I like to start out with the good. The Supremes released some decisions this morning, The Supreme Court banned warrantless cell phone searches. It was a win for 4th Amendment and privacy advocates.

The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that police cannot go snooping through people’s cell phones without a warrant, in a unanimous decision that amounts to a major statement in favor of privacy rights.

Police agencies had argued that searching through the data on cell phones was no different than asking someone to turn out his pockets, but the justices rejected that, saying a cell phone is more fundamental. — The Washington Times.

The decision was unanimous. That alone is striking. The article says the decision is a clear 21st century update of privacy rights. In answer to LEO questions about searching cellphones, Chief Justice Roberts response was simple, “Get a warrant.” This decision now places cellphones—and the information contained within, in the same category as a person’s home.

“The fact that technology now allows an individual to carry such information in his hand does not make the information any less worthy of the protection for which the Founders fought,” Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote for the unanimous court.

“Our answer to the question of what police must do before searching a cell phone seized incident to an arrest is accordingly simple— get a warrant.”

Justices even said police cannot check a cellphone’s call log, saying even those contain more information that just phone numbers, and so perusing them is a violation of privacy that can only be justified with a warrant.

The chief justice said cellphones are different not only because people can carry around so much more data — the equivalent of millions of pages of documents — that police would have access to, but that the data itself is qualitatively different than what someone might otherwise carry.

He said it could lay bare someone’s entire personal history, from their medical records to their “specific movements down to the minute.” — The Washington Times.

There is another similar case winding its way to the Supreme Court. In this case, the device is a laptop instead of a cell phone. A similar case that upheld a ‘legal exception,” known as ‘the border search,’ placed restrictions on searching personal tablets and laptops within 100 miles of the US border.

The decision released today is a win for all of us, regardless.

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On the other hand, the bad occurred yesterday in Mississippi. Thad Cochran won the run-off election for the GOP Senatorial candidacy. He did so by asking democrats to illegally cross party lines to vote for him. An estimated 35,000 did so.

Congratulations To The GOP Establishment On Their Pyrrhic Victory In Mississippi Yesterday

Written By : John Hawkins, June 25, 2014

Last night, Thad Cochran beat Chris McDaniel in a primary run-off and became the GOP’s Senate candidate in Mississippi.

It wasn’t an honorable victory.

Cochran won by getting Democrats to vote in a Republican primary. This was done by touting his support of food stamps. It was done by paying “walking around money” to buy votes. It was done by smearing Tea Partiers as racists.

That’s what it took to re-elect a senile 76 year old man that few people even believe is mentally capable of serving out another term in the Senate.

The cost of that victory was the integrity, personal honor and reputations of prominent Cochran supporters like Haley Barbour, Karl Rove, Mitch McConnell, John McCain and the NRSC, who were all undoubtedly congratulating each other on their sleazy victory last night, while today they’ll begin to try to distance themselves from the dishonorable conduct they winked at during the campaign. We may never know which of them was ultimately responsible for smearing Tea Partiers as racists or centering the run-off campaign around getting Democrats to vote in a GOP campaign. But what we do know is that if Haley Barbour, Karl Rove, John McCain or the NRSC found it unacceptable, they could have put their foot down and demanded the campaign put a stop to it. None of them did because they were just fine with using those sort of tactics to defeat grassroots conservatives.

In return, they will probably get their doddering moderate senator elected instead of adding another grassroots conservative in D.C. But, the cost will be millions of turned-off conservatives, fund raising hits for the already failing NRSC, and even more animosity and venom between Tea Partiers and the establishment.

What was it King Pyrrhus said after his “victory” over the Romans that cost him many of his best officers and troops?

“One more such victory and we are lost.”

How many more “victories” like the one Thad Cochran won yesterday can the GOP stand without shattering to pieces?

I call myself a conservative. At the moment, my allegiance is to the GOP…at the moment.

The Cochran-McDaniel primary isn’t over yet. McDaniel has not conceded.

MCDANIEL MAY CONTEST RESULTS
After Cochran sealed the GOP nomination Tuesday night, McDaniel spoke to supporters, but did not concede. Instead he spoke of “dozens of irregularities” in Tuesday’s voting. Supporters told Fox News today that McDaniel’s team was up all night looking into whether his campaign should challenge last night’s results. McDaniel backers accuse Cochran of pandering to black Democrats, an incendiary charge in the state with a freighted recent history on race relations. But Cochran’s outreach to black voters is nothing new. In a piece from 1984, NYT reports, “Mr. Cochran assiduously courted the black vote, flooding black radio stations with advertisements featuring ‘The Harrises, Mississippi’s Favorite Family,’ a fictional black family. To the strains of soap opera music, they debated the campaign and concluded that ‘Thad’s all right’ and ‘the other side is lying about him.’”
 
“There is nothing strange at all about standing as people of faith for our country that we built, that we believe in. But there is something a bit strange, there is something a bit unusual about a Republican primary that is decided by liberal democrats.” –Challenger Chris McDaniel’s election night speech. — FOX News First, By Chris Stirewalt, June 25, 2014.

 

Update: McDaniel will contest the election.

More and more conservatives, Shawn Hannity among them, are calling for a third party. I’m not in that party controlled socialism to corporate socialism, I’ll have to look for an alternative. At times like this, that decision point seems to be getting closer every day.