Look folks, I’m not about to suggest that the six (groomed by) Federalist Society F**kwads on SCOTUS are about to start actually being impartial Justices instead of being increasingly extreme conservative activists. However I read an article from Slate earlier that suggests there are hints they think maybe they’ve gotten out of control. And that while we won’t like much of what they do moving forward it’s started to sink in, and even sting a bit (a tiny bit to be sure) that public opinion of them is in the toilet. Maybe their fee fees are butt-hurt enough that they want to dial things down a notch.
The author describes fairly well the chaos and the steady weakening of our institutions. The crazy that’s become a widespread infection and media’s unwillingness to tackle said crazy. I don’t need to go into it all. However many examples I could cite you could come up with more. And let’s face it, while SCOTUS was once and in fact not so long ago the most respected branch of government its approval rating in recent years has been at Congressional levels. That is NOT a good place to be.
Insulated as they are from the voters once confirmed to their lifetime appointments, and thinking so highly of themselves they have steadfastly refused to abide by the standards they demand “mere” federal judges beneath their lofty status to adhere to. That’s bad of course, but at times Justices have gotten carried away with the power they wield and frankly dismissive of the negative impact of the opinions they write and convince others to sign on to. The rot in the GOP is long-standing and even years ago when people tried to warn voters of the Federalist Society’s long-term strategic plan to take over the federal judiciary including SCOTUS with hard-core to the point of fanatical not enough people took it seriously enough. Keep in mind that of the six Republican appointees to the Court only Clarence Thomas was appointed by a President who made it into office having won the popular vote.
Democratic voters and Democratic leaning Independents didn’t make goddamned sure in 2016 that Mitch McConnell’s stunt of holding open the seat left vacant when Scalia died was filled by a Democrat. Worse, in his four years Trump got to fill not just that seat but TWO others tipping the balance of the Court. Not just tipping the balance to a solid 6-3 hard core Federalist Society minded majority but to a radically activist one! The Dobbs decision might have finally riled people up but there have been other appalling decisions as well.
From the beginning of his tenure as Chief Justice Roberts, who dreamed of a legacy in the history books that spoke glowingly of him tried to used an “incremental” approach when able to marshal fellow GOP appointees to whittle away at rights. Whittle is the operative word, at least most of the time. Sometimes even Roberts couldn’t resist taking a meat cleaver to established law and precedent, as well as Congressional intent. Citizens United is an example. So was his gutting of the Voting Right Act. In any case, McConnell’s stunt led to Gorsuch who’s surprised us a few times and Roberts himself became a too-rare ‘swing vote. Then Justice Kennedy was forced out and we got Brewski Brett and the shift was palatable. With the cynical and hypocritical addition of Barrett while voting was already underway we got what we now have and it’s been an unmitigated disaster.
Thomas and Alito had long dreamed of a court with three more Justices who unlike Roberts were as radical as they were and not willing to wait one more minute to start IMPOSING their minority views on us all. Roberts lost control, plain and simple. His legacy will never be what he’d dreamed of and worked so hard and carefully to craft. But worse from his point of view was the nosedive in approval of his beloved Court. And all that was BEFORE the ethics scandals we’ve been treated to in the news in recent months came to light! SCOTUS reputation is in tatters. RWNJ (especially “Christian” ones) are upset they aren’t moving faster to trash everything and we of course are outraged at a Court that for the first time in history has stripped away rights that were affirmed by multiple precedents.
Justices like to pretend they don’t care about public opinion but they do. Whiny OpEd pieces have been published in recent times even! So they are feeling the pressure which leads to the important question – will it make any difference. Again, neither I or the author of the article I linked to is saying we will will see significant change, but she does note that SCOTUS the branch of our government she say (I agree) poses the greatest threat to our Constitutional Democracy is showing signs of wanting to get its crazy under control:
t is the Supreme Court that soundly rejected and repudiated the Alabama Legislature’s efforts to ignore its June holding in the Voting Rights Act case. It is the Supreme Court that at least sounded, this past Tuesday, as though it wasn’t all that interested in striking down entire federal agencies as unconstitutional. This week at the Supreme Court, Justice Clarence Thomas even managed to recuse himself from a case in which he had a conflict of interest. A few weeks back, he managed to choke out an amended disclosure form.
It’s hardly a sea-change, or even significant change for that matter but the author might be on to something here. Even the crazies on the Court might have realized they got out over their skis. I’m sure at the time of the Dobbs decision they all (including Roberts) assumed that there’s be a few months of outrage, and it would die down by the next time voters headed to the polls. It hasn’t worked out that way. Not by a long shot. Attempt to roll back voting rights also have angered voters, and same with gun laws and the Court’s having provided too much cover for beyond all reason expansion of the ease of damned near anyone buying guns. Including weapons of war. Add in that another old political axiom about young people not voting, and that latter one could be very significant indeed. Especially when combined with reproductive rights.
I think it’s dawned on the GOP appointees that the GOP could pay a terrible price at the polls next year. Especially if Trump is the nominee which he might well be even if he’s convicted between now and then. He will of course appeal any conviction and be allowed out (to campaign) while on appeal. The “Red Wave” that wasn’t in 2022 might in 2024 become a Blue Wave. Even if it’s note enough to make a big enough difference in the Senate to pass an expansion of the Court from nine to say thirteen Justices, both Thomas and Alito are getting up there in age. I don’t see either resigning, not even Thomas. But Roberts will for damn sure sideline them from writing any majority opinions. And lay down the law (so to speak) on Kavanaugh and Barrett to tone things down for the time being.
The internecine warfare among GOPers on SCOTUS this coming term will be something, although they still famously keep most of their discussion and debates (and outright fights) from leaking. The crazies might be thinking they might not have a majority all that much longer and have to push for everything they can while they’ve got a 6-3 Court. On the other hand they know that fellow Republicans will pay a price, and who knows? If Democrats do make big gains next year Senate Republicans might at least entetain the idea of increasing the number of Justices. I don’t think they actually would but just NOT rejecting it out of hand would make Republican POLITICIAN’S (that’s how they act now) blood run cold.
For the moment I think the best we can hope for a baby steps – back from the brink. It may not be much but it’s something to keep an eye out for.
“Democratic voters and Democratic leaning Independents didn’t make goddamned sure in 2016 that Mitch McConnell’s stunt of holding open the seat left vacant when Scalia died was filled by a Democrat.” So I have a serious question for you Dennis and / or anyone else – please feel free to jump in. How, exactly would or could we have done that? I had the queasy feeling at the time that it was another case of us (Democrats) just being polite, taking the hight road and not making a stink about Turtle’s claim that he had the right to “let the voters decide” in an election which was 10 months away. Was there really nothing with any weight we could have done? By we of course I mean Obama and Democrats in congress. I don’t believe I’ve ever gotten an answer to this question in all this time. So anybody?
Obama could’ve gone to the public and explained McConnell’s bull (yes, then-VP Biden, as a Senator some 25 years earlier, had made a suggestion but he’d done it as a mere hypothetical exercise) but the Democrats in the Senate had no power to do much–one of the hazards of being in the minority. And when there’s an entire propaganda network spewing nothing but right-wing talking points 24/7 (aka Fox”News”) and a mainstream media that’s terrified of being called “liberal” and “biased,” it’s difficult for Democrats (aside from the President) to ever get their message out unchallenged.
Remember the coverage of the Affordable Care Act? The GOP took over and controlled the messaging while the Dems (who, in Congress, were split in their own support and Obama, for some reason, felt it wasn’t proper for him to plead his case to the people) just sat out the fight while the mainstream media kept hosting all sorts of GOP politicians and talking heads attack the ACA pretty much non-stop so it got watered down (and still faced challenges on ALL fronts for the next freaking decade).
Obama made a huge mistake by not fighting McConnell but he, like pretty much everyone else, just assumed that Hillary was going to win and she’d manage to extort McConnell into letting her nominee not just get a hearing but get on the court (the GOP may have been out for Hillary’s blood but I’ll guarantee you her years in the Senate plus her years as First Lady and then as Secretary of State put her in a position to know exactly where all the proverbial bodies were buried and all the GOP skeletons; I imagine she was just fighting to keep from excoriating those smug little GOP bastards holding their pointless hearings with every single one of their secrets, the things that they probably wouldn’t have wanted the folks back home ever hearing about). Hell, TRUMP never expected to win. Oh, he made all the expected threats but I’m pretty sure if he’d not won the electoral vote, he would’ve just gone right into campaign mode for 2020, a full month earlier than he did in reality (remember–he had barely taken the oath of office before announcing his 2020 campaign) and all his talk about “marching on DC” would’ve been nothing more than talk. (He’d have probably calmed down his supporters with something like “I didn’t mean it literally” or “The Deep State had it in for me but let’s not give them an excuse to put us in jail and we’ll take the White House in 2020 for sure.” Not that he’d have really wanted that either; it would’ve just been more grift to fleece the rubes.)
Recent history is good reason for many to panic. But even more recent history may offer some cautious optimusm. Not mentioned above is their ruling against the “Independent State Legislature Theory” which would allow GOP legislatures to go rouge. To literally send GOP electors instead of those chosen by the electorate. And the Alabama case is a pleasant surprise.
I take it you mean ‘go rogue’ (out of control) rather than ‘rouge’ (a red cosmetic for lips and cheeks)
Don’t you just love spell checkers LOL
They didn’t expect the public outrage at some of their more outrageous decisions. When FDR threatened to pack the court, the court got the message and moderated (often called The stitch in time that saved nine). Public opinion is now providing the same service, but more Democrats calling for court expansion, term limits, ethics code, etc will likely help the crazies see the light. ProPublica also deserves some recognition for exposing the unbelievable amount of corruption on the court.
“Democratic voters and Democratic leaning Independents didn’t make goddamned sure in 2016 that Mitch McConnell’s stunt of holding open the seat left vacant when Scalia died was filled by a Democrat.”
Well, you can lay the blame for that on the moronic voters who–for the previous decade–had basically pooh-poohed the whole idea that the Supreme Court was important. It was brought up in 2010; voters ignored it (and let the House flip to the GOP). It was brought up in 2012; voters ignored it (and Obama’s winning share dropped from 2008; the GOP lost seats in the House and Senate but retained the House by a significant margin). It was brought up in 2014; voters ignored it (and the GOP regained the Senate with a significant majority and retained the House, increasing their majority). And, it was THAT election that led to McConnell’s ability to keep Scalia’s seat open for a full year. And, considering the fact that the GOP retained the Senate in 2016 (with 52 seats), even if Hillary had won the White House, there is NO guarantee that McConnell would’ve ever let her appoint a replacement–he would’ve just found some new excuse to keep the seat vacant (especially as there’s no law mandating 9 Supreme Court justices). It’s possible that 2018 would’ve seen the Senate switch to Democratic control but, again, the public at large–and Democrats, more specifically–have NEVER voted in a presidential (or Senate or House) contest with the Supreme Court in mind. Even when they’ve been warned, the general feeling is “Oh, that’s just alarmist talk; the Supreme Court won’t overturn established law.”
It took altogether too long for John Q Public to understand what “projection” means in politics, even though Goebbels taught a mater class in the 30s and 40s. I remember the Good Olde Days of the Rs calling sane decisions “look, look another activist judge!!!” You’re right, no one was listening in 2016 – I kept saying “…but the Supreme Court…” to anyone in hearing range, but nooo…
Other than the difficulty of “packing the court” it would appear to be valid to consider how they get away with their shenanigans: get some lawsuits going, now if not yesterday, that will get to a future SC that will serve to gut Citizens United and reestablish Roe (unless Congress turns D and writes the damn law already!).
In addition, as part of my fantasy in-my-head screenplay of how this all plays out, Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro are leaving the Oval Office and enter the Halls of Congress, while they are discussing just how they are going to explain to McTurtle that McConnell will be the one to explain to Alito and Clarence that they both have to go because of, cough, cough, ethics things. If they don’t… Reminds me of those photographs of Kennedy before he, ahem…gracefully retired. Gee, has his son straightened out those loan details yet?
Time to play some behind the scenes hardball…It’s either that or Chief Justice Gym Jordan up next.
Time to consider term limits, or maybe requiring “Subprime Court” justices be reconfirmed every decade or so.