It’s a death row pardon two minutes too late [gift link]:

Amid collapsing public confidence in U.S. courts, a federal judge has been found culpable of misconduct. The offense? Questioning the ethics of a Supreme Court justice. 

U.S. District Judge Michael Ponsor published an essay in the New York Times arguing that the display of flags associated with President-elect Donald Trump’s MAGA movement at Justice Samuel Alito’s Virginia and New Jersey homes was a breach of public trust. The piece was unusual because judges don’t typically offer personal criticisms of a colleague in public.

According to the jurist assigned to review the matter, Chief Judge Albert Diaz of the federal appeals court in Richmond, Va., it was Ponsor who damaged the judiciary. In a previously unreported order filed last week, Diaz found that by commenting on controversial issues and criticizing Alito, Ponsor violated the code of conduct that applies to all federal judges other than Supreme Court justices.

Among other transgressions, Ponsor, a 1994 Clinton appointee who sits in Springfield, Mass., was found to violate rules against actions that “detract from the dignity” of a judge’s office and harm “public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the judiciary.”

The judiciary has reason to be concerned about its perception. A Gallup survey published Tuesday found that public confidence in America’s courts had fallen by 24 percentage points since 2020, to a historic low of 35%. 

The idea that it is pointing out the misconduct of powerful judges as opposed to the misconduct itself that is undermining the legitimacy of the courts is the kind of logic that will ensure that the public confidence trend will continue to crater. Over to you, Warren and David:

The post Thou shalt not question our platonic overlords appeared first on Lawyers, Guns & Money.

I’m not sure you’re even ready for this much populism:

President-elect Donald Trump has expressed a keen interest in privatizing the U.S. Postal Service in recent weeks, three people with knowledge of the matter said, a move that could shake up consumer shipping and business supply chains and push hundreds of thousands of federal workers out of the government.

Trump has discussed his desire to overhaul the Postal Service at his Mar-a-Lago estate with Howard Lutnick, his pick for commerce secretary and the co-chair of his presidential transition, the people said. Earlier this month, Trump also convened a group of transition officials to ask for their views on privatizing the agency, one of the people said.

Told of the mail agency’s annual financial losses, Trump said the government should not subsidize the organization, the people said. The people spoke on the condition of anonymity to reflect private conversations.

Trump’s specific plans for overhauling the Postal Service were not immediately clear. But he feuded with the nation’s mail carrier as president in 2019, trying to force it to hand over key functions – including rate-setting, personnel decisions, labor relations and managing relationships with its largest clients – to the Treasury Department.

“The government is slow, slow, slow – decades slow on adopting new ways of doing things, and there’s a lot of [other] carrier services that became legal in the ’70s that are doing things so much better with increased volumes and reduced costs,” said Casey Mulligan, who served as a top economist in the first Trump administration. “We didn’t finish the job in the first term, but we should finish it now.”

This is a classic Republican economic policy in that 1)it will be disastrous for rural and exurban areas that are the most reliable sources of Republican support and 2)won’t hurt them with the typical voter in these areas at all even if they go through with it and their lives are negatively impacted.

The post Trump considers privatizing the USPS appeared first on Lawyers, Guns & Money.

Click here to go see the bonus panel!

Hovertext:
Everyone is a utilitarian until being a utilitarian is low utility.

Shut Up and Take My Money created a rather self-explanatory Dogs Pooping in Beautiful Places” 2025 calendar, which features different breeds in different scenic locations doing what dogs do best. The calendar could be a gag gift for someone who likes traveling and everything about dogs.

Get ready for 12 glorious months of dogs doing what they do best – pooping – but this time, in some of the most stunning locations on Earth! We’re talking Swiss Alps, sun-kissed beaches, Italian mountains, and more.

Portions of every sale goes to an animal charity.

Plus, a portion of your purchase goes to charity! So while these dogs are leaving a mark on nature, you’ll be leaving a mark on the world.

The 2023 Calendar

The calendar is reminiscent of the Instagram account Dogs Pooping In Pretty Places, which collects and compiles very similar photos.

via This Is Why I’m Broke