newrepublic--2020-06-10--Mitch McConnell Is No Genius

Mitch McConnell Is No Genius

Mitch McConnell believes in one political god : campaign cash .
Since he got his start in Kentucky politics in the 1970s , masquerading as a moderate Republican , he has been the Gordon Gekko of politics .
After he was elected to the Senate in 1984 , no one spent more time ingratiating himself with top GOP donors .
As Alec MacGillis recounts in his biography , The Cynic , McConnell even met his wealthy wife , Elaine Chao , the daughter of a shipping magnate , while fundraising in 1987 .
By the late 1990s , McConnell—a politician @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a coatrack—was the most passionate opponent of any effort to rein in the wealthy through campaign finance reform .
He believed Democrats would always struggle to match the spigot of special interest money the GOP could attract by preaching the gospel of low taxes and minimal regulation .
And , especially after the Citizens United decision—as the Koch brothers , the DeVos family , and Super PACs put together by Karl Rove dominated campaign finance—McConnell was right .
The Capitol Hill press corps worships anyone who wields legislative power with the same ferocity @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s case , the master strategist is proudly devoid of principle .
Judging from his recent clips , the laconic and unemotional McConnell is the true stable genius of our time .
When the Senate rejected impeachment , the press broke out into a new round of hosannas over his legislative sleight of hand .
CNN ’ s website ran an article trumpeting how he had pulled off the “ near-impossible.
” And McClatchy suggested that impeachment was “ the triumphant culmination of McConnell ’ s years of study , observation and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ central casting of the Trump era , someone has to play the evil genius on Capitol Hill—and House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy is too bland for the role .
McConnell has been all too happy to take on the part .
To his credit ( and , yes , the credit is offered grudgingly ) , he is a master of the Senate rules and adroit at holding his caucus together .
But , in campaign terms , the 78-year-old McConnell is a man of the 1980s still viewed as a master of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ passed McConnell by—and most reporters fail to realize it .
His ability to steer money to GOP incumbents was what built his reputation as a strategic mastermind , but Republicans no longer have a monopoly on political money .
Now , he is scrambling to preserve his majority in an election that will hinge on a pandemic , an economic collapse , and an incompetent president .
If McConnell had an ounce of introspection , he might rethink his decision to bow and scrape before the Great God Trump .
Because it didn @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for Mitch McConnell .
When Trump took office , McConnell had a choice .
The Senate majority leader had already displayed his distaste for Trump during the campaign , when he called the Access Hollywood tape “ repugnant ” and demanded that the nominee “ apologize directly to women.
” In theory , McConnell could have quietly encouraged the more endangered or principled members of his caucus to assert their independence in the face of an incompetent and dangerously mercurial president .
That is what happened when leading Senate Democrats rebelled against Lyndon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Republicans made Watergate a bipartisan cause in the 1970s .

Mitch McConnell believes in one political god: campaign cash. Since he got his start in Kentucky politics in the 1970s, masquerading as a moderate Republican, he has been the Gordon Gekko of politics. After he was elected to the Senate in 1984, no one spent more time ingratiating himself with top GOP donors. As Alec MacGillis recounts in his biography, The Cynic, McConnell even met his wealthy wife, Elaine Chao, the daughter of a shipping magnate, while fundraising in 1987. By the late 1990s, McConnell—a politician who normally displays the emotional range of a coatrack—was the most passionate opponent of any effort to rein in the wealthy through campaign finance reform. He believed Democrats would always struggle to match the spigot of special interest money the GOP could attract by preaching the gospel of low taxes and minimal regulation. And, especially after the Citizens United decision—as the Koch brothers, the DeVos family, and Super PACs put together by Karl Rove dominated campaign finance—McConnell was right.
The Capitol Hill press corps worships anyone who wields legislative power with the same ferocity as Lyndon Johnson—even if, in McConnell’s case, the master strategist is proudly devoid of principle. Judging from his recent clips, the laconic and unemotional McConnell is the true stable genius of our time. When the Senate rejected impeachment, the press broke out into a new round of hosannas over his legislative sleight of hand. CNN’s website ran an article trumpeting how he had pulled off the “near-impossible.” And McClatchy suggested that impeachment was “the triumphant culmination of McConnell’s years of study, observation and application of consensus-building strategies.”


newrepublic--2020-06-10--Will My Covid Symptoms Ever End?

Will My Covid Symptoms Ever End?

Amy Watson , a preschool teacher in Portland , Oregon , had been fighting a low-grade fever for almost a month when doctors started talking to her about cancer .
It was April 9 , right around the time that coronavirus cases were peaking across the United States .
She ’ d fallen ill in mid-March with a fever and flu symptoms , just two days after the state had shut down schools .
At that point , as we all are now deeply aware , there was a woeful shortage of coronavirus tests , and only frontline workers and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ get one .
Watson called an advice nurse , who told her to assume she had the coronavirus and isolate for two weeks .
Most health guidelines at the time stated that “ mild ” cases of Covid-19 should only last around two weeks .
But Watson ’ s illness lingered .
So her doctor thought that having a fever for as long as she did—79 days , ultimately—was a sign she could have leukemia or lymphoma .
She got a comprehensive workup that day and tested negative for everything .
She finally @ @ @ @ @ @ @ month after first getting sick , because she has asthma .
Her test , unsurprisingly , was positive .

Watson’s message certainly hit home for me. Around the same time Watson’s doctors were telling her she might have cancer, I was rounding out two weeks of what I was pretty sure was Covid in Brooklyn. I had what felt like a mild flu, plus the telltale shortness of breath. I had conducted a telemedicine appointment with my doctor, who prescribed me an inhaler and told me to self-isolate for two weeks. By the end of that time, I felt almost all better.
Then something strange happened: My toes started changing color. Every night, they’d become red, hot, and ungodly itchy. During the day, they’d be purple, as if they belonged to a corpse. Scheduling an appointment with a dermatologist for an unrelated foot problem in the middle of a pandemic felt ridiculous—hundreds of people were dying every day in New York at that point. But whatever this was—a rash? Gangrene? Creeping death?—got worse, causing many sleepless nights in which I would spray my burning feet with ice-cold water at 3 a.m. So I made the appointment with my dermatologist.
She suggested that my situation could be related to my presumed bout with Covid. We all now know about “Covid toes,” but at the time it seemed like a stretch to connect the two. My dermatologist was part of a group of skin doctors compiling a national registry of skin conditions related to the coronavirus, and they’d discovered a number of patients suffering symptoms similar to mine.


newrepublic--2020-06-10--Freeing Protest From the Language Police

This past Saturday marked the largest nationwide demonstrations against American police since George Floyd ’ s murder in Minneapolis on Memorial Day .
When hundreds of thousands marched across the world in what most newspapers praised as “ peaceful ” protests , it concluded a tense week of demonstrations across the country that often featured property destruction on one side and police batons , tear gas , rubber bullets , and mandatory curfews on the other .
Many commentators strained to appear sympathetic to the protests without endorsing the unrest they caused .
Former President Barack Obama praised the “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ peaceful , disciplined way , to be out there making a difference.
” New York ’ s police commissioner , Dermot Shea , praised his officers for working “ tirelessly to protect those who are peacefully protesting , ” as if demonstrators and cops were suddenly close colleagues in a shared enterprise .
The latest developments were presented to a television audience as progress : “ Violence , ” we were told , had given way to “ peaceful ” demonstrations .
With so much seemingly riding on this distinction , you could @ @ @ @ @ @ @ knows where the line between violence and peace has been drawn .
Obama ’ s celebration of the peaceful folks contained an implied criticism of some other folks protesting unpeacefully—that is , “ violently.
” Fraternal Order of Police president Patrick Yoes put it more bluntly in a widely circulated op-ed , “ Protesters do not injure cops or set fires ; rioters do.
” German López argued in Vox that racial justice has been secured most often through “ peaceful means , ” which he contrasted with “ riots ” like those @ @ @ @ @ @ @ what makes a peaceful protester , we need to know what a “ violent ” one does .
López makes a game attempt : “ For the purposes of this article , ‘ violent protest ’ and ‘ riots ’ means when protesters became violent.
” Besides the seemingly arbitrary isolation of protesters and police in a protest—as if the actions of each are not shaped in part by the other—López ’ s tautology only muddles things further .
A violent protest , it seems , is a protest that is violent .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ about protest and police tactics is an example of more than just journalistic imprecision , political mealy-mouthedness , or cowardice , although it is of course often these things .
It is an example of a fundamental problem with policing as we experience it in the United States : The police are imbued with a vast power to set the limits of what it is possible to say and do .
Our entire vocabulary for even describing protest actions feels policed at every turn .
Consider , for example , the parade of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of George Floyd issued by everybody from the manufacturers of the Taser to the Fruit by the Foot company , and count how many of them even mention the word “ police.
” By my rough count , the number is zero .
The best definition of a violent protest is a protest that the police say is a violent protest .
And , as one Detroit protester told me sarcastically , a peaceful protest is “ when no one throws a water bottle , ” a reference to the “ weapon ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ bullets and gas .
Besides the way it conceals the prerogative of the police to both define violence and to dish it out , our love of the “ peaceful protest ” is rooted , as well , in a belief bordering on faith in its superior effectiveness .
Onlookers and voters are spooked by violence , the argument often goes , making them unsympathetic to its cause ; riots are irrational spasms , not a “ true revolution , ” wrote The New York Times ’ Ross Douthat , that noted expert @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Ilhan Omar , the liberal congresswoman whose district includes Minneapolis , said that “ Every single fire set ablaze , every single store that is looted , every time our community finds itself in danger , it is time that people are not spending talking about getting justice for George Floyd .
”

This past Saturday marked the largest nationwide demonstrations against American police since George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis on Memorial Day. When hundreds of thousands marched across the world in what most newspapers praised as “peaceful” protests, it concluded a tense week of demonstrations across the country that often featured property destruction on one side and police batons, tear gas, rubber bullets, and mandatory curfews on the other. Many commentators strained to appear sympathetic to the protests without endorsing the unrest they caused. Former President Barack Obama praised the “folks who are willing, in a peaceful, disciplined way, to be out there making a difference.” New York’s police commissioner, Dermot Shea, praised his officers for working “tirelessly to protect those who are peacefully protesting,” as if demonstrators and cops were suddenly close colleagues in a shared enterprise. The latest developments were presented to a television audience as progress: “Violence,” we were told, had given way to “peaceful” demonstrations.
With so much seemingly riding on this distinction, you could be forgiven for wondering if anyone actually knows where the line between violence and peace has been drawn. Obama’s celebration of the peaceful folks contained an implied criticism of some other folks protesting unpeacefully—that is, “violently.” Fraternal Order of Police president Patrick Yoes put it more bluntly in a widely circulated op-ed, “Protesters do not injure cops or set fires; rioters do.” German López argued in Vox that racial justice has been secured most often through “peaceful means,” which he contrasted with “riots” like those in Minneapolis. In order to learn what makes a peaceful protester, we need to know what a “violent” one does. López makes a game attempt: “For the purposes of this article, ‘violent protest’ and ‘riots’ means when protesters became violent.” Besides the seemingly arbitrary isolation of protesters and police in a protest—as if the actions of each are not shaped in part by the other—López’s tautology only muddles things further. A violent protest, it seems, is a protest that is violent.


newrepublic--2020-06-10--The Down Days Is an Eerily Prescient Pandemic Novel

In 1962 , at a girl ’ s boarding school in rural Tanganyika ( present-day Tanzania ) , three students started laughing .
When the teachers tried to get them to stop , the girls became violent .
One became so overtaken with laughter that she started undressing ; she was hospitalized for three days and treated with valium .
Soon , almost the entire school began to break out in these episodes of uncontrollable laughter , fits that left them unable to attend class for weeks .
The situation became so unworkable that the principle shut the school down @ @ @ @ @ @ @ girls went back to their villages , they brought the laughter with them ; in one town , over two hundred people—men , women , the old , the young , were afflicted .
In time , this outbreak of contagious laughter swept the coast of Lake Victoria , resulting in the closure of 14 schools and 1,000 reported victims .
Known as the 1962 Tanganyika Laughing Epidemic , it was eventually categorized as “ mass psychogenic illness , ” a phenomenon wherein large swaths of a community become sick without any physical @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to be a reaction to collective stress , and has been observed in sweatshops , amidst refugee communities , and in areas that have been hit hard by war or terrorism .
One of the most famous examples occurred in the so-called “ Dancing Plagues ” of the Middle Ages ; hundreds , sometimes thousands of people danced themselves to the point of exhaustion and collapse .
Their symptoms were later deemed a response to the emotional trauma of the Black Death , though some speculate they had been poisoned by contaminated rye @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Tanganyika Laughing Epidemic , it is thought that the excitement and upheaval brought on by independence , which the country had gained three weeks before the laughter started , could have sparked the outbreak .
The Down Days , the debut novel from South African writer Ilze Hugo , is set in the present , when the laughter—or “ the Joke ” as her characters call it—has returned as a deadly virus , and Cape Town , now dubbed Sick City , is the center of the epidemic .
While most of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hawk the blood of people who survived , promising that it is “ rife with antibodies.
” Residents are required to wear face masks at all time ( spawning a growing market for “ lip porn ” ) .
The rich have fled or remained as shut-ins , paying top dollar to have their goods and groceries delivered .
With the wealthy largely gone , the city ’ s non-white and working-class residents , typically relegated to the townships , can now afford to live in central Cape Town .
Funerals take place @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ Facebook mourners.
” There are underground herd immunity-like parties where people go mask-less and openly laugh ( laughter is forbidden throughout the country ) .
To protect themselves from the virus , some Sick City residents have started drinking bleach .
Reading The Down Days , one can ’ t help but wonder—if these times are really as unprecedented as the government leaders and insurance companies tell us they are , then why was this moment so easy for Hugo to imagine ?
In an interview with CBS-Pittsburgh , Hugo remarked on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ book coming out now , in the midst of a real pandemic with such uncanny similarities to the one described in her book .
“ It ’ s absolutely crazy , ” she laughed , “ because when I wrote this and was thinking wouldn ’ t it be nice if I put Cape Town under quarantine , but then I thought that is so far-fetched.
” A novel that explores the shaky foundations of public trust—and the sham-remedies , conspiracy theories , and non-compliance that flourish in these conditions—The Down Days is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been here all along .

Faith is an avid reader of a conspiracy theory rag called The Daily Truth, which tells readers that “the Joke” is a CIA plot one day, a Russian one the next. Chatting with her assistant, Ash, she shares from the latest article that claims the U.S. military smuggled the laughing disease into South Africa through vaccines, testing them on the local population under false pretenses: “The plan, they say, was to use them on soldiers who would go into war zones and spread the Laughter. All while being vaccinated against it themselves. Pretty clever, right?” Eventually, Faith becomes convinced she can see patterns and deceptions that elude others and begins moonlighting as a “Truthologist”—essentially, a conspiracy-minded private detective for clients looking for help navigating an increasingly murky reality.
Hugo is sympathetic to Faith’s skepticism, rooting it in Africans’ deserved mistrust of the West. When “the Laughter” first emerges in Sick City, it is said by experts to be an “extreme response to Third World Stressors.” Listening to the radio, Faith overhears a representative of a local citizens’ rights organization balk at the notion the French were developing vaccines for the city. “Please! Do you really believe that?” the voice says, “Open your eyes! The West doesn’t care about us.” Faith’s eagerness to believe these stories does not go unchecked: Ash loses patience one day and levels with Faith, trying to get her to focus on the handling of the crisis rather than the origin of the virus: “Pandemics happen,” he tells her: “Don’t know why people always feel the need to blame someone for them.” Centering conspiracy theories and papers like The Daily Truth in the novel, Hugo anchors the story less in the disease itself and more in the concept of public trust, emphasizing that how we collectively come together to fix a crisis is deeply affected by who feels part of that collective in the first place.
The novel paints the healthy as possessing sicknesses of their own—so overwrought with uncertainty, their lives feel unsteady, surreal, and almost not like lives at all.
Mistrust and suspicion form the heart of The Down Days. The novel paints the healthy as possessing sicknesses of their own—so overwrought with uncertainty, their lives feel unsteady, surreal, and almost not like lives at all. That is most palpably felt through the character of Sans, who deals in human hair for weaves (an increasingly lucrative business now that international shipments have ground to a halt). Sans’s world gets turned upside down when he goes on a date with an enticing girl who likes to live dangerously—at least, in the context of their times: She doesn’t do the required temperature checks, and she doesn’t wear a mask. “A girl without a mask,” he thinks to himself, “was a recipe for trouble.”


newrepublic--2020-06-10--Oligarch of the Month: Jeff Bezos

Oligarch of the Month: Jeff Bezos

Jeff Bezos is having a good pandemic .
Amazon , the company he started in 1994 , has not only resisted the economic downturn , it has thrived : Its stock price sits hundreds of points higher than it did in March , and Bezos ’ s own net worth , which was depleted by his recent divorce—the most expensive in history—has ballooned by $ 32 billion since the start of the year .
Over the last decade , he has purchased The Washington Post , invested in space exploration , and gotten a glow up .
( Once the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ now looks like Vin Diesel playing Lex Luthor . )
He seems , in short , to be living his best life .
But Bezos ’ s stratospheric fortunes couldn ’ t be further removed from the conditions his employees are facing in the Covid-19 era .
Amazon ’ s warehouses , already known for their dangerous conditions , low pay , and Orwellian surveillance , have now become vectors of disease ; dozens of workers have fallen ill with the coronavirus .
When one , Christian Smalls , organized a strike , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ former Obama press secretary Jay Carney , and other top company officials then convened a meeting where they planned to smear him as “ not smart , or articulate.
” Carney ’ s involvement is no accident : For years , Amazon has leveraged political connections to stave off regulation and expand its empire .
Despite the company ’ s stranglehold on online retail , it posts sizable losses that are only occasionally offset by its profitable cloud computing division , Amazon Web Services .
This strategy has regularly allowed it to skip @ @ @ @ @ @ @ York City threatened to make the company pay more , Amazon simply yanked its plans to build a new headquarters there .
( Virginia , where it is now building the campus , has proved more pliant ; the state has forked over $ 750 million in grants , and promised to warn Bezos when someone takes out a Freedom of Information request on his company . )
The Senate , flirting with antitrust regulation , has summoned Bezos to Washington to testify about Amazon ’ s business practices .
He has not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But if he does , there ’ s no question he will walk into the Capitol like he owns the place .
After all , he basically does .

Jeff Bezos is having a good pandemic. Amazon, the company he started in 1994, has not only resisted the economic downturn, it has thrived: Its stock price sits hundreds of points higher than it did in March, and Bezos’s own net worth, which was depleted by his recent divorce—the most expensive in history—has ballooned by $32 billion since the start of the year. Over the last decade, he has purchased The Washington Post, invested in space exploration, and gotten a glow up. (Once the prototypical nerd—boxy khakis, a braying laugh—he now looks like Vin Diesel playing Lex Luthor.) He seems, in short, to be living his best life.
But Bezos’s stratospheric fortunes couldn’t be further removed from the conditions his employees are facing in the Covid-19 era. Amazon’s warehouses, already known for their dangerous conditions, low pay, and Orwellian surveillance, have now become vectors of disease; dozens of workers have fallen ill with the coronavirus. When one, Christian Smalls, organized a strike, he was quickly fired. Bezos, former Obama press secretary Jay Carney, and other top company officials then convened a meeting where they planned to smear him as “not smart, or articulate.”


newrepublic--2020-06-10--The Disappearing Backlash to Black Lives Matter

In a fully representative piece of conservative writing on the matter from the middle of the last decade , National Review ’ s David French dismissed Black Lives Matter as a “ serious political movement , ” calling it instead “ the grown-up equivalent of a student temper tantrum.
” It ’ s not reasonable , ” he wrote .
“ It ’ s not rational .
It might even be racist .
It ’ s part of our national racial problem , not part of the solution.
” Commentary like this has succeeded mostly in making the right apprehensive @ @ @ @ @ @ @ slogan—support for it is still underwater among Republicans according to The New York Times—even as they become more sympathetic to the movement ’ s concerns .
And there are notable exceptions , even to that : Mitt Romney caused a stir this week by tweeting “ Black Lives Matter ” and joining demonstrators in a march on the White House .
That was a publicity stunt , of course , and it remains to be seen whether the empty symbolism of kneeling policemen , kente stoles , and the moderate reforms now supported @ @ @ @ @ @ @ give way to more fundamental shifts in the way Americans think about the role of law enforcement .
Joe Biden , it should be said , has responded to the demonstrations with a reiteration of his support for giving more federal dollars to police departments , not fewer .
But what we can say with some certainty is that the mechanisms for inducing white backlash , as we ’ ve understood it in modern American politics , are fundamentally broken in important ways .
The upheaval of 1968 was over half a century @ @ @ @ @ @ @ American politics—from the ideological polarization of the electorate to its demographic composition—have changed in innumerable ways since then .
For example , while Republican candidates in the Obama era , right up through Donald Trump , have ridden the erosion of support for Democrats among rural and white working-class voters to electoral success in the last decade , we ’ ve also seen a significant erosion of Republican support in suburban America .
Democratic success in the suburbs during the 2018 midterms was attributed largely to Trump ’ s unpopularity .
While that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t be forgotten that the Republican Party has not won an outright majority of the suburban vote in the last three presidential elections .
In a 2017 piece written more than a year before the 2018 midterms , Politico ’ s Charlie Mahtesian noted that while Trump had eked out a narrow plurality against Clinton among suburbanites in 2016 , the ground was clearly falling out from under the GOP in these onetime strongholds .
“ A combination of demographic change and cultural dissonance is gradually eroding its ability to compete across @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the country out of the GOP ’ s reach , ” he wrote .
“ It ’ s a bigger crisis than the party acknowledges , a reckoning that threatens Trump ’ s reelection and the next generation of Republican office-seekers.
” In short , America is already in the middle of a broad and electorally significant cultural backlash against radical politics .
But it ’ s a backlash against the right , not the left .
On a remarkable range of cultural and identity-political issues—from LGBT rights to immigration—the conservative movement @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the court of public opinion or adopted positions extreme enough to alienate important constituencies like Latinos or white college-educated women .
Commentators whose political instincts were shaped decades ago might insist otherwise , but in the here and now , the right is losing the culture war and losing it decisively .

In a fully representative piece of conservative writing on the matter from the middle of the last decade, National Review’s David French dismissed Black Lives Matter as a “serious political movement,” calling it instead “the grown-up equivalent of a student temper tantrum.” “It’s not reasonable,” he wrote. “It’s not rational. It might even be racist. It’s part of our national racial problem, not part of the solution.” Commentary like this has succeeded mostly in making the right apprehensive about endorsing Black Lives Matter as a slogan—support for it is still underwater among Republicans according to The New York Times—even as they become more sympathetic to the movement’s concerns. And there are notable exceptions, even to that: Mitt Romney caused a stir this week by tweeting “Black Lives Matter” and joining demonstrators in a march on the White House.
That was a publicity stunt, of course, and it remains to be seen whether the empty symbolism of kneeling policemen, kente stoles, and the moderate reforms now supported by Democratic and Republican lawmakers alike will give way to more fundamental shifts in the way Americans think about the role of law enforcement. Joe Biden, it should be said, has responded to the demonstrations with a reiteration of his support for giving more federal dollars to police departments, not fewer. But what we can say with some certainty is that the mechanisms for inducing white backlash, as we’ve understood it in modern American politics, are fundamentally broken in important ways. The upheaval of 1968 was over half a century ago, and the underlying dynamics of American politics—from the ideological polarization of the electorate to its demographic composition—have changed in innumerable ways since then.
For example, while Republican candidates in the Obama era, right up through Donald Trump, have ridden the erosion of support for Democrats among rural and white working-class voters to electoral success in the last decade, we’ve also seen a significant erosion of Republican support in suburban America. Democratic success in the suburbs during the 2018 midterms was attributed largely to Trump’s unpopularity. While that was undoubtedly a factor, it shouldn’t be forgotten that the Republican Party has not won an outright majority of the suburban vote in the last three presidential elections. In a 2017 piece written more than a year before the midterms, Politico’s Charlie Mahtesian noted that while Trump had eked out a narrow plurality against Clinton among suburbanites in 2016, the ground was clearly falling out from under the GOP in these onetime strongholds. “A combination of demographic change and cultural dissonance is gradually eroding its ability to compete across much of suburbia, putting entire areas of the country out of the GOP’s reach,” he wrote. “It’s a bigger crisis than the party acknowledges, a reckoning that threatens Trump’s reelection and the next generation of Republican office-seekers.”


newrepublic--2020-06-10--The Real Snowflakes on the Op-Ed Page

The Real Snowflakes on the Op-Ed Page

For years , conservative and centrist columnists have been depicting college campuses as if they were the settings of horror movies .
A virus is incubating and spreading .
Every year , more and more people are infected with wokeness .
The stakes might be small—a misconstrued story about Chinese food and Oberlin College is frequently cited—but , these writers argued , something much scarier is afoot .
Every year , more snowflakes enter the real world , spreading cancel culture through every strata of society .
Soon , the whole world will be a campus .
The furor following @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Senator Tom Cotton ’ s op-ed was , for many of these writers , a vindication .
During a town hall meeting on Friday at the Times , in which staffers voiced their outrage and concerns , op-ed columnist Bari Weiss took a victory lap .
She tweeted that the debates about political correctness on campus—the debates she had warned about—were now on the front door of the country ’ s leading newspaper , as well as “ other publications and companies across the country.
” New York magazine columnist Andrew Sullivan has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ We all live on campus now , ” the headline of a column he wrote in 2018 .
National Review was somehow even more histrionic : The headline to a Tuesday David Harsanyi column about the Cotton op-ed described recent events without irony as a “ Cultural Revolution.
” The big issue for these writers wasn ’ t systemic racism or police brutality .
It was the return of Maoism .
These arguments rest on the idea that liberal democracy is under threat—from an increasingly authoritarian right wing , sure , but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Sullivan has recirculated a 2019 diatribe about Ibram X. Kendi ’ ’ s bestseller How to Be an Anti-Racist , whose recent presence on bestseller lists he has bemoaned .
“ They seem not to genuinely believe in liberalism , liberal democracy , or persuasion .
They have no clear foundational devotion to individual rights or freedom of speech , ” he wrote .
Despite all the paeans to liberal democracy , Sullivan and Weiss ’ s project is a small one .
Other anxieties are apparent .
For decades , the opinion @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reactionary writers .
These writers are lashing out at a loss of impunity and a rise in editorial standards that are making opinion journalism stronger .

Over the weekend, in a since-deleted tweet, former New York editor Max Read noted that he was one of the “junior editors” who had once pointed out something that needed to be changed in a Sullivan column (in this instance, Sullivan had cited a fake antifa social media account). Brian Feldman, a writer at New York, tweeted that it marked “the only time I’d ever heard of Sullivan’s column getting anything resembling substantive pushback from editors at all.” (On Sunday, Sullivan retweeted a tweet that falsely claimed that former Washington Post reporter Wesley Lowrey was “fired” from the paper and “lied” about it. Sullivan apologized after being called out.)
Cockburn’s column is revealing. For Sullivan and his defenders, free speech and liberalism mean that he gets to publish whatever he wants, without dissent or intervention. Pushing back or pointing out factual errors—key parts of the editorial process—are, for Sullivan and Co., a threat to the foundations of Western civilization.
In the polemic about “cultural revolution,” there is quite a bit of talk about the need for debate. For many on the right, “debate me” is the ultimate comeback, proof of one’s toughness and conviction and allegiance to liberal values. But the writers most committed to warning America about the barbarians at the gate are the ones who appear to be living in a bubble. Weiss’s tweet thread about campus culture coming to the Times was not factually accurate, particularly its claim that the controversy boiled down to a generational battle between those under 40 who believe in “safetyism” and those over 40 who believe in free speech. Rather than take criticism of her comments to heart, she has spent the last several days retweeting praise. Bret Stephens, who has written extensively about free speech and campus culture, got called out at the same time for repeatedly tattling on co-workers who had critiqued his columns.


newrepublic--2020-06-10--Don’t Support The New York Times

Don’t Support The New York Times

One can only describe what unfolded at The New York Times last week as an outright shitshow .
Following the publication of an op-ed by Senator Tom Cotton that advocated for military crackdowns in cities across America amid a nationwide wave of anti–police brutality protests , dozens of Times staffers flouted their publication ’ s strict social media policy , tweeting variations on the message , “ Running this puts Black @ nytimes staff in danger.
” While then–Times editorial page editor James Bennet defended his choice to run the op-ed on the day of its publication , an editors @ @ @ @ @ @ @ days later admitted that “ the essay fell short of our standards and should not have been published.
” Even more extraordinary is that it came to light that Bennet , who resigned on Sunday , said in a staff meeting that he had not read the essay in question prior to its publication , despite having publicly defended its publication .
Though many saw the fallout from Cotton ’ s piece as unprecedented , the debacle was only the latest and perhaps most extreme instance of a familiar cycle that ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ An odious , reactionary op-ed in the Times leads to public outcry , institutional humiliation , and dismayed subscribers .
Highlights of this genre include an incident in which columnist Bret Stephens regurgitated racist pseudoscience , David Brooks ’ s baffling screed on the classist implications of Italian meats , Ross Douthat ’ s argument in favor of far-right French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen , and Thomas Friedman ’ s fawning profile of Saudi despot Mohammed bin Salman .
Whenever a new instance of this cycle rears its head , and Twitter @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their discontent in the same helpless phrase : “ I ’ m not canceling my Times subscription , but.
” The thinking that seems to beget these tweets is that it ’ s so important to support good journalism and prop up the cornerstones of this particular institution that an occasional instance where the opinion editor engineers the ritual stoning of one of his writers in order to create a traffic-driving public spectacle must be grudgingly permitted .
I have seen this guardrail placed alongside criticism of the Times by readers and journalists @ @ @ @ @ @ @ perch at the top of the media food chain is unquestionably deserved , and ultimately indispensable—unstated but clear .
This line of thinking seemingly belongs to an alternate universe , one in which the entire country contains one newspaper , and the question of whether to subscribe to that paper is , effectively , a question of whether to support journalism itself .
We do not live in that world , at least not yet .
Nevertheless , it is somehow unthinkable and controversial to advocate for canceling one ’ s subscription to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ subscribers as of February—and reallocating those funds to one of the many hundreds of smaller publications that are in far greater need of the support and spend much less institutional capital ginning up clickbait controversies .

In this manner, the Times, by way of its disproportionate resources, has a sort of choke hold over the media ecosystem, one that only encourages the paper’s worst instincts toward hawkish protection of the status quo and relentless “both sides”-ism. With the view from nowhere dutifully performed, the history and makeup of the Times disappears from view on its pages, despite being an indelible part of every story it tells and each take it dispenses. Its institutional power has acted as a dam, insulating it from the natural consequences of bad editorial judgment—and with Bennet’s ouster amid a sudden loss of subscribers and the alienation of its most prominent staff members, that dam is only just beginning to splinter.
I am not immune to the allure of the Times. There’s a notebook on my bedside table, the first page of which contains a list of goals for 2020: The first item, slotted there for its urgency, simply reads, “New York Times byline.” In the days that followed Senator Cotton’s op-ed, I saw a few writers announce that they’d withdrawn their own forthcoming pieces in the Times in response. I want to believe that, in such a position, I’d have the moral fortitude to do the same, but deep down, I’m not certain I would. The chance of an assignment that could launch a career, or at least cover a month’s rent, is understandably enticing in an industry that promises instability and heartbreak in unbearable quantities.
But there is a wider world beyond my writerly aspirations, populated by people who need basic things from their journalists. This world is buckling under considerable strain. The current funding models for media have all but entirely crumbled: Ad revenue has shriveled, ultrawealthy benefactors are fickle and unreasonable, and venture capital will sell your favorite outlet for parts in the blink of an eye. If journalism is to have a future, that future looks like whatever readers are willing to pay for directly.


newrepublic--2020-06-10--A Fragile Answer to the Question of “Whose Streets?”

This type of theft is both anti-protest and part of a long-term trend , rooted in the city ’ s tessellating systems of police surveillance , racial discrimination , and neoliberal austerity .
The NYPD had already been sitting on a stockpile of e-bikes thanks to de Blasio , who in 2017 began cracking down on them after more affluent residents called riders—many of them immigrant delivery workers— “ reckless.
” When the pandemic hit full swing , authorities wound back these seizures in recognition of the essential labor these workers were now risking their lives to do , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to legalize the bikes completely .
Yet as scholar Mimi Sheller notes in her book , Mobility Justice : The Politics of Movement in an Age of Extremes , legal status is hardly a guarantee for free movement ; a city ’ s “ law and order ” apparatus will often front for its pervasive regime of disciplining and patrolling streets , through racist but theoretically legal “ police stops , searches , arrests , police shootings and imprisonment.
” The law is a matter of fickle interpretation , anyway , when it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Last week , a viral video showed police apprehending a Caviar delivery worker for breaking curfew , even as he pleaded with the officers that his job meant he was legally exempt .
His courier bag was in full view as they handcuffed him .
Both plainly and subtly , New York City has worked to impede the mobility of its poor and marginalized residents .
It is now , with fewer cars and more protesters on the street , that the terms of this game are changing , stiffening , into an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ resistant population .
Law enforcement has weaponized the city ’ s geography—trapping people on bridges and kettling them on city blocks .
Meanwhile , those in the streets have used Citi Bikes and Revels to transport protest supplies , scout out police , and even loot stores more efficiently .
Cyclists are biking on the frontline ranks of protests in order to protect marchers against cops and nearby traffic .
Groups are occupying highways .
The mechanisms of this spontaneity are far from perfectly egalitarian—Citi Bikes , for example , require credit cards @ @ @ @ @ @ @ trackable , in terms of user data—but they generate for many a novel sense of ownership of their city .
Across New York and many other places in America , individuals have redefined mobility as a function of mutual care and agency : The answer to the call-and-response chant , “ Whose streets ?
” is always the collective , “ Our streets.
” These shouts resonate beyond the notion of individual freedom of movement , instead calling for what Sheller terms “ acts of co-mobilization … based upon forms of solidarity , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” Even before protests , the coronavirus had already forced a rethinking of urban planning .
Scholars and groups working around mobility justice have pointed to the pandemic ’ s global slowdown as an opportunity for addressing some of their oft-ignored demands , which range from a low-carbon economy to a refigured urban density that grants public housing residents more green space , more balconies , and more air .
The multiracial collective The Untokening has articulated a program for urban living that centers vulnerable residents and denies the legitimacy of policing within @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , in addition to the pandemic , some slow , gritted attempts at a reorganization of power , advocates face the question of how to harness the energies of these overlapping moments .
People have enacted their refusal of a system that , in every facet of public life , fails to service the nonwealthy and targets black people , especially , for harm .
Despite what they may be concretizing and envisioning outside , their opponents can still make use of an urban geography rife with racist , classist , and ableist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ poses dire health consequences , especially in cities where officials have shut down testing centers .
It is uncertain whether this radical moment can stay ahead of the status quo ; whether organizers might be able to take a historic rupture and crack it open even wider .
The demonstrations today are unorthodox—even unprecedented .
Protesters can not rely on traditional means of disrupting civic life , since the pandemic has already rendered civic life unrecognizable .
For the groups on the street , there can be no strategic reliance on interrupting mass @ @ @ @ @ @ @ There is , instead , a more insistent proximity to new worlds , radically imagined , previously impossible : Defund the police .
Abolish the police .
The future protesters are picturing must be more exigent simply because the past has already fallen away .
The sight of people retaking and improvising on their environment abstracts outward , to a set of values for a different , nascent city : one with less pollution , where anyone can go anywhere , where nobody gets tackled by a racist cop for jumping a turnstile—where @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Standing on the edge of this moment , one receives , like flecks of ash in the air , brief insights into a world where such things are possible .

Both plainly and subtly, New York City has worked to impede the mobility of its poor and marginalized residents. It is now, with fewer cars and more protesters on the street, that the terms of this game are changing, stiffening, into an explicit tactical conflict between authorities and a resistant population. Law enforcement has weaponized the city’s geography—trapping people on bridges and kettling them on city blocks. Meanwhile, those in the streets have used Citi Bikes and Revels to transport protest supplies, scout out police, and even loot stores more efficiently. Cyclists are biking on the frontline ranks of protests in order to protect marchers against cops and nearby traffic. Groups are occupying highways. The mechanisms of this spontaneity are far from perfectly egalitarian—Citi Bikes, for example, require credit cards to rent and are at least minimally trackable, in terms of user data—but they generate for many a novel sense of ownership of their city. Across New York and many other places in America, individuals have redefined mobility as a function of mutual care and agency: The answer to the call-and-response chant, “Whose streets?” is always the collective, “Our streets.” These shouts resonate beyond the notion of individual freedom of movement, instead calling for what Sheller terms “acts of co-mobilization … based upon forms of solidarity, reciprocity, caring, trust, generosity.”
Even before protests, the coronavirus had already forced a rethinking of urban planning. Scholars and groups working around mobility justice have pointed to the pandemic’s global slowdown as an opportunity for addressing some of their oft-ignored demands, which range from a low-carbon economy to a refigured urban density that grants public housing residents more green space, more balconies, and more air. The multiracial collective The Untokening has articulated a program for urban living that centers vulnerable residents and denies the legitimacy of policing within communities. Now that we are witnessing, in addition to the pandemic, some slow, gritted attempts at a reorganization of power, advocates face the question of how to harness the energies of these overlapping moments. People have enacted their refusal of a system that, in every facet of public life, fails to service the nonwealthy and targets black people, especially, for harm. Despite what they may be concretizing and envisioning outside, their opponents can still make use of an urban geography rife with racist, classist, and ableist obstruction. The coronavirus, too, poses dire health consequences, especially in cities where officials have shut down testing centers. It is uncertain whether this radical moment can stay ahead of the status quo; whether organizers might be able to take a historic rupture and crack it open even wider.
The demonstrations today are unorthodox—even unprecedented. Protesters cannot rely on traditional means of disrupting civic life, since the pandemic has already rendered civic life unrecognizable. For the groups on the street, there can be no strategic reliance on interrupting mass commerce, tourism, or traffic. There is, instead, a more insistent proximity to new worlds, radically imagined, previously impossible: Defund the police. Abolish the police. The future protesters are picturing must be more exigent simply because the past has already fallen away. The sight of people retaking and improvising on their environment abstracts outward, to a set of values for a different, nascent city: one with less pollution, where anyone can go anywhere, where nobody gets tackled by a racist cop for jumping a turnstile—where there are maybe no turnstiles at all. Standing on the edge of this moment, one receives, like flecks of ash in the air, brief insights into a world where such things are possible.


newrepublic--2020-06-10--Small Acts of Care in a Failed State

Small Acts of Care in a Failed State

The ongoing protests against racist police violence , which have taken place in every state in the United States and are now in their third week , have offered endless illuminations of the political and moral urgency of the moment and the conditions that preceded it .
Long-standing racial and economic inequalities—that allowed hospitals , education , and other community resources to starve while police budgets expanded—and the inadequate and often incoherent government response to the pandemic—which has so far led to the deaths of more than 110,000 people in the U.S. and put more than 21 million out of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of George Floyd by the Minneapolis police , captured on video , lit the match .
Despite violent police crackdowns and citywide curfews , the marches—those peaceful and those less so—have carried on , even growing in some places .
And while these uprisings have already generated proposals to cut police budgets and shifted public opinion , their full meaning is still unfolding .
“ Only time will tell whether this moment is really different , or whether black Americans have merely thirsted for so long that we are drinking sand , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ recently said .
“ The United States has the remarkable ability to reconstitute old oppressions from the ashes of social movements.
” In addition to propelling new policy shifts , the mass demonstrations have sparked a parallel rise in small , sometimes unexpected acts of solidarity by people not immediately involved in direct actions .
City bus drivers in Minneapolis and New York , for instance , refused to transport arrested demonstrators at the behest of the police .
( After a Brooklyn bus driver refused police orders to shuttle protesters from the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the bus drivers ’ union tweeted , “ TWU Local 100 Bus Operators do not work for the NYPD .
We transport the working families of NYC.
” ) In an affluent Washington , D.C. , neighborhood , resident Rahul Dubey opened his front door to let in around 70 protesters who were cornered , beaten , and pepper-sprayed by the police , helping them avoid arrest and further violence .
Dubey ’ s neighbors passed him milk over their fences for washing the pepper-sprayed protesters ’ eyes ; one ordered pizza @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an army of K-pop fans flooded a number of reactionary hashtags on social media with “ fancam ” videos to drown out racist material .
( K-pop has a surprisingly international and multiracial fanbase , and the K-pop group BTS recently donated $ 1 million to Black Lives Matter , an amount that was promptly matched by the band ’ s fans . )
In New York City , establishments from the Brooklyn Museum to bodegas have opened their doors ( and bathrooms ) to passing protesters .
If the protests have demanded @ @ @ @ @ @ @ rather than police presence , then these actions have functioned as a real-time response in miniature .
At the same time , each of these evocative if small expressions of care is also a kind of inadvertent condemnation of the lack of institutions that have the leverage to press for sweeping change in this moment .
We have frightfully few options for retooling our broken social order in the absence of , say , a strong labor movement or an effective opposition party , let alone an actual left-wing political party .
Our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ effect of being simultaneously deeply moving and deeply unsettling .
A moment in which the government has offered only the most perfunctory aid to alleviate mass unemployment , while also threatening to deploy the military to contain protesters , necessitates such actions , and people have risen to the occasion , as they ’ ve always done , in ways large and small .
At the end of May , a group of volunteers in Minneapolis converted a former Sheraton hotel into a homeless shelter in the memory of George Floyd—himself a former @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the result was a breathtaking , evolving experiment in what might be called mutual aid , or simply just human decency .
“ In less than 24 hours , we housed nearly 200 people and are now organizing meals , first aid , and harm-reduction services , security teams , and housekeeping to make a home for people in need during the worst pandemic in recent history , ” the volunteers wrote .
Because its very existence indicts our absurdly deficient federal and municipal solutions to homelessness—for example , the city of Las @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for homeless people to sleep on , while its hotels went mostly shuttered—such a project is at once inspiring and entirely gut-wrenching .
Similarly , as protests unfolded , the spread of bail fund donation links was so rapid—and the outpouring of support so overwhelming—that after only a few days , a number of early funds started asking people to send their money elsewhere .
With so many protesters facing the double edge of Covid-related unemployment and new medical bills after being targeted for violence by police at demonstrations , others have stepped @ @ @ @ @ @ @ individual donations .

The ongoing protests against racist police violence, which have taken place in every state in the United States and are now in their third week, have offered endless illuminations of the political and moral urgency of the moment and the conditions that preceded it. Long-standing racial and economic inequalities—that allowed hospitals, education, and other community resources to starve while police budgets expanded—and the inadequate and often incoherent government response to the pandemic—which has so far led to the deaths of more than 110,000 people in the U.S. and put more than 21 million out of work—were kindling for unrest. The murder of George Floyd by the Minneapolis police, captured on video, lit the match. Despite violent police crackdowns and citywide curfews, the marches—those peaceful and those less so—have carried on, even growing in some places. And while these uprisings have already generated proposals to cut police budgets and shifted public opinion, their full meaning is still unfolding. “Only time will tell whether this moment is really different, or whether black Americans have merely thirsted for so long that we are drinking sand,” the sociologist and author Tressie McMillan Cottom recently said. “The United States has the remarkable ability to reconstitute old oppressions from the ashes of social movements.”
In addition to propelling new policy shifts, the mass demonstrations have sparked a parallel rise in small, sometimes unexpected acts of solidarity by people not immediately involved in direct actions. City bus drivers in Minneapolis and New York, for instance, refused to transport arrested demonstrators at the behest of the police. (After a Brooklyn bus driver refused police orders to shuttle protesters from the Barclays Center to the precinct for processing, the bus drivers’ union tweeted, “TWU Local 100 Bus Operators do not work for the NYPD. We transport the working families of NYC.”) In an affluent Washington, D.C., neighborhood, resident Rahul Dubey opened his front door to let in around 70 protesters who were cornered, beaten, and pepper-sprayed by the police, helping them avoid arrest and further violence. Dubey’s neighbors passed him milk over their fences for washing the pepper-sprayed protesters’ eyes; one ordered pizza for them. Off the streets, an army of K-pop fans flooded a number of reactionary hashtags on social media with “fancam” videos to drown out racist material. (K-pop has a surprisingly international and multiracial fanbase, and the K-pop group BTS recently donated $1 million to Black Lives Matter, an amount that was promptly matched by the band’s fans.) In New York City, establishments from the Brooklyn Museum to bodegas have opened their doors (and bathrooms) to passing protesters. If the protests have demanded neighborhoods made safe through social provision, rather than police presence, then these actions have functioned as a real-time response in miniature.


newrepublic--2020-06-10--Who Killed Olof Palme?

Who Killed Olof Palme?

In a dreary news conference broadcast live from Stockholm this morning , Swedish chief prosecutor Krister Petterson named the man he thinks assassinated Prime Minister Olof Palme in 1986 : Stig Engström .
Dubbed “ the Skandia Man ” in the press because he worked at the Skandia insurance firm ’ s office near the murder scene at the time , Engström died by suicide in 2000 .
When Palme was shot dead while walking through the streets of Stockholm , it kicked off the largest criminal case in Sweden ’ s history .
Though around 20 people witnessed the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , nobody has ever been prosecuted for the crime .
Suspects over the years have ranged from members of the Kurdistan Workers ’ Party to a number of different far-right extremists , but the cops ’ blunders and poor leadership led them nowhere .
Many have speculated that this means the hit was an inside job .
Palme was deeply unpopular with some sectors of Swedish society , so there was no lack of motivation , from inside or outside the government .
Conspiracies of all kinds swirled around the killing , which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ committing , in a syndrome nicknamed Palmessjukdom : “ Palme sickness.
” The assassination has morphed into a vast national obsession , a kind of a keystone in Swedish identity , generating countless books , blogs , and podcasts ( including one which has aired 228 episodes to date ) .
It ’ s a great murder-mystery story for enthusiasts of political conspiracy theories , many of whom are dissatisfied with today ’ s verdict .
They think that Sweden has good reason to suppress the truth—and that the United States could be @ @

Many of these latter crimes have never been publicly solved. The death of the United Nations Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld—also a Swede—in a mysterious plane accident in Zambia in 1961 has long been attributed to the South African apartheid government, possibly in collaboration with Britain and the U.S.
This is not an outlandish theory. As The New York Times reported in 1996, former police hit squad commander Eugene de Kock once testified in court that the Palme killing was part of “Operation Long Reach,” the secret campaign to counter the apartheid administration’s foes abroad. Jan Stocklassa, author of The Man Who Played With Fire: Stieg Larsson’s Lost Files and the Hunt for an Assassin, has compiled bold new evidence supporting this theory from former apartheid torturers, many of whom have been long protected by the amnesty they received as part of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s agreements.
The other reason we have known so little about the international crimes South Africa committed during apartheid is that the U.S. might prefer it that way. In the mid-1980s, the South African government was having trouble navigating a global market bent on excluding it through boycotts. It got around the problem by partaking in secret trade deals with Iran and Israel, brokered by then–CIA Director William Casey. When Olof Palme won reelection in 1985, he recommitted to his long-standing anti-apartheid foreign policy, which took the form of interfering in those shadow trade networks in arms and oil. In 1985, Sweden intercepted a delivery of arms en route to Iran and revealed to the world that Israel was selling explosives to Iran.


newrepublic--2020-06-11--When Mr. Sloan Went to Washington

When Mr. Sloan Went to Washington

“ You ’ re gon na have a pretty easy time with this one , ” McCree said .
“ I ’ m not so sure , ” Pitt said .
Chief Justice Burger , blessed with a deep , commanding voice , began the proceedings .
“ We ’ ll hear arguments next in Securities and Exchange Commission against ... Sloan.
” He paused theatrically , as though he needed to glance at his notes to verify the name of a respondent he knew very well .
Harvey Pitt stepped up to the podium , and launched into a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ thought was untenable .
He claimed that the SEC had issued suspensions in a responsible manner , with each of the five commissioners weighing in on a “ separate and fresh review ” of facts for each ten-day suspension .
Justice William Rehnquist interrupted with the obvious question : Should there be any kind of limit on the SEC ’ s suspension power ?
Yes , Pitt said .
The SEC ’ s authority to suspend the sale of stocks should be limited to when consecutive suspensions amounted to an abuse of discretion @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ What about 36 consecutive suspensions of ten days each ?
” he asked .
“ Where would that fall ?
” This was , in fact , the exact number of suspensions listed in the SEC brief , which put Pitt in an awkward position .
He dodged and weaved , until Rehnquist came to the rescue .
He changed the question from 36 suspensions to a hypothetical 20 .
This enabled Pitt to get back to an even keel , arguing that the Canadian Javelin case had been very complicated , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ both foreign and domestic markets .
It might well take an extended period of time to prepare materials for a judge , he said , to whom the SEC could appeal for a much longer suspension—as long as a year .
Justice Potter Stewart noted that Canadian Javelin had already been suspended for more than a year—ten days at a time .
Pitt repeated that it was a complicated case .
“ For how long ?
” Justice John Paul Stevens asked .
“ How long should be required to get enough evidence @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Pitt refused to specify—not even 50 days would be sufficient in all cases .
“ I ’ m just wondering , ” Stevens persisted , “ if you have the ten-day power you claim , why would you ever run to court for ” a year-long suspension ?
Pitt responded nonsensically , and tacked toward his conclusion .
He appealed to the justices to rule on the merits of the case .
If they did not , Sloan would surely take them back to the Second Circuit .
The matter was before the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ time , had not first gone to the district court , which had found all his previous claims to be frivolous .
“ Well , ” Stewart quipped , “ I guess he took it as a lesson never to try that route again.
” Supreme Court arguments are hushed , sedate affairs .
Emotions inserted into the proceedings tend to have an exaggerated effect .
Tepid jokes become riotously funny .
Mild slights become devastating insults .
At Stewart ’ s quip , a throaty gurgle of laughter rose up from the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was more than amusement at the break from formality .
Stewart ’ s joke had a subtext .
The suggestion was that an issue with merit had managed to come before the Court only because Sloan had refused to play by the rules .
Perhaps a lawyer—one with “ moral character ” —would have been unwilling to execute an end-run around the judicial chain of command .
Pitt laughed along with the audience .
“ Indeed , Sloan has learned well , ” he said , and quickly concluded his presentation .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the podium .
What came next was , according to the Brennan narrative , the one thing that made SEC v. Sloan significant .
Before Sloan had a chance to speak , Chief Justice Burger demanded to know whether Sloan had received the usual “ notice to counsel ” that was sent when lawyers were granted leave to appear before the Court .
The exchange that followed was “ amazing , ” and left Brennan “ incensed ” : Sloan made it only two or three minutes into his argument before Burger @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Harvey Pitt told me that after the argument ’ s first day , Burger ’ s “ enormous hostility ” to Sloan made him believe that an unwinnable case just might be winnable , after all .
After adjournment , Justice Brennan cornered Clerk of the Court Mike Rodak .
Earlier in the day , Rodak had slipped Burger proof that Sloan had received the March 1 letter .
So Burger knew Sloan had lied .
Now , cornered by Brennan , Rodak fessed up : Pitt , too , had checked @ @ @ @ @ @ @ only 45 minutes before Sloan .
Brennan burst into his chambers , complaining to his clerks that Burger had treated Sloan “ like a dog.
” The Chief had feared that Sloan would disgrace the Court , but now he had disgraced it himself .
Brennan immediately dictated a note , and a terse exchange of letters on the afternoon of March 27 , 1978 , sent to the entire conference—all justices receiving a copy—may mark a low point in the history of intra-chamber correspondence at the Supreme Court .
Brennan insisted that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was tardy , as well .
Burger claimed innocence , and blamed Rodak for failing to inform him that both sides were late .
He suggested a letter of reprimand to the SEC .
When the proceedings resumed the following morning , Sloan had shifted into full Perry Mason mode .
“ I wish to bring to the attention of the Court a small factual matter which came to my attention yesterday , ” he said .
He reminded them that the day before , Chief Justice Burger had asked a question about @ @ @ @ @ @ @ had noticed that the SEC ’ s filing had failed to include a single suspension dated December 25 , 1976 .
Burger now recognized his mistake .
He tried to backtrack .
“ The question I put , Mr. Sloan , was purely hypothetical .
It was deliberately made one less to make it a hypothetical.
” Sloan chuckled .
That was the problem .
Thirty-six was exactly what was in the SEC filing .
If Burger had wanted to reduce the number by one , he would have said 35 .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ one dated Christmas day , was 37 .
Burger had been caught lying .
Sloan next went into a complicated sequence to argue that both of the previously consolidated cases of SEC v. Sloan should now be before the Court .
He slyly suggested that his own appeal should have been granted cert , and should be considered now .
Justice Thurgood Marshall saw right through it , and chastised Sloan accordingly .
( “ Do you understand that the other case is not before us ?
Well , let me tell you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ you ?
” ) Next , Sloan attacked the various reasons the SEC had relied on in issuing suspensions , until Rehnquist sensed a hole in his argument and prodded Sloan ( “ Do you concede or don ’ t you that there are circumstances under which they could issue more than one ten-day consecutive suspension ?
” ) to acknowledge that the SEC might be right about the law after all .
Sloan ’ s refusal ( “ No , I do not make that concession !
” ) was delivered with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ drama .
Justice White interrupted to establish that Sloan ’ s position was about consecutive suspensions only .
This exchange sank deep into the legal weeds .
Sloan explained that Section 19 ( a ) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 included four provisions , of which , ( 1 ) , ( 2 ) , and ( 3 ) all required the SEC to provide notice of a suspension .
19 ( a ) ( 2 ) had become provision 12 ( j ) of the newer law , but the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ k ) , originally 19 ( a ) ( 4 ) , to issue ten-day suspensions , even though they had had more elaborate resources available to them since 1934 .
Four decades later , halfway-dressed , seated among his pylons of books and occasionally fielding calls from his wives asking for money , Sloan told me that at one moment during the oral argument Justice Brennan reached across to tug the sleeve of Chief Justice Burger ’ s robe .
Brennan nodded in Sloan ’ s direction , as though to say @ @ @ @ @ @ @ so.
” He had known all along that Sloan ’ s argument would prevail .
Sloan did not recall precisely at what moment this occurred , but it was surely during this speech—when the Justices stopped holding Sloan to the merits of the case , stopped scolding him , stopped attempting to trick him into making concessions , and turned instead to simply asking him to clarify vagaries of the law ’ s history .
Suddenly , everyone in the room realized that Sam Sloan—an embodiment of the absence of “ moral character @ @ @ @ @ @ @ present .
The justices fumbled a bit with their laymen ’ s understanding of finance .
For an extended period , Sloan seemed almost to forget himself .
He accelerated to the climax of his presentation : He paused , expecting to be interrupted .
He wasn ’ t .
The case had been reduced to its simplest denominator .
The SEC had violated the law , not just in this single case , but hundreds of times over .
Like it or not , Sam Sloan was right .
It took him @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on .
He pointed out that the very first suspension order had gone into effect three days before it was signed by the commissioners .
How could they possibly have approved of it ?
After some further back and forth , Sloan ’ s time expired .
Pitt had three minutes remaining .
Burger gave him ten .
Justice Stevens barely let him speak .
He asked after the Christmas Day suspension order , which had gone unremarked upon since Sloan first mentioned it , half an hour earlier .
Was it true @ @ @ @ @ @ @ had been entered on that day ?
Pitt admitted that it had .
This unleashed a frenzy of judicial sarcasm , various justices chiming in to remark on the great deliberation that the commissioners of the SEC had likely given the order when they showed up to work on a holiday .
These wry remarks also had a subtext .
The suggestion was that the SEC had deliberately omitted the date from their filing , so as to not call attention to the fact that suspension orders were communicated in a loose fashion @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The scheme had come to light only because Sloan had noticed that on the first day of argument Chief Justice Burger botched his attempt to pose a hypothetical question to Harvey Pitt .
And now Pitt was forced to suffer through what even he recalled as a vicious round of questioning , until his time was up .
“ Thank you , gentleman , ” Burger said .
“ The case is submitted.
” The outcome was a foregone conclusion , but the drama wasn ’ t over .
A former clerk @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in conference , Justice Brennan proclaimed that Sloan had performed splendidly .
Burger scowled .
The Brennan narrative concluded that “ all but the Chief agreed [ that Sloan ’ s argument ] was among the best of the Term.
” Burger was reluctant to join with the rest of his colleagues in officially siding with Sloan .
Justice Rehnquist ’ s chambers penned a tepidly-worded opinion , drafts of which passed from chamber to chamber , the various justices joining with what was clearly going to be a lopsided decision .
All @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
At last , on May 6 , 1978 , Burger sent a quick note to Rehnquist to say that his “ reservations ” had now been “ resolved.
” It ’ s unclear whether any of the justices knew that when their unanimous decision was handed down on May 15 , 1978 , Sloan was in a Central Asian jail on suspicion of being a spy .
I obtained files on SEC v. Sloan from the archived papers of seven of the nine justices who heard the case .
I received permission @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Stevens a month before he died in July 2019 .
His papers will not be made available until fall 2020 .
The only remaining file I have yet to consult is that of the central player in the Sloan drama : Chief Justice Warren Burger .
Burger ’ s papers are held at Swem Library at the College of William and Mary , where he served as chancellor until shortly before his death .
Access to them is controlled by Leonora Burger , the widow of Burger ’ s son .
Leonora Burger @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wish to be disturbed and does not care about “ the impact on historical inquiry.
” She did not return requests for comment .
The impact of SEC v. Sloan appears to have been two-fold .
One result would seem to be a change to the Securities and Exchange Act , which has been amended a number of times since 1978 .
The portion of the law that now covers extensions of emergency suspension orders is Section 12 ( g ) ( 2 ) ( k ) ( 2 ) ( C ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ suspension remains , but paragraph ( C ) ends unambiguously : “ In no event shall an order of the Commission under this paragraph continue in effect for more than 30 days.
” A less direct consequence of SEC v. Sloan would appear to be the 2013 change to the rules of the Court .
I contacted the office of the Clerk of the Supreme Court several times .
Why did the Court decide to prohibit non-lawyers from arguing ?
Who proposes changes to the rules of the Court ?
How are proposed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ or vote ?
The Court ’ s Public Information Office promised a speedy reply .
I never heard back .
“ It ’ s funny , ” one of the clerks from the 1977 term told me .
“ You don ’ t have to be a lawyer to be a Supreme Court judge .
Why should you have to be a lawyer to argue before them ?
” After Sloan won his case he didn ’ t bother to try to get his trading license reinstated .
There wasn ’ t any @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Rather than $ 5,000 , broker-dealers were required to demonstrate a minimum of $ 25,000 in assets .
He began to travel again , accumulating more wives and children .
For a time , he worked on the fringes of the finance world , preparing for corporations financial reports required by the SEC , and he authored a number of books , including Khowar-English Dictionary ( 1981 ) , Chinese Chess for Beginners ( 1989 ) , and How to Take Over a Publicly Held Corporation ( 1992 ) .
In the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ released from prison in Virginia , Sloan says he road-tripped to California , where a legal mix-up involving one of his wives resulted in his being incarcerated for an additional 42 days .
Then came the years of driving a taxi , the years of fighting his way onto the Board of the U.S .
Chess Federation , the years of publishing books that had already been published , and the years of running for office .
The last time I saw Sloan , at the National Archives , he announced that a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from New York to New Hampshire to pay the $ 1,000 required to enter the Democratic primary .
He is once again running for president of the United States .
He has imminent plans to reprint Catch-22 and Chess : A History .
Finally , he received word that the highest court in South Carolina had refused to hear the case of a long-running feud in Sloan ’ s immediate family .
Sloan had asserted that his brother was not his brother , and that his mother had been kidnapped and held against @ @ @ @ @ @ @ last recourse is the Supreme Court .
He intends to appeal .
Poland and Sloan co-wrote a book about the Berkeley chapter of the Sexual Freedom League , Sex Marchers ( 1968 ) .
Poland later changed his name to “ Jefferson Clitlick Poland ” and pleaded guilty in 1983 to molesting a young girl .
↑ Sloan ’ s line— “ Hey , play by the rules , will ya ?
” —is a fair summary of the Supreme Court ’ s decision in SEC v. Sloan.↑ As it happens , Sheldon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Sloan , years later pleaded guilty to participating in a trading scheme intended to funnel money to “ unnamed organized crime figures.
” ↑ Doyle wiggled his way out of trouble , too .
He was first accused in 1960 of spiriting $ 4.8 million in Canadian Javelin stock from Canada to Liechtenstein , but the case was thrown out of court .
Later , when he was questioned in a fraud investigation , he charmed two FBI agents into buying Canadian Javelin stock .
In 1963 , he pleaded guilty to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ months of jail time .
He escaped to Canada—securities crimes were non-extraditable—and later to Panama.↑ There were actually two suspensions of Canadian Javelin lasting more than a year .
The first began on November 29 , 1973 , and remained in place until January 27 , 1975 , almost thirteen months .
Another suspension began on April 29 , 1975 , and lasted until May 2 , 1976 , 370 days , and it is this suspension that was discussed at length in the oral arguments of SEC v. Sloan.↑ The initial suit @ @ @ @ @ @ @ SEC v. Sloan when the Supreme Court agreed to hear the SEC ’ s appeal.↑ A bench memo prepared for Justice Harry Blackmun found that between 1964 and 1976 , the SEC had issued ten-day suspensions no fewer than 235 times.↑ In the margin of a bench memo prepared for Justice Lewis Powell , which suggested that Sloan ’ s brief was not likely to be “ very helpful , ” Powell scribbled two words : Burn it.↑ Sloan claims to have spent quality time with Fischer just before Fischer turned the match @ @ @ @ @ @ @ skirmish of the Cold War.↑ It was at the U.S. embassy in Pakistan that Sloan learned he had won his Supreme Court case .
The decision had been announced while he was imprisoned.↑ The justices discussed Sloan v. Nixon in their conference on May 25 , 1973.↑ Only Justice Thurgood Marshall preserved Burger ’ s motion .
The document became publicly available through the Library of Congress when Marshall died in 1993.↑ In the Supreme Court , where the emphasis is less on guilt and innocence in the case at hand , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it ’ s held to be desirable for hypothetical questions to present facts that vary significantly from a particular case.↑ No such letter was sent.↑ The Brennan narrative is a lingering mystery .
The narratives were written by clerks , but all of Brennan ’ s clerks from the 1977 term deny having produced the account of SEC v. Sloan .
Its authorship remains unknown.↑ A clerk told me that Rehnquist was known to “ salt ” opinions with commentary on other opinions that the Court had recently decided .
It ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Rehnquist salted the SEC v. Sloan decision with commentary on a more controversial decision , Adamo Wrecking v. United States , from earlier in the term .
This , in turn , resulted in a concurring opinion from Justice Brennan that offered a blistering attack on the SEC and his fellow justices.↑

“For how long?” Justice John Paul Stevens asked. “How long should be required to get enough evidence to make out a case?”
Pitt refused to specify—not even 50 days would be sufficient in all cases.
“I’m just wondering,” Stevens persisted, “if you have the 10-day power you claim, why would you ever run to court for” a yearlong suspension?
Pitt responded nonsensically and tacked toward his conclusion. He appealed to the justices to rule on the merits of the case. If they did not, Sloan would surely take them back to the Second Circuit. The matter was before the court now only because Sloan, this time, had not first gone to the district court, which had found all his previous claims to be frivolous.
“Well,” Stewart quipped, “I guess he took it as a lesson never to try that route again.”
Supreme Court arguments are hushed, sedate affairs. Emotions inserted into the proceedings tend to have an exaggerated effect. Tepid jokes become riotously funny. Mild slights become devastating insults. At Stewart’s quip, a throaty gurgle of laughter rose up from the audience seated behind the litigants. It was more than amusement at the break from formality. Stewart’s joke had a subtext. The suggestion was that an issue with merit had managed to come before the court only because Sloan had refused to play by the rules. Perhaps a lawyer—one with “moral character”—would have been unwilling to execute an end-run around the judicial chain of command.
Pitt laughed along with the audience. “Indeed, Sloan has learned well,” he said, and quickly concluded his presentation.
The day was nearly finished when Sloan rose to the podium. What came next was, according to the Brennan narrative, the one thing that made SEC v. Sloan significant. Before Sloan had a chance to speak, Chief Justice Burger demanded to know whether Sloan had received the usual “notice to counsel” that was sent when lawyers were granted leave to appear before the court. The exchange that followed was “amazing” and left Brennan “incensed”:
SLOAN: I have not received anything. BURGER: Nothing? SLOAN: No. BURGER: March 1 letter, you have not received? SLOAN: No, I have not. BURGER: Are you aware that the rules of the Court require that counsel ... must register with the Deputy Clerk in Room 22D at 9:00 AM or shortly after that on the day assigned for argument? SLOAN: No, I am not aware of that rule. BURGER: Then you better check your mail, because you are in violation of that rule. You did not appear here until 2:30 today, and the Court cannot organize its business if it doesn’t know that arguing counsel is going to be present. Now you may proceed. SLOAN: Thank you very much, Your Honor. Gentlemen, Mr. Chief Justice, and may it please the Court.
Sloan made it only two or three minutes into his argument before Burger interrupted to adjourn to the following morning. Harvey Pitt told me that after the argument’s first day, Burger’s “enormous hostility” to Sloan made him believe that an unwinnable case just might be winnable, after all.
After adjournment, Justice Brennan cornered Clerk of the Court Mike Rodak. Earlier in the day, Rodak had slipped Burger proof that Sloan had received the March 1 letter. So Burger knew Sloan had lied. Now, cornered by Brennan, Rodak fessed up: Pitt, too, had checked in late. He’d arrived only 45 minutes before Sloan.
Brennan burst into his chambers, complaining to his clerks that Burger had treated Sloan “like a dog.” The chief had feared that Sloan would disgrace the court, but now he had disgraced it himself.
Brennan immediately dictated a note, and a terse exchange of letters on the afternoon of March 27, 1978, sent to the entire conference—all justices receiving a copy—may mark a low point in the history of intra-chamber correspondence at the Supreme Court. Brennan insisted that Pitt be compelled to acknowledge that he was tardy, as well. Burger claimed innocence and blamed Rodak for failing to inform him that both sides were late. He suggested a letter of reprimand to the SEC.
Suddenly, everyone in the room realized that Sam Sloan understood the law better than anyone present.
When the proceedings resumed the following morning, Sloan had shifted into full Perry Mason mode. “I wish to bring to the attention of the court a small factual matter which came to my attention yesterday,” he said. He reminded them that the day before, Chief Justice Burger had asked a question about 36 consecutive suspensions. Overnight, Sloan had noticed that the SEC’s filing had failed to include a single suspension dated December 25, 1976.
Burger now recognized his mistake. He tried to backtrack. “The question I put, Mr. Sloan, was purely hypothetical. It was deliberately made one less to make it a hypothetical.”
Sloan chuckled. That was the problem. Thirty-six was exactly what was in the SEC filing. If Burger had wanted to reduce the number by one, he would have said 35. The total number of suspensions, including the one dated Christmas Day, was 37. Burger had been caught lying.
Sloan next went into a complicated sequence to argue that both of the previously consolidated cases of SEC v. Sloan should now be before the court. He slyly suggested that his own appeal should have been granted cert, and should be considered now. Justice Thurgood Marshall saw right through it and chastised Sloan accordingly. (“Do you understand that the other case is not before us? Well, let me tell you it is not. Will that help you?”) Next, Sloan attacked the various reasons the SEC had relied on in issuing suspensions, until Rehnquist sensed a hole in his argument and prodded Sloan (“Do you concede or don’t you that there are circumstances under which they could issue more than one 10-day consecutive suspension?”) to acknowledge that the SEC might be right about the law after all. Sloan’s refusal (“No, I do not make that concession!”) was delivered with all the passion of a Hollywood courtroom drama.
Justice White interrupted to establish that Sloan’s position was about consecutive suspensions only. This exchange sank deep into the legal weeds. Sloan explained that Section 19 (a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 included four provisions, of which, (1), (2), and (3) all required the SEC to provide notice of a suspension. 19 (a) (2) had become provision 12 (j) of the newer law, but the SEC had been relying on 12 (k), originally 19 (a) (4), to issue 10-day suspensions, even though they had had more elaborate resources available to them since 1934.
Four decades later, halfway-dressed, seated among his pylons of books and occasionally fielding calls from his wives asking for money, Sloan told me that at one moment during the oral argument, Justice Brennan reached across to tug the sleeve of Chief Justice Burger’s robe. Brennan nodded in Sloan’s direction, as though to say, “See, I told you so.” He had known all along that Sloan’s argument would prevail. Sloan did not recall precisely at what moment this occurred, but it was surely during this speech—when the Justices stopped holding Sloan to the merits of the case, stopped scolding him, stopped attempting to trick him into making concessions, and turned instead to simply ask him to clarify vagaries of the law’s history. Suddenly, everyone in the room realized that Sam Sloan—an embodiment of the absence of “moral character”—understood the law better than anyone present. The justices fumbled a bit with their laymen’s understanding of finance. For an extended period, Sloan seemed almost to forget himself. He accelerated to the climax of his presentation:
SLOAN: I would like to point out that in this particular case, the SEC suspended trading for three-hundred-and-seventy days, which is more than one year. Therefore, what they are saying is that they can suspend a stock for a longer period of time under 12 (k), without notice, than they can under 12 (j), with notice, and I am sure that this could not possibly be what Congress intended.
He paused, expecting to be interrupted. He wasn’t. The case had been reduced to its simplest denominator. The SEC had violated the law, not just in this single case, but hundreds of times over. Like it or not, Sam Sloan was right.
It took him a moment to compose himself and go on. He pointed out that the very first suspension order had gone into effect three days before it was signed by the commissioners. How could they possibly have approved of it? After some further back and forth, Sloan’s time expired. Pitt had three minutes remaining. Burger gave him 10.
Justice Stevens barely let him speak. He asked after the Christmas Day suspension order, which had gone unremarked upon since Sloan first mentioned it, half an hour earlier. Was it true, Stevens asked, that an order had been entered on that day? Pitt admitted that it had. This unleashed a frenzy of judicial sarcasm, various justices chiming in to remark on the great deliberation that the commissioners of the SEC had likely given the order when they showed up to work on a holiday. These wry remarks also had a subtext. The suggestion was that the SEC had deliberately omitted the date from their filing, so as to not call attention to the fact that suspension orders were communicated in a loose fashion, orally, without any paper trail. The scheme had come to light only because Sloan had noticed that on the first day of argument, Chief Justice Burger botched his attempt to pose a hypothetical question to Harvey Pitt. And now Pitt was forced to suffer through what even he recalled as a vicious round of questioning, until his time was up.
“Thank you, gentleman,” Burger said. “The case is submitted.”
The outcome was a foregone conclusion, but the drama wasn’t over. A former clerk told me that when the justices gathered in conference, Justice Brennan proclaimed that Sloan had performed splendidly. Burger scowled. The Brennan narrative concluded that “all but the Chief agreed [that Sloan’s argument] was among the best of the Term.”
Burger was reluctant to join with the rest of his colleagues in officially siding with Sloan. Justice Rehnquist’s chambers penned a tepidly worded opinion, drafts of which passed from chamber to chamber, the various justices joining with what was clearly going to be a lopsided decision. All except the chief justice, that is. At last, on May 6, 1978, Burger sent a quick note to Rehnquist to say that his “reservations” had now been “resolved.” It’s unclear whether any of the justices knew that when their unanimous decision was handed down on May 15, 1978, Sloan was in a Central Asian jail on suspicion of being a spy.
I obtained files on SEC v. Sloan from the archived papers of seven of the nine justices who heard the case. I received permission to submit questions to Justice John Paul Stevens a month before he died in July 2019. His papers will not be made available until fall 2020. The only remaining file I have yet to consult is that of the central player in the Sloan drama: Chief Justice Warren Burger. Burger’s papers are held at Swem Library at the College of William and Mary, where he served as chancellor until shortly before his death. Access to them is controlled by Leonora Burger, the widow of Burger’s son. Leonora Burger, I was told, does not wish to be disturbed and does not care about “the impact on historical inquiry.” She did not return requests for comment.
The impact of SEC v. Sloan appears to have been twofold. One result would seem to be a change to the Securities and Exchange Act, which has been amended a number of times since 1978. The portion of the law that now covers extensions of emergency suspension orders is Section 12 (g) (2) (k) (2) (C). The power to extend a 10-day suspension remains, but paragraph (C) ends unambiguously: “In no event shall an order of the Commission under this paragraph continue in effect for more than 30 days.”
A less direct consequence of SEC v. Sloan would appear to be the 2013 change to the rules of the court. I contacted the office of the clerk of the Supreme Court several times. Why did the court decide to prohibit non-lawyers from arguing? Who proposes changes to the rules of the court? How are proposed changes approved? Do the justices argue or vote? The court’s Public Information Office promised a speedy reply. I never heard back.
“It’s funny,” one of the clerks from the 1977 term told me. “You don’t have to be a lawyer to be a Supreme Court judge. Why should you have to be a lawyer to argue before them?”
After Sloan won his case, he didn’t bother to try to get his trading license reinstated. There wasn’t any point, as the law had changed. Rather than $5,000, broker-dealers were required to demonstrate a minimum of $25,000 in assets.
He began to travel again, accumulating more wives and children. For a time, he worked on the fringes of the finance world, preparing for corporations financial reports required by the SEC, and he authored a number of books, including Khowar-English Dictionary (1981), Chinese Chess for Beginners (1989), and How to Take Over a Publicly Held Corporation (1992).
In the mid-1990s, not long after he was released from prison in Virginia, Sloan says he road-tripped to California, where a legal mix-up involving one of his wives resulted in his being incarcerated for an additional 42 days. Then came the years of driving a taxi, the years of fighting his way onto the Board of the U.S. Chess Federation, the years of publishing books that had already been published, and the years of running for office.
The last time I saw Sloan, at the National Archives, he announced that a day or two earlier, he had driven from New York to New Hampshire to pay the $1,000 required to enter the Democratic primary. He is once again running for president of the United States. He has imminent plans to reprint Catch-22 and Chess: A History. Finally, he received word that the highest court in South Carolina had refused to hear the case of a long-running feud in Sloan’s immediate family. Sloan had asserted that his brother was not his brother and that his mother had been kidnapped and held against her will for 13 years.
His last recourse is the Supreme Court. He intends to appeal.
Poland and Sloan co-wrote a book about the Berkeley chapter of the Sexual Freedom League, Sex Marchers (1968). Poland later changed his name to “Jefferson Clitlick Poland,” and he pleaded guilty in 1983 to molesting a young girl. ↑
Sloan’s line—“Hey, play by the rules, will ya?”—is a fair summary of the Supreme Court’s decision in SEC v. Sloan.↑
As it happens, Sheldon Kanoff, one of the lead investigators of Sloan, years later pleaded guilty to participating in a trading scheme intended to funnel money to “unnamed organized crime figures.”↑
Including, Sloan claims, a number of transactions with Bernie Madoff.↑
Doyle wiggled his way out of trouble, too. He was first accused in 1960 of spiriting $4.8 million in Canadian Javelin stock from Canada to Liechtenstein, but the case was thrown out of court. Later, when he was questioned in a fraud investigation, he charmed two FBI agents into buying Canadian Javelin stock. In 1963, he pleaded guilty to another charge but balked at three months of jail time. He escaped to Canada—securities crimes were nonextraditable—and later to Panama.↑
There were actually two suspensions of Canadian Javelin lasting more than a year. The first began on November 29, 1973, and remained in place until January 27, 1975, almost 13 months. Another suspension began on April 29, 1975, and lasted until May 2, 1976, 370 days, and it is this suspension that was discussed at length in the oral arguments of SEC v. Sloan.↑
The initial suit was Sloan v. SEC. It became SEC v. Sloan when the Supreme Court agreed to hear the SEC’s appeal.↑
A bench memo prepared for Justice Harry Blackmun found that between 1964 and 1976, the SEC had issued 10-day suspensions no fewer than 235 times.↑
In the margin of a bench memo prepared for Justice Lewis Powell, which suggested that Sloan’s brief was not likely to be “very helpful,” Powell scribbled two words: Burn it.↑
Sloan claims to have spent quality time with Fischer just before Fischer turned the match around, winning what amounted to a propaganda skirmish of the Cold War.↑
It was at the U.S. Embassy in Pakistan that Sloan learned he had won his Supreme Court case. The decision had been announced while he was imprisoned.↑
The justices discussed Sloan v. Nixon in their conference on May 25, 1973.↑
Only Justice Thurgood Marshall preserved Burger’s motion. The document became publicly available through the Library of Congress when Marshall died in 1993.↑
In the Supreme Court, where the emphasis is less on guilt and innocence in the case at hand and more on future disputes and legislation, it’s held to be desirable for hypothetical questions to present facts that vary significantly from a particular case.↑
No such letter was sent.↑
The Brennan narrative is a lingering mystery. The narratives were written by clerks, but all of Brennan’s clerks from the 1977 term deny having produced the account of SEC v. Sloan. Its authorship remains unknown.↑
A clerk told me that Rehnquist was known to “salt” opinions with commentary on other opinions that the court had recently decided. It’s likely that Burger withheld his vote until Rehnquist salted the SEC v. Sloan decision with commentary on a more controversial decision, Adamo Wrecking v. United States, from earlier in the term. This, in turn, resulted in a concurring opinion from Justice Brennan that offered a blistering attack on the SEC and his fellow justices.↑