobbs opinion was a crime, though that legal question may be arguable.  What is NOT arguable is that lying in the sworn statement denying responsibility IS a crime under 18 U.S.C Section 1001.  (That’s the statute they used to put Martha Stewart away for two years.)