The Kavanaugh Effect, continued

The Democrats’ attempt at crucifying Brett Kavanaugh was so low, so despicable, that even milquetoasts like Grassley, Collins and, most notably, Mitch McConnell grew backbones and lashed back.

Now, riding on that momentum, McConnell has forced the Democrats to agree to the confirmation of 15 new federal judges, a deal brokered in exchange for ending this session and allowing endangered Democrats to return home to campaign (and endangered Republicans too, but McConnell apparently didn’t mention that).

The point is, these are lifetime appointments, and these judges will be on the bench long enough to make a significant difference. Like a number of conservatives I know, I held my nose and voted for Trump precisely because I hoped he’d do something about our federal courts, and he’s come through magnificently. NAFTA reform and our new foreign policy successes are just icing on the cake.

But Trump’s refusal to back down on Kavanaugh, combined with the awful tactics employed against the judge, seems to have inspired the previously complacent Republicans to stand up and fight. Hooray.

Noah lands on Mt. Ararat

11 Highgate Road, in Riverside’s “Harbor’ Point (there is no harbor here, but is that any worse than a 1970s tract development on a flat cow pasture being named “Flintlock Ridge?) has sold for $1.350 million. The original structure was wiped out by Hurricane Sandy in 2013, so any new home here will have to be built on stilts, but even so, this price seems reasonable. 0.67 of acre in the R-1 zone limits the allowable size to around 5,000 sq. feet or so (including garage); that should be sufficient for normal humans.

Water views over cattails, so not direct waterfront, though there’s a community dock and a small beach available. The original 2014 listing included a restriction that the property couldn’t be sold until the master lot, 54 Cathlow Drive was sold, but the owners gave up on their effort to unload Cathlow for $16 million in 2015 and last year freed this lot to be sold as a distinct parcel.

Harbor Point’s a pleasant neighborhood, if you can get past the residents’ proclivity to sue one another over basketball poles, walls, fences and loud popcorn machines, and at this price, a nice house could be built at a reasonable cost, one well within the current price range of houses here.

Probably not the result they were hoping for

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110 Shore Road, now asking $2.795 million, reports a contract. The owners paid $3,919,318 for it in 2006; obviously a price reached only after scrupulous negotiation, but today’s result shows that the buyers should have kept that pencil sharpened a bit longer.

A nicely renovated 1925 home, with a detached, one-car garage, it was priced at $3.895 back in 2014; a number that has suffered a number of indignities over the years. Our GMLS shows a “days on market” of 22; my math’s different, and I’d say it was on the market for four-and-a-quarter years, but then, I’m not interested in perpetuating a myth.

Half measures will avail us nothing — usually — in this case, however ...

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Wine thief jumps to his death to avoid prison.

A former personal assistant who was about to plead guilty to ripping off his ex-boss — the multi-millionaire head of Goldman Sachs — leaped to his death from the Carlyle Hotel Tuesday as his lawyers waited for him in court.

Hotel staff had been alerted by his sister that he was sending alarming texts saying he might kill himself over the case, police sources said. When security forced open his door, he was naked and sitting on the window sill.

He smiled at them and then jumped, sources said, his body striking a 17th floor balcony with such force that half of him landed on a terrace two floors below, the sources said.

Riker’s Island, then prison, being beat on by gangs? Right choice, I’d say.

Psychological impact

Just in time for Halloween, a haunted house

Just in time for Halloween, a haunted house

A reader tells me that this Stamford house, 315 Hycliff Terrace, which is on the market for $899,990, reduced from $945,000 after just a week on the market, was recently the site of an ugly attempted murder/suicide. The husband managed to kill his wife but botched his own suicide, and after the police rejected his story about home invaders, was eventually released on bail. He returned home, and finished the job.

The house itself doesn’t seem to amount to much: Zillow labels it as “new construction”, although it was built in 1928 and last remodeled in 1980, but that’s Zillow (and real estate agents) for you, and, for Stamford, seems overpriced, but I do wonder how the market will react. People die in houses all the time, even by suicide, and generally those deaths don’t affect value, but murders cast a certain pall over a property: according to Trulia, a homicide on the premises can drop a home’s value 10% - -25%, and, in my experience, sometimes more. The Dairy Road home where the owner was dragged into the basement and slaughtered, for instance, was torn down and even had its address changed from No. 8 Dairy to No. 10, and still took years to sell, though much of that time on the market can probably be attributed to its being both designed an built by Mark Mariani and grossly overpriced.

I’m curious to see how this one fares.

As if lingering corpses weren’t enough, fogged double-panes indicate failed seals, requiring replacement..

As if lingering corpses weren’t enough, fogged double-panes indicate failed seals, requiring replacement..

4,015 days later, a spec house finds a buyer

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12 Intervale Place (Belle Haven península, near I-95), last asking price $4.375 million, is reported as pending. This is a good looking, beautifully made house, but when finished in 2007 it was put on the market at $6.450, and that was far, far too high, even though 2007 was the peak of the market.

It’s been on and off the market as a rental in the intervening years, but all in all, eleven years is a long time to wait to cash out of a building project.

But again: nice house, and these buyers are probably doing well.

Lead, follow, or run away: Head of Scotland Yard chose the latter

Acting Commissioner of Scotland Yard Craig Mackey admits that he locked himself in his car while witnessing knife-wielding terrorist stab police office, then sped away.

Sir Craig, who retires in December, went on: "The attacker had one of those looks where, if they get you in that look, they would be after you.

"He seemed absolutely focused on getting further down and attacking anyone who was in his way."

Mackay’s colleagues were not impressed by his actions.

A former Scotland Yard commander, who did not wish to be named, said: 'When very senior officers get caught up in a situation like this, they need to remember, first and foremost, that they are a police officer – and then that they are a leader.'

Former Metropolitan Police Federation chairman Glen Smyth said: 'If you are an ordinary cop, your instinct when someone is in trouble – particularly a colleague – is to help them. 

Whether it was the right or wrong decision for the Acting Commissioner to leave the scene, it will certainly raise eyebrows.'

“Unarmed” doesn’t necessarily mean that no weapon couldn’t have been found: a tire iron in the body, perhaps? Had he been present on 9/11 when the towers were burning, Siir Craig would today be a “survivor”. Many he enjoy his retirement this December.

UPDATE: the comment from “Your Mother” regarding the use of an umbrella as a weapon reminded me of this:





This prediction from Glenn Reynolds sounds right

How Kavanaugh’s confirmation will change the Supreme Court

With Brett Kavanaugh as the newest Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, things are going to be different. But how different? Here are a few changes to look for:

► There will be less change than you expect. Most Supreme Court decisions are boring, technical, and decided by easy majorities. That will still be true post-Kavanaugh.

► [snip]

► Strange New Respect for judicial minimalism. As Harvard Law Professor Adrian Vermeule remarked, “Law review editors: brace for a tidal wave of legal academic theories supporting judicial minimalism, Thayerianism, and strong — very strong — theories of precedent. Above all: the Court must do nothing without bipartisan agreement, otherwise it is illegitimate.” The past half-century’s enthusiasm for judicial activism will vanish, as legal academia turns on a dime to promote theories that will constrain the Court until a left-leaning majority returns, at which point they’ll turn on a dime again.

► [snip]

As George Mason University Law School’s Adam White notes, we may see a rerun of the “Impeach Earl Warren” campaigns of the 1960s, only from the left. (Though, to be fair, the move to impeach Warren was led by Democrats, too, of the segregationist variety.)

And of course, there’s this prediction, which is sure to delight the manufacturer of Orvile Redenbacher’s popcorn:

Of course, the shrieking hysterics surrounding this Supreme Court appointment, as bad as they are, will likely pale beside the shrieking hysterics we’ll see if, as seems likely, President Trump has a chance to replace aging liberal heroine Ruth Bader Ginsburg. So there’s that to look forward to, anyway.