The Supreme Court....

[Suckrates]

 

Already hard at work.... FOR THE REPUBLICANS....

As it shuts down Gov Cuomos request to limit attendance in NYC houses of worship amid SOARING Covid-19 numbers...  Good work guys !

Next up:  Box vs Henderson, and discrimination against the rights of same sex PARENTS.....   You know they'll pass that shit...those Repuglican assholes just love that shit against Gays !  

Amy Conjob Barrett is doing EXACTLY what we knew she would, putting her personal views BEFORE the law....  And Kavanaugh went right along, just licking her pussy the whole time....

[stevenkesslar]

America’s Captured Courts

SHELDON WHITEHOUSE

I assume this is part of Sen. Whitehouse's job interview for Ranking Minority Member (dare I say Chair?) of the Senate Judiciary Committee.  If it is, I say give him the job.  I like Dick Durbin.  But he's got plenty of other fish to fry.

I also like the idea of making the case that SCOTUS is now becoming the best court money can buy.  What I really like is giving the Federal Society SCOTUS appointees the opportunity to prove they were appointed to be the best Justices [sic] money could buy.

Quote

The result of this scheme is a disturbing record of decisions favoring an array of special interests. Over the course of Chief Justice John Roberts’s tenure, the Court has delivered 80 partisan 5-4 decisions that benefit identifiable Republican donor interests. Some of the more flagrant and damaging decisions – like the infamous 2010 Citizens United ruling that paved the way for unlimited dark money spending in elections – drew public ire. But most have gone unnoticed, as when the Court quietly undermined Americans’ access to civil juries or weakened the independence of regulatory agencies.

In order for such a strategy to make sense, there actually have to be 80 specific decisions where "identifiable Republican donor interests" can in fact be identified.  More important, there have to be lots of decisions like this moving forward.  Republicans will argue that these rulings of course have nothing, nothing, nothing to do with money.  Just like they are now arguing it was mathematically impossible for Joe Biden to win the 2020 election.  Let them.  Their arguments are almost self-defeating.

Most of the "process" arguments in that article don't make sense, and could backfire.  Democrats will look like hypocrites if they try to make a case about money in politics, or attacks ads.  Ain't it awful?  But they do have a case about fat cats and corporate special interests.  I'd frame it all around the sad reality that SCOTUS is just returning to the purpose it has served for much of US history.  Which is to be the court of last resort for the rich and powerful.

I think Democrats could use this the way Republicans used Obamacare.  There was a big payoff to Republicans in 2010, right after Obamacare passed.  And in 2014, right as it was implemented.  So we won't have that.  In fact, my guess is that Rich Mitch and The Divine Miss Graham calculated that a SCOTUS fight would help them at the margin in red states, just like it did in 2018.  If they made such a calculation, they were likely correct.  But their victory now sets Democrats up to let SCOTUS be the non-stop drip drip drip that Obamacare was for maybe 8 years, until 2018.  If Whitehouse is right, there will be dozens of opportunities to keep reminding people that SCOTUS is the best court money can buy for Republican special interests.  It's a little bit like the Trump Presidency itself.  Yes, he won - kinda, sorta, maybe - in 2016.  But everything since then was this annoying drip drip drip and rant rant rant and tweet tweet tweet that converted Republicans to Democrats and drove everyone to the polls.  Granted, Justice Rapist is no Donald Trump.  But their rulings can be used as a constant reminder that if you don't like government by the rich and powerful elite, you have to vote, vote, and vote.

Such a strategy would also make it just a little harder for SCOTUS to go after the big game, like abortion and voting rights and Citizens United and LGBTQ protections.  The argument should be that pandering to corrupt special interests is a pre-existing condition for judges who were hand-picked by The Federalist Society to serve the people who hired them.  If people have heard that 30 times, they are more likely to believe it when SCOTUS makes a major ruling.   Roberts and his fellow conservatives are not stupid.  It will make them more likely to use shovels rather than bulldozers to dig their own political graves.