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Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died yesterday.
Hopefully she will be replaced by a Gen X Justice, as Boomers make terrible Supreme Court Justices.
At least this will provide an opportunity to correct the leftward drift of the Court, though I wish that were happening by Roberts being replaced instead.
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Rest in Peace, indeed. Pancreatic cancer is horrible.
Now for the political manifestations: I expect President Trump to force upon us one of his judicial stooges, someone who believes something as diametrically opposed to what Ruth Bader Ginsburg stood for as is possible.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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(09-19-2020, 02:34 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: Rest in Peace, indeed. Pancreatic cancer is horrible.
Now for the political manifestations: I expect President Trump to force upon us one of his judicial stooges, someone who believes something as diametrically opposed to what Ruth Bader Ginsburg stood for as is possible.
Are the candidates now being mentioned those to replace RBG, or the resignation of one of the other justices. Earlier this week Thom Hartmann did a piece on the state of SCOTUS today with the implication that it may be being hijacked in a way. While in school I learned that the reason the body has an odd number is so there could never be a tie vote. And the reason they were appointed for life terms expiring only upon death or resignation was supposedly so that politics wouldn't enter the picture. We all know now that this happens anyway.
Such would no doubt require constitutional amendment, but might be beneficial to throw out the idea as to whether we should move to an elected SCOTUS, just like most states do it.
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Donald Trump got the one lasting influence upon American political life, and it would remain even if he died: he nominated three Justices to the Supreme Court who can be expected to remain on it for at least twenty years. He chose them more for fitting an ideology than for judicial wisdom (OK, political extremists recognize agreement with them as wisdom). "Barf" Kavanaugh may be a laughing stock, but he may be around until his liver impeaches him.
Hyper-partisanship is much of the fault in American political life, but even at that such results more from one side going to the extreme. We know how that goes.
Obviously most of the decisions of the US Supreme Court have not fit the values of the masses. Legal process is inherently conservative in that legal precedents are not to be toppled unless a severe fault exists; thus Brown v. Board of Education decided that the concept of "separate but equal" (Plessy v. Ferguson) was without logical basis because separation involving the politically-powerless could never be equal. The USSC has been on the avant-garde on some issues, typically on race and on reproductive rights. If of course the avant-garde is the idea that he who owns the gold makes the rules, then the USSC can be in the avant-garde (Citizens United, which decided that unaccountable "dark money" has as much right to influence politics as candidates themselves). Know well that should America morph into a pure and absolute plutocracy in which workers are consigned to hereditary peonage,then such a decision as Citizens United was the avant-garde for such.
An assumption was that the Senate would represent the States and optimally their wisest, most senior pols who had become aware of the importance of foreign policy and the judiciary and exempt from the siren of partisanship. The fault was that when the State legislators selected Senators they ended up with partisan hacks who had long and meritorious service for political machines. Elected? The Great State of Wisconsin elected such notable figures as Joseph R. McCarthy and Ron Johnson, and that is before I mention such Senators from "Kukluxistan" as have emerged.
It may be simple coincidence that one one-term President (Carter) nominated nobody to the Supreme Court and the far-worse Donald Trump could push three through a bare majority that operated in authoritarian lockstep.
It's up to us Americans to reject demagogues, shysters, sadists, and extremists (those who are one are often the others) in all elections.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
