capper, love him and hate him

I love capper because, well, what's not to love. But I also hate capper for alerting me to nonsense like this.

As I have explained and demonstrated repeatedly, one cannot label opinions of the Wisconsin Supreme Court as "pro-criminal" simply because a criminal defendant prevailed on the merits. To do so is both blatantly disingenuous and an essentially textbook example of the logical fallacy known as "poisoning the well."

("Poisoning the well" is actually a fairly apt description for the Gableman campaign nearly in its entirety, so that his supporters perpetrate it regularly and consistently is no surprise whatsoever.)

Since many of these cases involve extremely narrow and subtle questions pursuant to interpreting the U.S. or Wisconsin constitutions — or some relationship between the two — one might as well just label the entire Bill of Rights as "pro-criminal."

Or, as Gableman's daft and monied supporters at Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce would have it, a "needless technicality."

And to do that is effectively a disgraceful, un-American assault on the underpinnings of the entire U.S. system of justice, and not just criminal law justice. If that's the case, why even have courts? Or, for that matter, why not just completely scuttle the Bill of Rights altogether? Wouldn't that be the logical thing to do? Because that is precisely where Jessica McBride's faux "scholarship" leads.

And, as usual, McBride's laughably embarrassing misunderstandings practically jump off the page, horrifying grammar and all, e.g.,

[In State v. Jensen, Justice Butler] wanted looser standard than other justices on allowing hearsay; standard preferred by Jensen's attorney

Um, no. In FACT, Butler's lone dissent in Jensen, which appears likely to be affirmed by the considerably more conservative United States Supreme Court, argued for a TIGHTER, TWO-STEP APPROACH under the Sixth Amendment's Confrontation Clause.

Yet we're expected to accept McBride's "judgment calls"? Riiight.

Moreover, and perhaps not coincidentally, McBride's latest "analysis" arrives at exactly the same figure, 58%, that the Coalition for America's Families claims (58.62%, to be precise) in its monumentally inept and desperate failure to justify its original falsehood that Butler "sides with criminals 60% of the time."

I also explained Jensen in some detail more than once, most recently in this post. I've also pointed out — and this is very important — that

Butler's approach [in Jensen] exemplifies both narrow textualism and original intent, two doctrines of constitutional interpretation to which political conservatives normally proclaim undying devotion.

And that troublesome hypocrisy is but one especially compelling among countless reasons why this ridiculous designation of "pro-criminal" is, to say the very least, problematic.

According to Google Analytics, which tracks blog activity, the same individual "referred" by McBride's own Google account has been viewing illusorytenant.blogspot.com on a nearly daily basis for several weeks. What's she doing, looking at the pictures?

Back to work.