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Peter Sagal Profile picture
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25 Nov, 5 tweets, 1 min read
Is that Sen. Romney on the right with a two by four?
Just for the record, I unironically enjoy Mr McNaughton’s art and will brook no condescension.
That said, who’s the dude with the sunglasses?
Thanks to a suggestion from one of you, I figured it out: the painting is called “The Impeachment Mob,” so all the characters are related to the Ukraine scandal.

The guy in sunglasses is the person the right wing media and Trumpist politicians ID’d as the whistleblower.
I found the photo Mr McN used as a reference. The sunglasses are a commentary.

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More from @petersagal

Peter Sagal Profile picture
26 Nov
A thread of thanks.

Ever since hosting "Constitution USA" on PBS 7 years ago I've given talks on the Constitution. The principle question I ask and then try to answer is: Why has our Con succeeded (+ or -) when so many others have failed or were instantly ignored?
Here's the Soviet Constitution of 1936, for example. Note: guaranteed universal suffrage, rights to work, health care, leisure time, etc. A liberal's dream. And of course, it was instantly and immediately ignored. Why wasn't ours?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1936_Cons…
After a long chat, with care to mark the places/times it WAS ignored (see: Jim Crow), I arrive at this answer: because what binds us together in America is not culture or national origin but a kind of civic religion of democracy.
Read 14 tweets
Peter Sagal Profile picture
12 Oct
An additional point on the "consent of the losers," as mentioned in a previous thread.

First of all, after thinking about the issue for a while, I saw it boiled down to that perfect phrase in this article by @urilf, here:

theatlantic.com/international/…
But it's also useful in thinking about the Civil War, and its causes. Usually we talk about the South's motivation for seceding, because it's been so intentionally obscured and lied about. They did it to preserve chattel slavery, period.

But why did Lincoln fight them?
He himself said, famously, that it was to "save the Union." "If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could do it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that."
Read 8 tweets
Peter Sagal Profile picture
12 Oct
Sen. Tillis made a point I often do: that every dictator in the modern world ran a country with a Bill of a Rights.

It’s true! Among those countries: the Soviet Union, Communist China.

Then he said the difference between them and the US was “we have a Constitution.”
Um, no.

1st of all the Bill of Rights IS the Constitution. First ten amendments thereto, in fact.

2nd, those countries also had Constitutions, which their leaders also ignored. It’s all just paper.
So what’s the real difference between them and us? I could go on about this — and do!— but it boils down to: in this country we’ve always* had the willing consent of the losers.
Read 7 tweets
Peter Sagal Profile picture
27 Sep
Fake Constitutional Scholar here.

ACB believes that the right to an abortion is not guaranteed in the Constitution. (She hasn't said that in so many words, but the people who support her seem sure about that.)

Okay, but what does the Constitution allow?
Would it allow the government to ban all abortions under any circumstances? If not, which circumstances are allowed? (She's said that it shouldn't be allowed for sex selection or for certain birth defects like Downs Syndrome.) But how about an non-viable pregnancy? Rape?
If a woman seeks out an illegal abortion and is caught, can the state imprison her until the baby is brought to term? Can they then take the baby away from the mother, on the grounds she tried to kill it? The Constitution remains silent.
Read 7 tweets
Peter Sagal Profile picture
23 Sep
If you haven't read it, the @nytimes did a superb investigation of the killing of Breonna Taylor, and all the terrible turns of luck and judgement that led to it. nytimes.com/2020/08/30/us/…
They've also presented their investigation as a TV documentary, below, and two episodes of "The Daily" podcast.

hulu.com/watch/56c64f89…
The NYTimes correspondent who led the investigation is now questioning the Attorney General about an important fact: did the police announce their presence?
Read 4 tweets
Peter Sagal Profile picture
21 Sep
I love telling stories about Bill, and none more than this one. Here it is, more or less fact-checked by Bill:
In 1966 Bill was a law student who was working part time at the local TV station in Topeka as a night and weekend anchor. On this particular night, he was alone in the studio when the phone rang. It was the station's correspondent in the newfangled "radio car."
"There's a huge tornado bearing down on the city," said the reporter.

"Are you sure?" said Bill. "There's nothing on the wires."

"I CAN SEE IT!" shouted the reporter. "It's right in front of me!"
Read 6 tweets

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