The White House is able to pitch the media the idea that demanding the recusal of a SCOTUS Justice who, prior to her elevation to the Court, advocated for legislation she will be asked to rule on, is a right-wing political ploy — and the media doesn’t instantly break out into hysterical laughter.
We are so over.
That’s only the end if the media are the Gatekeepers. It ain’t necessarily so.
It could be that this is how you know your mainstream media has come to an end.
There’s a thing. Herman Cain, I’m hearing said, knows his past. So, I think, with Kagan (or any Justice or Judge who faces the question of recusal). What we have on the record isn’t the record, that is, the record as Kagan knows it. Nor is what is now on the record the limit of what will come to be on the record. Which, I guess, is why the decision is particularly left up to the individual, who has to decide, will I be honest and decide appropriately, or dishonestly and be found out later?
Therein lies the rub. I think we can be assured that the contemporary media will run cover for her and the academics will sanitize the historical record.
So a lefty with no scruples has no secondary reason (being found out) to do the right thing.
I heard that there were internal discussions amongst the Justices about Kagan and Thomas both recusing themselves.
That sounds like a trap leigh. They announce it and then Kagan says she never agreed to it, leaving Thomas looking nakedly political if he recants.
Again, people with scruples/conscience wouldn’t do that, but the ends always justify the means for a lefty and they can be assured of protection on their flanks from the press and academia.
It is disgusting. But in terms of this particular vote probably will not make a difference, other than showing how partisan and corrupt the court has become. They are going to need a majority to over turn Obamacare. A four four tie goes to keeping Obamacare. Even with Kagan off, they need Kennedy to do it. In a weird way, this may make Kennedy more likely to do the right thing and vote it down.
And if it is a case of them both recusing or both not, I’ll take them both for no other reason than getting Thomas’ opinion onto the record whether it be with the majority or minority.
It is not like Elena Kagan is having an affair with Lawrence Tribe. They are just friends with benefits.
Mere reality will NOT be allowed to interfere with The Narrative!
Perhaps, though only if given the assumption that no change of party can ever come to pass. Otherwise, what’s to stop new occupants of the DoJ from revealing what they find? Though again, one might say, well, the Obama DoJ will destroy all and any documentation before leaving power. But this action too would be subject to scrutiny.
sdferr, I agree that is what should happen, but I am not optimistic it would happen. Even if she is found out to be blatantly compromised two years from now, I think it a fools bet to hope congress would take any action against her.
Why the hell would Thomas recuse himself? He didn’t campaign for the legislation. He wasn’t part of the team that wrote it.
Kagan was.
Where did you hear this? It’s pure Kos-level BS.
I’m just trying to look at the question seriously from Kagan’s point of view iron308. What she knows she knows, held up against what she may believe she can slip through with. It’s a risk analysis, in a sense, though it doesn’t have to be. That is, on the alternative, she could simply do the right thing for the right reasons with no worries as to risks from whatever quarter. But should we think, in her shoes, of depending on the external (uncontrollable!) actions of the press or her former colleagues at DoJ, I submit we’d be justly cautious putting our fate in other’s hands, were we in her place.
Crawford, They are trying to create a conflict with Thomas’ wife. It is BS but that justifies in their minds Kagan staying in (I guess).
I know the pravda that’s being pushed, Joe. But who’s saying there are discussions inside the Supremes?
If there are discussions and they aren’t going: Kagan: “I will if you will.” Thomas: “Shut up, you ignorant whore.” then I’ll be seriously disappointed.
I’m saying now there aren’t discussion within chambers linking the two questions. What could possibly be more political than such a linkage? And why would any non-party Justice stand to witness that? That ain’t happening.
sdferr, we agree people could do the right thing for the right reasons. I am not sanguine regarding the average lefty statist doing the right thing for the right reason.
However, 1-I do not expect her to do the right thing, 2-from her (and my) perspective, she can assign a lower risk factor to being found out AND a lower risk factor to any negative result from being found out. She can assign those lower risk factors because, in my view, she can ‘reasonably’ expect her fellow travelers in the press, in government, entertainment, in academia, in union halls, colin powell, lindsey graham, etc, etc, to give her cover regardless the weight of her conflict.
You or I or anyone not accepted by those same fellow travelers, needs a much brighter, much wider line of separation from any supposed conflict. In other words, if we were of a mind not to do the right thing for the right reason, we would have to assign a much higher risk factors to being found out and the resulting punishment.
Why is it that Kagan is to recuse herself? Because she was personally in favor of ObamaCare?
Why is it that Thomas is being asked to recuse himself? Because his wife profited from advocating against ObamaCare?
Based on boilerplate ethics language, there is a stronger case for Thomas to recuse himself, based on the profit of an immediate family member.
The question remains as to whether both jurists can bifurcate their personal biases from the issue of constitutionality of the individual mandate.
I guess I differ as to her “reasonable” expectations of people and events outside her control, at least to the extent that she intends to continue to be perceived as upright, no matter what events may unfold or how, what documents may come to light, what conversations held, etc.
For my money, and I think for hers, trusting to the “cover” provided by others is a conspiracy-entailed view of the world too far from probability, or to put it more baldly, too far from reality. There’s simply too much that can go wrong, strictly speaking, under the hypothetical posit (if and only if, in other words) that there are in fact and to her knowledge documents and potential testimony exposing her deep involvement in ObamaCare damning any participation in deciding the issue on the Court she might undertake and rightly demanding her recusal.
But again, these are things I think she best knows (or any Judge would best know of their own circumstances), and for that matter, would be expected to think through for her own well being, nevermind the interests of the nation itself.
“Based on boilerplate ethics language, there is a stronger case for Thomas to recuse himself, based on the profit of an immediate family member.”
How is Thomas going to profit by ruling on this now? That seems to be the question, if your looking at it as a money factor.
I also don’t think Kagan should recuse herself either, if it’s just a matter of her being personally in favor of ObamaCare.
Which brings us to sdferrs line of thinking.
Is that all it was?
Kagan was involved in fashioning earlier responses to legal challenges (eg., she was in the loop on Landmark Legal’s having noted it was prepared to contest the Slaughter Rule, if used). Alternately, Thomas is not his wife.
Easy peasy. The law is clear. But your attempt to appear disinterested and objective is noted.
Was it not Kagans job at the Whitehouse to craft responses to legal challenges prior to her nomination? How does that rise to the need for recusal.
Re:Thomas. Most boilerplate ethics language does in fact mention immediate family members who are paid to push a particular issue that may find itself being heard by the highest court in the land.
On October 21, 2010, Thomas was specifically criticized for taking a position, via Liberty Central, on an issue that was likely to come before the Supreme Court – whether the 2010 health care legislation was unconstitutional.[7] A memo signed by Thomas that called for the repeal of the law and that was posted on the Liberty Central website was removed following the criticism. A Liberty Central spokesperson explained that Thomas had not personally reviewed the memo and that it been mistakenly approved by a staff member, and had been circulated by another group, the Conservative Action Project.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_Central
“But your attempt to appear disinterested and objective is noted.”
Will it go in my permanent file?
Crawford, I doubt there are any discussions between the actual Supremes on Kagan or Thomas recusing themselves. There is no motion on the topic, so isn’t it up to the individual justices to determine this on their own. There may be some clerks debating the issue over beers–but I doubt that too. But at this stage I am assuming that Kagan may be dicussing it with her cleaks to see if they can figure out a way she can justify this bullshit and get in on the action.
Because when she was being vetted she told the Senate she’d been sequestered.
Emails show she is a lying liar.
Is how it rises to the need for recusal. Or perhaps you think the GOP was happy to put someone who was working on arguments for the legality of the mandate on the SCOTUS in preparation for the ultimate decision on whether the mandate is legal?
bt thinks statist vs antistatist is not important when interpreting an an antistatist document.
@24 if she perjured herself, as you say, why hasn’t she been impeached?
@25 I have no idea what you are talking about.
Because everyone knows that it’s okay for Democrats to lie to Congress.
“why hasn’t she been impeached?”
harry reid geez this stuff ain’t rocket science. @25 yea a progg’s goin’ to defend individual liberty. you could post at otb.
Last i heard articles of impeachment start in the house.
Unless there are no grounds for impeachment, like she wasn’t under oath when she told her lying lies. But even so, the trial would take place in the Senate and that would be when they could vote against the bill of impeachment. Maybe public pressure would be such that she would resign because of the conflation between perjury and lying.
NR are you saying that there is a litmus test for what is allowed to be posted on these comment pages, and are you one of the ones who grades the test?
“NR are you saying that there is a litmus test for what is allowed to be posted on these comment pages, and are you one of the ones who grades the test?”
i ain’t the owner ax him. my prob is you don’t see an obamacrat who pushed obamacare being seated on the scotus. sumtimes being “even handed” is the height of cluelessness.
You can’t decide a case that you’re clearly not impartial on. If you’ve touched the thing to be decided before, you recuse.
I’m more concerned about what the Tribe email shows than any zealous advocacy on the part of her client back when she was the Government’s lawyer.
I haven’t seen any evidence that BT is a “progg”, nr.
I also agree that Kagan should recuse herself, but when this subject was touched upon a week ago or so, there is no remedy if she refuses to do so. I think that whether or not Justice Thomas is tainted by his wife’s work is also a legitimate question. Who is an attorney around here? Where’s Mikey?
“I haven’t seen any evidence that BT is a “progg”, nr. ”
you don’t do reading comprehension
“@25 yea a progg’s goin’ to defend individual liberty.”
Reverse the roles for a second: Would anyone seriously argue the Kagan needs to recuse herself because her spouse made money working for a group opposed to the particular legislation that’s come before the Court? That’s rather sexist, isn’t it?
I don’t think so, Ernst. Conflict of intrest is conflict of interest, no?
Ginny (sp?) Thomas’s interests determine Clarence’s? What? You think she won’t put out for him if the ruling goes the wrong way?
NO no no. Isn’t there some sort of guideline (for lack of a better word) about whether family members are employeed or receiving some sort of financial gain (I assume their funds are co-mingled) from that employment?
No. And she no longer works for Heritage, so there would be no financial interest for Thomas anyway.
That is if there were one to begin with, which is an awfully big stretch. It’s not as if Heritage exists to oppose O-care.
I was unclear about whether or not she still worked at Heritage.
I’m not certain, but think this is the relevant bit in Kagan’s instance of the Code of Conduct for US Judges:
As to the questions about J. Thomas (which I think haven’t any merit), read at the code.
@30 She was seated on SCOTUS because she was nominated by the President and approved by the Senate, a Senate that was well aware of the work she did while in the executive branch.
When did the emails come out? Before or after she was confirmed?
Code of Conduct for United States Judges
“To be fair, what Breyer and Kennedy said was that the justices do abide by the federal judiciary’s ethical code. They just do so voluntarily.”
from here
Which basically means that if Kagan is pushed to recuse, then Thomas will be pushed to recuse, and neither of them has to do it.
And of course the larger lesson is that control of the Senate is just as important as control of the executive, so that liars don’t get confirmed.
Which basically means that if Kagan is pushed to recuse, then Thomas will be pushed to recuse, and neither of them has to do it.
That’s the way I had interpreted it. I don’t see anyone stepping aside.
Control of the Senate doesn’t mean as much as you might think when your guys play “you get the consideration you give” (aka “we beez nice to them if they beez nice to us gollum!“) and their guys play “you get the consideration we think you deserve (just as we get the consideration we think we deserve).”
After.
Right, neither of them has to do it. Their only obligation is moral, not legal.
here
The tea party group mentioned is Liberty Central
@45 maybe the senators this time around will have learned their lesson and not build an alternate route to K street.
@43
“@30 She was seated on SCOTUS because she was nominated by the President and approved by the Senate, a Senate that was well aware of the work she did while in the executive branch. ”
the harry reid senate that hasn’t passed a budget in almost 3 years? i don’t argue with clueless.
@47
“The tea party group mentioned is Liberty Central”
bolster your junk citing nyt. you go grrrrl
Oh, stop. You cite the NYT all the time.
all you can do is mock at this point. bj Don’t Stop Believing
I’m male. And the NYT article checks out. The facts stated are in fact factual.
“You cite the NYT all the time.”
you’re a fucking liar troll
“I’m male. And the NYT article checks out. ”
prove it. and by whom?
what’s worse romneybots or obamabots or maybe perrybots?
You just did yesterday, nr. You cited an article by Ross Dou-something about the cult of the Kennedy’s. You misrepresented it, too, since it did not take any whacks at the Kennedy’s and devolved into Reagan bashing.
Troll, eh? Sober up.
@55 I don’t need to prove anything to you. You made the charge you back it up. Donald knows me in real life.
re the rest
http://www.ajc.com/news/nation-world/generosity-to-clarence-thomas-1234525.html
“You just did yesterday, nr. You cited an article by Ross Dou-something about the cult of the Kennedy’sYou misrepresented it, too, since it did not take any whacks at the Kennedy’s and devolved into Reagan bashing.”
oh fuck you troll.
What if this scenario involved a mixed marriage? Kinda like say Carville and Matalin? Would anyone question whether Carville (gag) could be impartial based on his wife’s advocacy? Or is the fact that both Thomas and Thomas are on supposedly on the same side of the issue that is the problem? I can’t believe any prog would argue that Carville should recuse in that instance… and that is total politik BS.
Says more to me about the thinkings of the proggies that they expect the wife to either kowtow to her husband or her husband to kowtow to his wife. Either way they are espousing a relationship that is 180 degrees at odds with their lip flapping about equality in marriage. Again, politik BS.
“You made the charge you back it up.”
another fucking troll using cynthia tuckers’ ajc. you clowns move on . org
too bad bj and leigh can’t get together for bjleigh
Oh for pete’s sake. What gets into you this time of night? The Penguins are on.
you’re a dishonest loser ms. leigh
leigh jg in drag
@60 of course it is possible that Thomas is quite capable of independent thought.
That isn’t the point. The point is that both justices have the appearance of impropriety (prejudice) either by prior actions or associations. Basically all that means is whatever side loses will have a chip to play with when the whining commences.
Wow. I love how some on “our” side are willing to ride the moral equivalency train just so they can tell themselves how considered is their opinion. Here’s who believes the Crow story an ethics problem. Find the common denominator.
I don’t know much about law. If asking questions about a SCOTUS recusal because I don’t understand the law is problematic, I’m sorry to learn that.
“. The point is that both justices have the appearance of impropriety (prejudice) either by prior actions or associations. Basically all that means is whatever side loses will have a chip to play with when the whining commences.”
statists vs antistatists in interpreting an antistatist document(US Constitution) idiot
Would the Crow association be a problem if Thomas had sided with the majority in kelo v. new london?
“Would the Crow association be a problem if Thomas had sided with the majority in kelo v. new london?”
how much do you want to lynch the nigger bj? you be sorry about missing the 1924 klanbake?
Re: Kagan. Read here, and the follow-ups.
Is being a statist a disqualification for the office of Justice of the Supreme Court?
Could you point to the relevant section of the constitution that states that it is?
lynch the nigger? are you to be taken seriously?
That seems to have broken three whole days after Weiner, the leading Thomas attack poodle, uh… went down. Surely, it’s just a coinkydink.
And appearance is truth, perception is reality. A pox on both their houses. It’s a cycle of violence. I say we need compromise. Can’t we all just get along?
“Is being a statist a disqualification for the office of Justice of the Supreme Court?”
yes
I’d say the fact that a statist can’t honestly take an oath to uphold the Constitution — because it is itself anti-statist by design and intent — counts as a disqualification.
“lynch the nigger? are you to be taken seriously?”
yea democrats used to do it all the time. the naacp tells us but hides the word democrat. go 1924 klanbake starring sen. byrd from wva
More here. And be sure to look at the documents and memo from Judicial Crisis Network (linked as pdf files).
Thank you for the links, Jeff. There are enough bad actors here for a Shekespeare play.
*shakespeare* sheesh
define statist, just so i am on the same page as you.
We should just drop the whole appeal and hold hands and sing songs. Why fight? Let’s all be happy!
A statist believes in an expanded and elevated role for the federal government, one explicitly prohibited by the Constitution. To achieve their ends, they reject federalism and ignore 9th and 10th amendments as if they don’t exist, while arguing for a method of Constitutional interpretation that must reject originalism as a principle.
They are leftists, in short.
“define statist, just so i am on the same page as you.”
too little too late
The liberal justices cancel out the conservative ones, so yeah, let’s just let the thing ride. It’s the most fairest way. I mean, everybody has a right to an opinion, and who’s to say who is right and who is wrong? God? I haven’t heard from him lately, so all opinions are equally valid.
That’s what democracy looks like.
” define “dead armadillos” just so i’m on the same page as you” language and intent
Would the war on drugs be considered a statist program?
or the interstate highway system?
See Thomas’ opinion in McDonald v. Chicago.
#89 Yes.
#90 That is an explicitly enumerated power of the federal government, so no.
“Would the war on drugs be considered a statist program?”
yes next question
“or the interstate highway system?”
no see the constitution
Jeff Your JCN pdf has some interesting arguments. If recusal is in fact triggered by 28 U.S.C. §455(b)(3)what is the enforcement mechanism?
“If recusal is in fact triggered by 28 U.S.C. §455(b)(3)what is the enforcement mechanism?”
personal honor idiot. you proggs don’t do dat
Just wondering here if the charge “appearance of impropriety” rises to the level of seriousness.
@96 and if the subject has no honor, then what?
name-calling? slurs tsk tsks?
it’s the most wonderful time
of the year
The better question in the context of the Supreme Court is does custom (in this case stare decisis and existing jurisprudence (Wickard and all it’s thistles) regarding both the “Commerce clause” and the Neccessary and Proper clause” to override the rest of the Constitution?
Only Anthony Kennedy knows for sure.
“@96 and if the subject has no honor, then what?”
then the bitch rules and has no honor. you effin’ proggs are losers bt. also almonds for the win.
There really is none. If a justice isn’t shamed, we live under judicial oligarchy. Rule by unimpeachable, politicized philosopher kings and queens.
That is, unless some “extremists” decide that the Court doesn’t hold supreme power, but is rather one of the branches of govt.
Is that plan B or plan C?
Maybe next time we’ll get it right.
We Three Kings
We already had it right. We lost it the moment we decided to let language control us, rather than the other way around.
the congress can take away alot of power if we want that. but all we have is johnny cry baby.
We built this city on the Frankfurt School of rock and roll.
@107 So whats the plan to get it back to right?
@110 This. And this.
dated We Built This City
Smartest President evuh!
Occupy LA and Police live video from helicopter here.
And here.
Are they having a set-to geoffb? Or what’s up?
Supposedly the police are going to evict them tonight. Reports are there are 900 cops. Hard to tell what is happening as it’s nighttime. Crowds milling about in the street. Saw them shooting of Roman candles earlier.
After living through the late 60s and things like the Detroit riots where they brought in the National Guard with tanks and had sandbagged machine-gun emplacements at intersections these things look like the farce version. A play by people who think they want the real thing but they really, really don’t.
I just heard a News helicopter observer say the roman candles or mortar style fireworks may have been intentionally aimed at a police helicopter, which this fellow says flies much lower than the news helicopters.
I have the sound turned off as Anne is listening to something else but I figured that was what they were doing too.
“We Built This City” figures prominently in the new Muppet movie.
I thought of you all as I heard it.
Wil Wheaton (@wilw) is mad because the LAPD told some reporters they could cover the event and others didn’t.
Ok.
That prefaced every BT remark for me from the top of the page, in a game-over,-pal kinda way. So these came as no surprise:
This has been answered, but yes, barring drugs of the kind composing a national threat, the bullshit thing is evidently statist. Of course it is. Look at its institutions, scope, and reach. As are national or nationalized anything statist by effect and nearly always cause, as far as my reading of constitutional intents and purposes go.
No. Being it’s a valid and necessary component of national defense.
So, a statist lies when taking the oath to uphold the Constitution. That is the premise here. And it holds and always shall, provided the damn Constitution is written in English for cause and reason.
Was it? Is it?
Jesus JHo, what are you smoking? The Constitution was written in the Eighteenth Century in late post-Shakespearean middle modern English. My God man, don’t you know that s,f,j and i, all more or less looked alike? And besides, it was written by slave-owners who thought African-colonials were only 3/5s human!
If that isn’t the appearance of impropriety rising to the level of a serious charge, I don’t know what is. Hell, it probably rises to the level of grave! How can you expect the illuminati of this enlightened age to keep faith with that?!?
Barbarian
@96 and if the subject has no honor, then what?”
Lucky them, that can absolve themselves of responsibility for their deeds without a metric for their behavior. The rest of us must slog on knowing our word is the only thing that separates us from chaos.
OK I’m done.
Perhaps it was over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor.
The funny thing, Ernst, is that sarcasm aside there may be another point in there. The Constitution is, in my view, quite obsolete all these decades later. I’ll be the first classical liberal to claim so.
Following a flurry of right-minded amending reinforcements to the bulwarks of personal sovereignty many years ago, the thing has become fairly abandoned as far as what might have been. If instead of constantly eroding it, what if we’d spent those intervening decades perfecting and then constitutionally enshrining and codifying those liberties instead of lying through our teeth as to what the document’s original intent was?
In this light a shirked duty is seen to have allowed this precious opportunity to go to the waste it obviously has. We had nearly a quarter thousand years to research our history and that of the globe’s and to take the unique opportunity gifted us to add to and confirm the Constitution’s constitutionality.
But instead we lapsed. Hard. We obsoleted the thing. On a planet of what we should wisely assume are takers and usurpers, we let our founding premise turn so moldy that we can barely find it anymore. We define it by way of what we can severely warp it to say. Threads like this abound, wherein it’s somehow controversial to grasp and then support — what had once been to our last breath — what we say we cherish.
This spiritual malaise informs our entire political landscape, where instead of rightly labeling socialism for the statism it is, we insist that it’s quasi-conservative centrism. From there, that the GOP, of all things, is rightwing. And from there that originalism is radical fascism and actual fascism on the left is proud independent reform.
Yeah, the Constitution is obsolete, if for no other reason than we can’t even define it properly anymore. Imagine what we could have had had we the integrity, courage and conviction to comprehend our place in history and insist that we’d always and forever hold that ground by solidifying structurally then what we’ve allowed to become so eroded by now.
Which would have evidenced itself in preventative measures made to our founding structure instead of a patchwork of fleeting, last-hour reforms patched in around the edges…being labeled by our official organs of truth as wrong and improper and the work of hillbillies intent on starving all the needy minority women.
Which we buy. And that in a land where not a single major federal program does anything but go impossibly upside down while impairing its own stated aim.
Damn, if that doesn’t enlighten us, what will?