Tag: federal courts

Project Veritas Not Only Loses Its Vexatious SLAPP Suit Against Stanford, It Has To Pay The University’s Legal Fees

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

from the thank-you-anti-slapp-laws dept

Mon, Aug 8th 2022 12:00pm – Mike Masnick

Project Veritas, the faux conservative group of pranksters pretending to be journalists likes to pretend that they’re “free speech” supporters. But they’re not. They appear to really only support their own free speech, and have a much more flexible view of free speech when it includes speech critical of themselves. Over the past few years, Project Veritas (PV) has gotten fairly aggressive in suing organizations that are critical of PV. That’s… not very free speechy. PV has tried to silence the NY Times, has sued CNN, and last year it sued Stanford and the University of Washington over a blog post debunking some of the usual nonsense from PV.

Project Veritas Not Only Loses Its Vexatious SLAPP Suit Against Stanford, It Has To Pay The University’s Legal Fees

America, Meet Your New Dictator-in-Chief: The President’s Secret, Unchecked Powers

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)1 Comment

by John W. Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead | June 01, 2022

America, meet your new dictator-in-chief.

As the New York Times reports, “Newly disclosed documents have shed a crack of light on secret executive branch plans for apocalyptic scenarios—like the aftermath of a nuclear attack—when the president may activate wartime powers for national security emergencies.”< The problem, of course, is that we have become a nation in a permanent state of emergency. Power-hungry and lawless, the government has weaponized one national crisis after another in order to expand its powers and justify all manner of government tyranny in the so-called name of national security. The seeds of this present madness were sown almost two decades ago when George W. Bush stealthily issued two presidential directives that granted the president the power to unilaterally declare a national emergency, which is loosely defined as “any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions.”

America, Meet Your New Dictator-in-Chief: The President’s Secret, Unchecked Powers

Missing Links/Links Behind Paywalls:

Secret Emergency Orders May Include Focus on Internet, New Files Show

Report: Military may have to quell domestic violence from economic collapse

Known Unknowns: Unconventional “Strategic Shocks” in Defense Strategy Development (PDF)

End the Imperial Presidency Before It’s Too Late

Too Much Presidential Power — We’ve Got to Address the ‘Unitary Executive’ Question

The Details of OSHA’s Vaccination Rule for Private Employees Suggest Several Ways It Could Be Vulnerable to Legal Challenges

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

The Details of OSHA’s Vaccination Rule for Private Employees Suggest Several Ways It Could Be Vulnerable to Legal Challenges

Employers who adopt a “mandatory vaccination policy” can comply with the ETS even if some employees are not actually vaccinated. OSHA allows the following exceptions: “those for whom a vaccine is medically contraindicated, those for whom medical necessity requires a delay in vaccination, or those legally entitled to a reasonable accommodation under federal civil rights laws because they have a disability or sincerely held religious beliefs, practices, or observances that conflict with the vaccination requirement.” It seems those unvaccinated employees don’t have to wear masks or be tested each week, since those safeguards apply only to businesses that require employees to choose between vaccination and testing plus masking.

If so, a legal challenge could argue, OSHA is implicitly conceding that testing and masking of unvaccinated employees is not truly “necessary.” In the example OSHA offers, 5 percent of a company’s employees “are entitled to reasonable accommodation.” In terms of COVID-19 risk, that situation is indistinguishable from a workplace where 5 percent of employees simply choose not to be vaccinated.

The vaccination exceptions allowed by OSHA do not include people who are resistant to COVID-19 because they were previously infected. While there is considerable debate about how the protection offered by naturally acquired immunity compares to the protection offered by vaccination, the lack of an exception for people who have recovered from COVID-19 could be another basis for questioning the necessity of OSHA’s requirements.

Related:

EXPLAINER-The legal challenges awaiting Biden’s vaccine mandate

Blanket COVID-19 liability shield will cost taxpayers

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Blanket COVID-19 liability shield will cost taxpayers

As a starting point, it is important to remember who is protected by immunity and who is harmed. Immunity from civil liability for negligence does not prevent harm or injury. It simply shifts the burden and costs to the person or group who has been injured — and all too often, to the taxpayer. The legal standard for negligence requires a plaintiff to prove four separate elements: duty of care, a breach of that duty, harm, and a causal connection between the harm and the breach of duty.