From the LRC blog:
The “Arab Problem”
Posted by Stephan Kinsella on March 26, 2004 11:00 AMThe following informal memo (Download file) was passed on to me by a pro-Israel, pro-war attorney. Apparently this is what passes for sober wisdom among neocons; this is the kind of thing they are apparently passing along to each other in secret, wink-wink emails.
The piece is, as far as I can tell, anonymous, but draws on Colonel Ralph Peters views. The memo breathlessly argues that “our enemy” is basically Arab culture. As it suggests: “We’re facing a 14th century culture engaged in a 14th century war against us. The problem is that they are armed with 20th century weapons, which may eventually include nuclear weapons. … It may sound strange to say, but what we have to do is to take the 14th century culture of our enemies and bring it into the 17th century. Once we’ve done that, then we can work on bringing them into the 21st century, but that will be much easier.”
I’m reminded of Rothbard’s proposal to repeal the Twentieth Century (unlike the William Buckley/National Review crowd, who advocated that conservatives “stand athwart history, yelling Stop.”)
So it seems to me that instead of bringing Arab culture from the 14th to the 21st century, we should meet them halfway, around the 18th or so. What the hell, let’s make it the 16th.
Other recent LRC blogposts:
The Golden Age
From Bad to Worse (on database bill)
Is every conservative organization insane? (Federalist Society)
Re: Is every conservative organization insane?
Posted by Stephan Kinsella on February 28, 2004 12:08 PMThom, this reminds me of one reason I quit the Federalist Society. While they are more conservative and even more free market than most lawyers, the ones I’ve met have been woefully non-intellectual, ignorant, and completely unlibertarian. I remember a few years ago I was at a luncheon w/ some fellow members of the Houston chapter. I was sitting next to one guy who is an extremely intelligent lawyer, at a big firm, very well educated from some posh New England law school, etc. Trying to draw some interesting conversation out of him–he was kind of quiet and reserved, and I was not sure of how conservative, or libertarian, or whatever he was–I finally asked him something like, “Well, which political philosophers would you say you admire?” The answer stunned me, almost left me speechless: “Oh, I’d say Newt Gingrich.”
‘Nuff said.
Impeach Jefferson!
Posted by Stephan Kinsella on February 26, 2004 04:47 PMA French-German Tulane law student acquaintance of mine (he speaks nine languages–I only speak about 0.7), Frederic Sourgens, sent me his Inn of Court brief where he argues for the impeachment of President Jefferson for undertaking the unconstitutional Louisiana Purchase. A bit rough, but fun… Download file. After 30 pages of legal reasoning, it concludes: “President Jefferson must be removed from office because of his blatant disregard of the Constitution constituting a high misdemeanor of state and high treason against the United States.”
Gay Marriage Amendment
Posted by Stephan Kinsella on February 24, 2004 02:31 PMFrom an article on the proposed Gay Marriage Amendment: “Bush plans to endorse language introduced by Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-Colo.) that backers contend would ban gay marriage but not prevent state legislatures from allowing the kind of civil unions and same-sex partnership arrangements that exist in Vermont and California. …
“Musgrave’s proposal, called the Federal Marriage Amendment, states: ‘Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution or the constitution of any State, nor state or federal law, shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.'”
This is bizarre. First, what would happen to bigamy statutes which prohibit one man marrying two women? One reading of the amendment would be that marriage is “defined” so that bigamy cannot exist–after all, it’s not just “a” man and “a” woman. So would bigamy now be decriminalized?Second, even this wording does not seem to prohibit “gay marriage”. Suppose Louisiana passed a law permitting gays to marry. They are not being required to do it by a judge or the feds; they just do it. Does this amendment mean that even a clear law letting gays marry can’t be “construed” to mean what it says? And what is “marital status”? Does it refer to the status that society confers upon marriage? If so, how can the Constitution affect it? Or does it simply refer to the *label* used in the state statutes? After all, even its drafters admit civil unions could be permitted–these could be identical to marriage in every way except the label used in the title of the statute.
In sum, this proposed amendment seems to do the following: it prevents judges from forcing states to include gays in their marriage laws. But it does not seem to prevent states from having civil unions, or even from enacting their own marriage laws.
Nor does it seem to do a good job at making it clear that one state’s gay marriage laws need not be given full faith and credit by others.
A better amendment would be simply: “No State may be required by the Federal government, including Federal judges, to recognize gay marriage, nor to give full faith and credit to gay marriage laws of Sister States.”
An even better amendment would be: “The Federal government shall have no power to tax.” Let’s keep our eyes on the ball, people!
N.B.: I am of course NOT calling for or endorsing a constitutional amendment or convention–I don’t trust any of these bozos.
“a cooked dough product having a light, flaky, crispy texture”
“a cooked dough product having a light, flaky, crispy texture”
Posted by Stephan Kinsella on February 21, 2004 01:10 PMFor those curious about the actual patent process, Chef America, Inc. v. Lamb-Weston, Inc. is an interesting and short recent case. This is a typical example of how patent attorneys describe reality and how federal judges handle patent disputes.
The case concerns U.S. Pat. No. 4,761,290 (PDF version; USPTO version), owned by plaintiff Chef America.
The patent covers “[a] process for producing a dough product which is convertible upon finish cooking by baking or exposure to microwaves in the presence of a microwave susceptor into a cooked dough product having a light, flaky, crispy texture.” The patent explains that with prior dough products “[i]n large measure, instead of the desired light, flaky, crispy texture, the cooked products have been found to be leathery, in the case of baked products, or soggy in the case of microwave heated products.” It involves the process of “applying a layer of shortening flakes between the dough and a light batter which is applied to the dough, setting the batter and subsequently melting the shortening flakes present in the set batter in order to form pin holes or air cells in the batter and at the surface of the dough. Upon finish cooking, these pinholes or air cells form a porous product and permit the batter to be quickly heated and browned, resulting in a dough product having a light, flaky, crispy texture to the pocket.”The patent’s technical description explains that the dough is cooked in an oven, at a temperature from about 400 degrees F. to 850 degrees F. The problem is that the claims of the patent–which specify what invention is legally protected–include the step: “heating the resulting batter-coated dough to a temperature in the range of about 400° F. to 850° F. for a period of time ranging from about 10 seconds to 5 minutes to first set said batter and then subsequently melt said shortening flakes, whereby air cells are formed in said batter and the surface of said dough”.
The claim should have said heating the dough “at” that temperature, not “to” that temperature. The dough is in an oven which is at 400° F. to 850° F., but the dough does not reach this temperature. If it did, it would burn up. Lamb-Weston was accused of infringing the claims of Chef America’s patent. But Lamb-Weston pointed out that it did not heat dough “to 400° F.”; therefore, it did not infringe the claims.
Chef America argued “that ‘to’ should be construed to mean ‘at’ because otherwise the patented process could not perform the function the patentees intended”. In other words, the claim is nonsensical if you construe “to” to mean “to”; anyone skilled in the art (e.g., a chef) reading the claim would understand it to mean that the oven is at the specified temperature, not the dough being cooked.
However, the appeals court held that the language was unambiguous and the court would not rewrite it. As the court stated, “we construe the claim as written, not as the patentees wish they had written it. As written, the claim unambiguously requires that the dough be heated to a temperature range of 400° F. to 850° F.”
This was the correct ruling, IMHO.
Subsidiarity and San Francisco (Gay Marriage)
Subsidiarity and San Francisco
Posted by Stephan Kinsella on February 20, 2004 04:33 PMRegardless of the substantive merits of whether a particular state or state sub-unit “should” “recognize” “gay marriage”–no right-thinking libertarian ought to be in favor of the feds–or even California–forcing San Francisco to abandon its recent policy of marrying gays. You can say the SF government should not exist; should not marry gays; should not be in the business of marrying anyone. But that does not imply that California or the Feds should have the power to do anything about it (and in the case of the Feds, constitutionally, they do NOT have the power to do anything other than to refuse to force other states to give full faith and credit California’s gay marriage policy).
IMHO, libertarians who are against gay marriage should not make the mistake of abandoning decentralization by endorsing the feds’ interference with local government policies on this issue.
