SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Amy Coney Barrett: Who is Trump's Supreme Court pick?:
Amy Coney Barrett's nomination to the US Supreme Court comes as little surprise.
[...] Donald Trump - who as sitting president gets to select nominees - reportedly once said he was "saving her" for this moment: when elderly Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died and a vacancy on the nine-member court arose.
It took the president just over a week to fast-track the 48-year-old conservative intellectual into the wings. This is his chance to tip the court make-up even further to the right ahead of the presidential election, when he could lose power.
Barrett's record on gun rights and immigration cases imply she would be as reliable a vote on the right of the court, as Ginsburg was on the left, according to Jonathan Turley, a professor of law at George Washington University.
"Ginsburg maintained one of the most consistent liberal voting records in the history of the court. Barrett has the same consistency and commitment," he adds. "She is not a work-in-progress like some nominees. She is the ultimate 'deliverable' for conservative votes."
And her vote, alongside a conservative majority, could make the difference for decades ahead, especially on divisive issues such as abortion rights and the Affordable Care Act (the Obama-era health insurance provider).
Barrett's legal opinions and remarks on abortion and gay marriage have made her popular with the religious right, but earned vehement opposition from liberals.
But as a devout Catholic, she has repeatedly insisted her faith does not compromise her work.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) is facing considerable controversy about his plans to move the nomination forward quickly:
"President Trump could not have made a better decision," Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., the majority leader, said in a statement. "Judge Amy Coney Barrett is an exceptionally impressive jurist and an exceedingly well-qualified nominee to the Supreme Court of the United States."
He added: "First, Judge Barrett built a reputation as a brilliant scholar at the forefront of the legal academy. Then she answered the call to public service. For three years on the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, she has demonstrated exactly the independence, impartiality, and fidelity to our laws and Constitution that Americans need and deserve on their highest Court... As I have stated, this nomination will receive a vote on the Senate floor in the weeks ahead, following the work of the Judiciary Committee supervised by Chairman Graham."
This is in sharp contrast to McConnell's actions following US Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's passing away on February 13, 2016. McConnell waited less than 2 hours to make the first of 5 statements to urging delay in nominating a new Supreme Court justice:
The American people should have a voice in the selection of their next Supreme Court Justice. Therefore, this vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president
That statement was made with 342 days (over 11 months) remaining in Obama's term as President. There are 124 days (just over 4 months) remaining before the end of Trump's term.
President Obama nominated Judge Merrick Garland to fill the vacancy. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) followed McConnell's lead and never allowed the confirmation process to begin. Thus, no nomination was ever brought to the Senate floor and thereby leaving the vacancy open.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by takyon on Sunday September 27 2020, @07:04PM (65 children)
Barrett is obviously qualified for the job. To attack her nomination and most others, you have to admit that the Supreme Court is about politics, not law.
Requiring a Senate supermajority to confirm judicial nominees could put a band-aid on this problem, forcing (perceived) moderates to be appointed even if the Presidency and Senate are controlled by the same party.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 27 2020, @07:32PM (50 children)
I find it always strange how these things run in the USA, as if trias politica isn't executed in a proper manner. If it would, there would be no reason to politicise the Supreme Court. Judges (including the Surpreme Court) should only judge based on what the law says and it is up to the law-making body to make sure new laws are in line with existing laws. Having done those things properly, there should be very little room for a judge's personal opinion to have influence on an outcome.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 27 2020, @08:13PM (28 children)
You'd think so, but in the USA judging based on what the law says is widely regarded as a dangerous right-wing fringe extremist approach, exemplified by freaks like Scalia and Thomas.
Judging based on what the law might have been presumed to say with the benefit of hindsight and shifts in popular language and culture is regarded as the high-minded, flexible, progressive approach as exemplified by the late RBG.
I don't know where you're from, but publically expressing those views in much of the USA is likely to get you pegged as a fascist.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 27 2020, @09:03PM (21 children)
Not even Scalia and Thomas judge based on what the law says. Scalia, for example, said the interpretation of law should be based on what reasonable persons living at the time of its adoption would have understood the ordinary meaning of the text. Hence his famous use of historical dictionaries. And Thomas interprets it based on what he thinks the drafters meant when they wrote it. Both of those can mean subtly or radically different things than what it says on its face, especially to a modern reader.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 27 2020, @11:28PM (19 children)
You end up with the quandary: do you try to interpret the past intent, as of the time of writing the law, or re-interpret it based on the shifting sands of language?
Crazy rightwingnut fascists like Thomas and Scalia go for past intent. Regardless of how they seek to achieve that, this is what they're doing. Obviously (it's been over two centuries since the constitution was drafted) that is different from today's language.
RBG & co. are more interested in what we'd think it would mean today. That's the whole "living document thing".
Thus, as the G-GPP suggested, judging what the law says depends very much on whether you're a retrograde, radical reactionary fascist (i.e. trying to interpret the intent of the authors) or, y'know, not.
(Score: 2, Informative) by khallow on Monday September 28 2020, @12:32AM (14 children)
Sounds like someone needed to read some 1984. If you can control the language, you then can control a living document.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by hemocyanin on Monday September 28 2020, @12:56AM (1 child)
This is fair.
It is a problem that the court is taking sides on political issues. The big one, abortion, would be better handled by Congress for a couple reasons. First, Congress better represents the constituents but even more, it would take this partisan focus off the court where justices have to be selected by ideology rather than skill. It is the latter side effect of an activist court that is so poisonous to our political system and it comes up every year -- "you have to vote for this bloodthirsty wall street whore (yes, talking about HRC) because SCOTUS!!!" Yeah fuck that -- wouldn't it be better if SCOTUS wasn't legislating from the bench and Congress did the legislating? But as usual, Congress is content to let the Executive usurp war powers and SCOTUS usurp legislative powers because they individual congresspeople don't want to be held accountable for their votes.
Anyway, the side effect of activist courts is playing out in a very toxic manner right now and that should itself be seen as a reason why judicial activism is to be avoided.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Monday September 28 2020, @01:19AM
It's a full time job to chase the pork, and sell your influence to the highest bidders. There's not much time left over to actually legislate. In fact, some of that legislation requires research and no congress critter has that much time!
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by dry on Monday September 28 2020, @02:21AM (11 children)
Things change. Like what is cruel and unusual punishment. Does speech include all expressions. Does papers include emails.
Ideally the Constitution would be updated periodically but Americans treat it like a holy document with the priests being the Supreme Court Justices.
In Canada, we had a case back in the '20's where the question came up whether a woman could be a Senator. Constitution said only persons could be a Senator and described a person as male. It went to the House of Lords in the UK before it was ruled that the Constitution was a living document and now a woman is also a person.
Now we get our Supreme Court doing things like striking down 3 strike laws that would put a shoplifter in prison for life due to our right not to have cruel and unusual punishments.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday September 28 2020, @01:36PM (10 children)
My take is that those terms are intentionally broad, precisely to allow such latitude. Exacting definitions allow for lots of exceptions.
But what really needs to be updated? You mention a few definitions which haven't really changed.
Should have been done via amendment. Because tomorrow, "persons" may be redefined yet again.
Bad definitions aren't improved by letting them linger. Here, persons never meant "male". It was a legal context that needed to be removed, not ignored.
(Score: 2) by dry on Tuesday September 29 2020, @01:57AM (9 children)
Well, just a couple of years back, some originalist on your court made a ruling based on how cruel and unusual punishment had to be taken in an 18th century context. Forget if it was about torturing a person to death or excessive solitary. A century ago, rulings were made about telephone conversations not being covered by the 4th as there were no telephones in the 18th century. That ruling was eventually overthrown by a living document type Judge.
The point of that ruling was that that part of the Constitution didn't actually specify sex, just qualified persons and that in 1867 it was considered that only males were persons (I misremembered) and that was how the originalist Supreme Court ruled.
As at the time only the UK Parliament could amend that part of the Constitution, a court case going all the way to the Privy Council was one way to change things. Lobbying the UK Parliament also may have worked as this was after the Balfour Declaration but really it would have had to be the government lobbying for the change whereas our Constitution allows a group of 5 to petition to have standing to ask the Supreme Court to rule on a Constitutional issue.
Interesting parts of the ruling,
From https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/persons-case [thecanadianencyclopedia.ca]
Canada has always had problems with amending the Constitution, took us over 50 years just to repatriate it after the UK encouraged us to. Trudeau finally forced it through in 1982 with the Constitution Act 1982, passed by the UK and Canadian Parliaments. Even now it is a can of worms to try to amend it, what with Quebec never signing on and our nature of 2 nations.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday September 29 2020, @01:05PM (8 children)
Doesn't sound like much of a problem to me, especially given the many abuses of the living document interpretation. For example, the hubbub over the Second Amendment, undermining of the Tenth Amendment (deciding that the federal government suddenly has more powers), or the development of a pretty unqualified qualified immunity. You can think of cases where originalism doesn't work? I can think of cases where living document doesn't work.
So amendments are hard? That's the point. I was reading about Austria's government, which has a pretty lax process for amendment in comparison. They already had one serious failure - the takeover of Austria in 1933 by Fascists.
(Score: 2) by dry on Friday October 02 2020, @04:29AM (7 children)
Those aren't examples of a living document, rather examples of totally changing the Constitution. Living document might give the argument that nukes aren't arms, or more likely that the right includes women, or people that aren't qualified for the militia, but the 2nd has been totally perverted.
I also note that the originalists have no problem with changing " the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." to " the right of some of the people to keep and bear some Arms in certain places, shall not be infringed."
The changes that the 10th should have stopped, I guess are mostly a result of your civil war. Civil war is always a fuck up. Funny enough Canada was a result of your civil war, created with a strong central government, and since the courts have consistently given the Provinces more power based on a couple of interpretations of things like civil rights and property rights management.
Some amendments are hard, others are easy. Newfoundland had no problem getting the Constitution amended to become Newfoundland and Labrador", just took the agreement of 2 legislatures. One difference here is our Constitution is spread across various documents and partially unwritten. The point I was making was why the UK was in charge of amending our Constitution for about half a century too long, namely no agreement about how. Now it varies from really easy like a name change to a little harder like a Provincial boundary change to hard (7/50 rule, 7/10ths of Provinces with 50% of population) like changing rights, to really hard (100%) to change the fundamental government or a Province to secede.
You're right that fundamental changes should be hard. Otherwise you get like Brexit where the vote was statistically a tie.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday October 02 2020, @12:37PM (6 children)
Saying it doesn't make it so. To the contrary these are examples. That's what a living document interpretation does. It changes the constitution. Whether the pretext for that change is to adapt to a present situation or reality, is merely a matter of spin.
There's no criteria other than highly subjective ones for what is a living document interpretation.
(Score: 2) by dry on Saturday October 03 2020, @03:44AM (5 children)
So you are saying that when society now considers a woman a person, the Constitution can't be interpreted that way?
Or in the case of the 2nd, when poison gas was oulawed by treaty, the right of the people to possess poison gas should have remained?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday October 03 2020, @04:34AM (4 children)
Society considered a woman a person back then too.
(Score: 2) by dry on Saturday October 03 2020, @03:44PM (3 children)
No it didn't, women had restricted rights compared to a full person, with first their father then their husband responsible for the woman instead of her being responsible for herself. Legally they were not full persons but rather similar to a child, with restricted rights.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday October 04 2020, @01:28PM (2 children)
(Score: 2) by dry on Sunday October 04 2020, @04:52PM (1 child)
Well, we can call a dog a person, it doesn't mean that they have the rights that go with being a person.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday October 05 2020, @01:12AM
Sure, we can call a dog a person, but we don't.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @07:48PM (3 children)
what a stupid fuck. of course you base the interpretation on what it meant in the beginning. otherwise, you might as well ignore it altogether. ridiculous logic.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 29 2020, @05:55AM (2 children)
Then your phone calls can be recorded by the government at will because they aren't your "persons, houses, papers, and effects."
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday September 29 2020, @01:11PM
What is the reason that a "living document" judge would rule the above way? Originalist arguments are limited by what the laws actually say. They could have instead ruled that phone communications (and indeed all communication) was legal to monitor without warrant because that's the new norms of the land. That sort of nebulous reasoning is a serious problem in today's world.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 29 2020, @06:28PM
i said "what it ****meant****"! not what exact words were used for what specific examples of the concept were in question when it was written. They made a long fucking list of stuff for a fucking reason. To get the goddamn point across. Now people want to act like they don't understand the point because $new_thing is not on the list. It's transparent bullshit. This whole subject is completely obvious, yet some people can't be honest about anything.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @08:09PM
"And Thomas interprets it based on what he thinks the drafters meant when they wrote it. Both of those can mean subtly or radically different things than what it says on its face, especially to a modern reader."
Except of course the meaning of "people" in "we the people". In which case they are more than happy to defer to a magic eight ball.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @01:44AM (5 children)
And yet, it was the right that gave us corporate personhood in spite of people behind the 14th amendment stating that it there was no intent to give personhood to corporations. In fact, it was just a clerk who claimed to be present during the debates on the 14th amendment stating that the original intent was corporate personhood. But, all the right-wing judges since pretend that it is precedent.
The right gave us money = speech. No precedent led to this decision, just a bunch of far right activist judges deciding that they wanted an oligarchy and not a democracy.
The right gave us the Dredd Scott decision in which African Americans were decided to not be human.
The right interfered in an election, stopped the vote count (without any valid legal justification) and gave the election victory to one of their own in Bush v Gore.
You should notice a trend. Right = racist, pro-rich, pro-corporate, anti-democratic and corrupt
Also, that the right wing judges are very activist, and use their positions to create racist, pro-rich, pro-corporate and anti-democratic law without regard to things like constitutionality.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @03:00AM
Did you actuallly follow the Florida count? There was a very clear legal justification:
The law on voting in Florida covered conditions for recounts, limits on the number of recounts and so on. It wasn't a legal black hole; it was a clearly set forth law.
A judge in Florida decided to tear that up because the Gore campaign went judge-shopping, and he was on their side.
The supremes looked at it and said: "This is bullshit, the law means what it says, judges don't get to make it up. You've had your counts, we're done here."
I know it's all warm and fuzzy like an old wool blanket to feel that you're crucified next to baby Jesus and the weight of the world is on you because you're such a martyr and everybody should totally agree with you because your feelings are so hurt, but you spoil it when you wreck your credibility with fairytales like that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @07:52PM
the Dredd Scott ruling didn't even address the classification of Africans in america at the time. SJWs always lie.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @08:02PM
Race is just an extension of your family and we have been separated by *nature* and *evolution* for many thousands of years. It's only due to the Jews that White preservation is called Racism and White nations must be invaded by darker breeds of human, likely different subspecies of homo sapien.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday September 29 2020, @01:22PM
Well, then it'll be interesting to see if you are "Right" under this definition. I guess we can rule out pro-corporate, but the rest seem up in the air.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 29 2020, @02:38PM
It was the Romans who invented the idea of a "corporation" by which the law could consider a group of people as one person. "Personhood" is what "Corporation" means. So it's no surprise that a clerk stated as much, it's probably what he learned in law school.
1. people with money can pay other people to say something
2. interference with these payments is interference with speech
That's not exactly a right-wing interpretation.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday September 27 2020, @10:58PM (16 children)
Well, how can you execute separation of powers better?
Interpretation of law is inherently political. You can't ignore the political element.
Maybe those things can't be done properly?
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday September 28 2020, @12:06AM (7 children)
Always the defeatist. With nothing but the simple desire, anything can be done properly.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday September 28 2020, @03:18AM (6 children)
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday September 28 2020, @04:52AM (2 children)
Simply not possible. There is nothing but us to prevent it. With sufficient demand we can and will have a very strong separation of power. We have the power to ignore the parties and form our own, just takes desire and initiative.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday September 28 2020, @10:10AM (1 child)
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday September 28 2020, @03:39PM
The only thing that is not possible is impossibility. When you say "not possible", what you really mean is you don't know. And many things that people don't want to do are declared "not possible" for the obvious reason. All the trivial things you declare as "not possible" can be traced to lack of personal will or outright antagonism.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @07:48AM (2 children)
Earlier poster here. There are plenty of countries that just do fine without all those politics.
I've read to more parts in the discussion that I started here and there seem to be a few things going on:
1) Seperation of power. Having the president appointing a person for life should not be a problem if the judge has to follow the writings of the law to the letter.
2) Interpertation of the law. Task for the house and senate to make sure there is no room for "interpretation" or "maybe the person who wrote the law intended this". If there is discussion about this, stick to the letter in how it is written down. If house or senate start to complain, let them make a new law that invalidates the flawed one.
The Surpreme Court could even have a duty to check those new laws that they are executable and in line with existing laws.
3) Allow laws to be replaced by a new law, even the constitution. My country (in Europe) is older than the USA, but the constitution is from early 1900. Even now sometimes we want to make changes to it, which requires new elections for the house and a 2/3 voting majority.
However, I'm aware that these things would be basically undoable to implement in the USA (at least in its current state of distrust).
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday September 28 2020, @10:09AM
1) You can't make the letter of the law sufficiently unambiguous.
2) The House and Senate are already so tasked, but they've ignored that for a couple of centuries.
3) Already done. Nobody has come up with a sufficient reason, much less the needed majorities to replace the Constitution.
I simply don't buy that your country does this any better. Glancing through Wikipedia, it sounds like Austria might be the country in question with their constitution established in 1920. They have an insanely easy process for modifying their constitution, it just takes a 2/3 supermajority of the National Council (which sounds like the "house" in question), which is way too easy. And their constitution broke down prior to their annexation by Nazi Germany. That's a pretty serious failure.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @03:50PM
We already have this. It's called judicial review and it's been around from the beginning of the Republic. See Marbury v. Madison [wikipedia.org] for further info.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @12:55AM (1 child)
Have you guys tried AK-47?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @03:54PM
So, the only way you have of solving your problems is with a gun? Is there really no other way with you guys?
(Score: 3, Funny) by driverless on Monday September 28 2020, @12:56AM (4 children)
Here the highest-court judges are appointed, not elected, after extensive consultation among the legal profession and other bodies. Although the party in power makes the appointment, it's the legal profession, covering all political viewpoints, that selects who they consider the most suitable candidate. And that's not just in theory, that's how it actually works in practice. We have a pretty independent judiciary that doesn't take any crap from the government, the near-universal response to a new appointment is typically "yep, that was a good choice" no matter where on the political spectrum you are.
So in the US perhaps the ABA and other bodies could select the candidate?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @02:22AM
lol Harriet Myers
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday September 28 2020, @03:27AM (2 children)
Much like how it's done with the US Supreme Court, I see. Also, be aware that there's a large conflict of interest between those legal professional bodies and the interpretation of law. There are many ways to generate business from the rulings of a court.
Hell no. Only if we get to elect the membership of the ABA would it even start to make sense.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Monday September 28 2020, @03:33AM (1 child)
Unless I'm missing something, it's more or less the opposite of how it's done in the US. Here, it's the consensus of the legal community and other groups that makes the choice. In the US it's the President.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday September 28 2020, @09:49AM
(Score: 3, Informative) by dry on Monday September 28 2020, @02:28AM
Canada does it pretty well by only appointing Judges based on qualifications though there is a tendency to try to represent all regions. There's almost never any controversy over appointments though the last Conservative PM tried to appoint someone who wasn't qualified, by the qualifications listed in the Constitution, and ended up in a battle with the Chief Justice.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @12:23AM (2 children)
The reason why the court has been politicized is mainly because they're appointed for life and the politicians in the House and Senate are cowards. Rather than handling the public policy matters that they're supposed to handle, they kick things to the court to rule on as the justices can't removed except in extremely limited circumstances.
The problem that the GOP has started to recognize is that once on the court, there's not much that can be done to ensure that they will rule the way that the President and Senators expect. These are people who are on the court for decades in some cases and their views can evolve as they see the consequences of their past decisions come back to haunt them. They can also rule differently when the people vetting them don't care or they have a limited area where they do care.
Unfortunately, they nominees tend to be selected for being selectively incompetent on business issues. There's no basis in the constitution for constitution-free zones or for corporate personhood, but it would be tough getting nominated or confirmed if you aren't going to toe the line on those issues.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday September 28 2020, @03:30AM (1 child)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @01:48PM
The Supreme Court, POLITICIZED?
It's only the third branch of GOVERNMENT. (snicker)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @11:16AM
It's one of the bugs of the common law system: the law itself is only a pencil sketch, the judges get to do all the coloring.
In a proper system, ambiguous laws get sent back to the legislative branch for updates and clarifications. Judges don't get to reinterpret the laws-as-written for their own benefit. It's also why there's usually two houses: one to draft the legislation, and one to do QA. But hey, it's tradition [despair.com].
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 27 2020, @09:36PM (8 children)
It, in fact, did used to require more than a simple majority. 60 votes, in fact. Harry Reid (D-NV) eliminated that requirement to push through some federal judge appointments for Obama. Subsequently, Mitch McConnell (R-KY) extended that to Supreme Court.
Dems never seem to think ahead about what violating norms does. Game theory tit-for-tat would have made that progression of events obvious to predict (in fact, it was widely predicted when Reid made use of his nuclear option). They always seem to think they're on the verge of being the single party in a single party state, and are ensconced firmly in a bubble that reinforces that belief.
That's why I have no trouble expecting that the Dems will follow through on the court packing threats. Not necessarily soon, but in the mid-term it's bound to happen. The problem will be what happens after that. The Repubs will follow suit as soon as they get the opportunity to, and no one will trust the court anymore, undermining about the only part of the federal government that's still widely respected.
And before I get accused of TDS, I should point out I only vote third party.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 27 2020, @09:59PM (5 children)
I only vote third party.
To the democrats, that is a traitorous vote for Trump. This is why why they make so many enemies. They are like the Islamists in their demand for absolute fidelity
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 27 2020, @10:37PM (2 children)
Republicans are now White ISIS, Y'all Qaeda, the Western version of religious extremists happy to subvert democracy and violently force their religious viewpoints upon others.
They are the white terrorists, a danger to freedom everywhere.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @12:11AM (1 child)
Yeah, and despite all that, why isn't anybody pulling out way ahead? What the fuck is up with that?!
(Score: 2) by driverless on Monday September 28 2020, @01:00AM
It's all a vast conspiracy, but it's a really badly run conspiracy with everyone conspiring together to do different things.
Uhh, hang on a minute, there's something not quite right there...
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @06:46PM (1 child)
Tired propaganda. Projection as usual from conservative nutters who squeal with glee about insing tyranny just so they can pwn da libs. Has to be the most pathetic political display in history.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 03 2020, @12:56AM
conservative nutters
Yeah! the ones that run the democrat party!
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @02:25AM (1 child)
You forget this was after years of the Senate refusing to let any judges through, saving them up for the next Republican president.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 29 2020, @06:36PM
But THAT was only because more people vote Democrat which is just soooo unfair! /s
(Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 27 2020, @10:56PM (4 children)
Oh sure she's competent, it's her ability to remain impartial and follow the law that's at question. Her writings and her record as a judge suggest she can't, which is exactly why the right loves her so much. The last thing they want is someone who is both impartial and competent.
If this goes through, the only remedy will be to take the senate, presidency, and keep the house. Once all three are in Democratic hands, it's time to go beyond nuclear into antimatter-warhead territory: nuke the filibuster, add 4 seats to the supreme court, admit DC as a state and possibly Puerto Rico. Hell, if Guam leans left, offer them statehood too. Consider expanding the size of the house just enough that tiny conservative states like Wyoming and the Dakotas still only have one rep while California and New York gain a lot more.
The whole problem is right now the Republican Party is a tyranny of the minority. They are not at all representative of the portion of the demographic who votes for them, they have far too much power than they should have. The reason for this is all the large states with tiny populations that tend to vote for them. Because of how the electoral collage works, voters in those states have a higher proportion of political power than the large states when it comes to picking the president and controlling the senate. Everyone is supposed to be equal, and the constitutions was designed to defend AGAINST a tyranny of the majority, not ENABLE a tyranny of the minority. The measures I mentioned will also overbalance things to a point where depending on democratic cohesion and if they get pulled as far to the left as republicans have to the right, we MIGHT end up with a tyranny of the majority. What I think will happen tho is once these measures are in place, democrats will lose that cohesion because they just don't have the same inherent aptitude for unity that the republicans do. Right now Democrats are pissed off and rightly so. There have been multiple elections in recent memory where their candidate won the popular vote but lost the electoral vote, and the same is true in the senate.
Republicans are god at exactly one thing: holding themselves in power. They are incompetent when it comes to governing. They say they want a government that's small but they want to control the reproductive freedoms of women, tell gays they cant be together in marriage, force trans people to live against their own identity, and keep racial disparity going. They say they want fiscal responsibility, but then they add tons and tons more to the defense budget while cutting things that the future of the country depends on like education and health care. What they really want is a government that's small.... if you're rich as hell. Their tax policies going back decades evidence this. Ever seen the hockey stick graph? Take the incomes of average people vs rich people and graph them. From the mid 20th century until Reagan's term, both were going up proportionally. Everyone was getting richer. After that? The line for average people flattens, while the line for the rich curves sharply upwards like a hockey stick. The relative income of average people has remained the same since the 80s while prices keep going up. And it's thanks to bullshit economics that Republicans parrot because they serve the rich exclusively.
None of this is to say Democrats are going to be very good for this country either. Some of the far lefts policies are needed, such as education and healthcare being treated as rights instead of things only the rich can properly afford. Other things that could have very dramatic consequences they don't seem to concerned about. The China problem for instance. That one is, in fact, better addressed by China Hawks on the right and is a growing threat to democracy in general. It's worrying, but I have to believe that EVENTUALLY the Democrats will pay attention to it...right?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday September 27 2020, @11:16PM (2 children)
If that's so, I'd like to hear about it instead of more talk about how you don't like the Electoral College.
She seems to have some libertarian cheerleaders (I lean that way). For example, Reason.com has posted several mostly favorable stories on her (here [reason.com], here [reason.com], here [reason.com], and here. The TL;DR is that she's voiced concern about due process in college sexual assault cases, shot down a pretty bogus claim to qualified immunity by a police detective framing a suspect, and opposes blanket firearm bans for felons (though not a qualified ban, if I understand correctly). The last article voices concern that she'll continue to support deference to some iffy law (here, assuming in law and regulation of commercial transactions that the legislature and Executive Branch knowledgeably passed it in good faith, when they wouldn't do the same for laws or regulation that challenge higher priority rights like speech or due process).
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @12:27AM (1 child)
Different AC here, but if she were competent, the GOP wouldn't have her on the list of potential nominees. A competent judge on the court would rule time and time against the projects that the GOP has been engaged in. They'd rule against the gerrymandering and the repeal of voter's rights as well as against corporate personhood. Sadly, the Democrats aren't much better in terms of their nominees these days.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @03:04AM
Why the hell is this partisan wishlist redefinition as competence being marked as insightful?
Let's just wrap this up: Parent poster thinks that judges aren't supposed to have opinions that make the parent poster cry in evening time milk.
Thank you for clarifying your position, now go back to the little table while the grown-ups chat.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 28 2020, @09:05PM
It isn't an RNC v. DNC thing.
From the very beginning the southern states said "well, that whole people thing, doesn't really mean certain people". We fought a war over it. Then ten years later they passed the dictionary act, which essentially said that all people weren't really people, they were just one player in a system split between corporations and biological persons.
The thing is, in 1789 the founders would have been acutely aware of corporate corruption. They had just fought a war over it. The revolutionary war wasn't about "taxation without representation", it was about corrupt trade regulations. John Hancock tarred an exchequer (starting the whole thing) not because they strolled up and levied a a tax. He tarred the guy because he was siezing cargo on behalf of a private international corporation with the kings blessing.
The current problems dates back to the late 1800s, just like the problems in the middle 1800's dated back to well before 1776. First because the dictionary act is an undeniably bizarre interpretation of the preamble. Second because the weight of bench law behind that one line of code, has become so onerous that is as powerful as a constitutional amendment. And because only congress can pass an amendment, that bench law is therefore extra-jurisdictional. So SCOTUS's house has been out of order for a long long time.
This should have been corrected by congress, but the American people haven't given them an adequate reason to rat on each other yet. Nore will they anytime soon, if you consider that BLM was a state managed controlled-release. The one thing you can say about racism, is that it generally isn't blamed on congressmen. Well at least not in states above the mason dixon. So who gained from those riots? Well of course the people who would have otherwise been targets of public ire! Racism isn't the biggest civil rights issue in the U.S. anymore. We've got bigger fish to fry. Oh, you thought that whole thing was genuine?
I think the other big question is whether SCOTUS has been doing due dilligence in vetting its own cases. If they had been checking for collusion they should have caught somebody by now, and locked them up. So there is some question as to whether SCOTUS is a rubber stamp mill for corporate enterprise at this point.
The movement towards fascism in this country derives from the judiciary. I'd like to blame it on congress, but SCOTUS has been covering their butts for a long long time.
In short, the judiciary ignores its own rules. Which means there are no rules. If you think the debate here is RNC v. DNC, you're wrong. DNC v. RNC is a question that never escaped the matrix.
The only people voting in a two party system in this country, are those voting for third parties.