Perhaps a billionaire hosting a Supreme Court Justice in his own home for pot roast is all fine and dandy as Justice Thomas Thomas insists. I suppose public servants do not give up the rights to friendships as a result of their service, although new reporting by CNN and ProPublica reveals that Clarence Thomas’ circle of “friendly” conservative billionaires is much wider than previously understood.
In addition to his mensch Harlan Crow, whom we have already read is reported to have treated Thomas to many luxury “vacation, flights, and gifts”, as well as purchasing his mother’s home while allowing her to continue to live in it, a wider circle of billionaire benefactors have enriched the Thomas’s downtime lifestyle during his tenure.
“During his three decades on the Supreme Court, Clarence Thomas has enjoyed steady access to a lifestyle most Americans can only imagine. A cadre of industry titans and ultrawealthy executives have treated him to far-flung vacations aboard their yachts, ushered him into the premium suites at sporting events and sent their private jets to fetch him — including, on more than one occasion, an entire 737. It’s a stream of luxury that is both more extensive and from a wider circle than has been previously understood.
Like clockwork, Thomas’ leisure activities have been underwritten by benefactors who share the ideology that drives his jurisprudence. Their gifts include:
At least 38 destination vacations, including a previously unreported voyage on a yacht around the Bahamas; 26 private jet flights, plus an additional eight by helicopter; a dozen VIP passes to professional and college sporting events, typically perched in the skybox; two stays at luxury resorts in Florida and Jamaica; and one standing invitation to an uber-exclusive golf club overlooking the Atlantic coast.“
How nice! I don’t know about you, but it is a comfort to me knowing that the SCOTUS justice perhaps most devoted to upending a woman’s right to choose, stifling affirmative action and curtailing voting rights does not want for recreational activities.
And who are these newly reported billionaire patriotically insuring that Thomas is well rested from his exertions at screwing the 99% of us who cannot afford to sail him around in the Bahamas, you ask?
ProPublica dishes:
“The New York Times recently surfaced VIP treatment from wealthy businessmen he met through the Horatio Alger Association, an exclusive nonprofit. Among them were David Sokol, a former top executive at Berkshire Hathaway, and H. Wayne Huizenga, a billionaire who turned Blockbuster and Waste Management into national goliaths. (The Times noted Thomas gives access to the Supreme Court building for Horatio Alger events; ProPublica confirmed that the access has cost $1,500 or more in donations per person.)
Records and interviews show Thomas had another benefactor, oil baron Paul “Tony” Novelly, whose gifts to the justice have not previously been reported. ProPublica’s totals in this article include trips from Crow.”
The total value of the undisclosed trips they’ve given Thomas since 1991, the year he was appointed to the Supreme Court, is difficult to measure. But it’s likely in the millions.“
But surely this is just business as usual, you may say, and this sort of generosity and largess is not out of the ordinary.
Not so much.
“Perhaps even more significant, the pattern exposes consistent violations of judicial norms, experts, including seven current and former federal judges appointed by both parties, told ProPublica. “In my career I don’t remember ever seeing this degree of largesse given to anybody,” said Jeremy Fogel, a former federal judge who served for years on the judicial committee that reviews judges’ financial disclosures. “I think it’s unprecedented.”
I am probably at the limit of my fair usage, but if this poor article has not sufficiently allayed your concerns that Justice Thomas and his seditious spouse lack for adequate luxurious recreational activities you should click over to the ProPublica link and read all about it.
If you can stomach doing so.
IMPEACH THIS SLEAZY F*CK.
Lovely sentiment, but absolutely pointless.
Impeachment REQUIRES a 2/3 majority of the Senate to remove a Justice (without that, a “guilty” verdict is effectively the same as an “acquittal”). And with the current membership in the House, there’s no way that any articles for impeachment will even be brought (a simple majority is all that’s required to “impeach” but I don’t see a single GOPer agreeing to vote to bring any article of impeachment before the House–members of the minority can file impeachment articles but they go absolutely nowhere without enough members of the majority to reach that simple majority; even Margarine Traitor Greene knew that much which is why she waited to really talk about impeaching Joe Biden until after the GOP took the House although she HAD suggested she wanted to impeach the President in 2021 or 2022).
You may as well be asking Santa Claus for whatever present you can’t possibly ever really afford for yourself or can’t possibly ever really get as to want Thomas impeached.
I hope, maybe foolishly maybe not, the political make-up of the house and senate change (drastically) in 2024 and hopefully more in the future. The ‘pubes are out of step with the nation-badly out of step. Their prime demographic is dying and the majority of the younger demographics do not vote republican. Now on the downside those younger folks don’t get and vote as regularly as they should. IF we retain our right to vote (i.e. if we don’t have an emperor mango moron starting in Jan. 2025), I see not only the ‘pube majority in the house going away, but also the senate ‘pube minority getting so small a filibuster won’t even be possible (and I’d like that to go onto the trash heap of history).
I’m Jewish so I don’t ask for sh*t from some fatty in a red suit. I work like hell to get people to vote the ‘pubes out of office. It gets better results. BTW, I believe this and I live in MT f.f.s. We might have too many idiots in MT to turn it from red to blue, but I still retain hope. I damned sure believe other red states will turn blue.
Let’s not forget his wife who tried to overthrow democracy so billionaires can run the country, and world. Instead of jail, her seditious a$$ sits on yachts around the world. SICK OF IT YET AMERICA???
It takes two to tango. While Supreme Court justices can only be removed from the bench through impeachment in Congress, persons who bribe them are subject to the full force of laws made by Congress and enforced by the Department of Justice. So, Thomas et al. can be investigated and their partners in crime can be indicted and punished. The stench of the high court over-turning a conviction involving one of their own members would be too powerful even for them. What is surprising (or maybe not) is that no Attorney General has had the gumption to do this.
The problem is right there in your comment: DEFINING THE CRIME OF BRIBERY. In order to indict and punish the “partners in crime” on a bribery charge, the prosecution has to PROVE it. Bribery may seem like an open-and-shut crime but a prosecutor would have to prove that Billionaire A provided some valuable to Thomas in DIRECT EXCHANGE for his vote on a specific case or group of cases–which means you have to prove that said Billionaire had a direct interest in that case.
There’s also the minor fact that, without an actual written code of ethics to bind the members of the Supreme Court, it becomes next to impossible to actually differentiate “bribery” from a “gift” (especially when the justices “forget” to disclose those “gifts”).
I seem to be saying this a lot lately but your comment compels me to say it again because I know some will disagree with you. You are correct that in a court of law a distinct quid pro quo is required for conviction – an “I do this specific for you and you do such-and-such specific thing for me in return.” Ok some will say, it can be pretty obvious that some wealth/connected person will provide something of value to a public servant, even federal elected/appointed official including a Justice and “magically” something happens that makes it clear the person on the receiving end delivered or at least tried like hell to deliver payment. Timing can make it pretty clear what was wanted, and what the recipient did or tried to do to pay back the person(s) who showered largesse on them. Still, absent a written contract or a recording of a conversation it’s a tough case to prove. Convictions happen but not often, because sometimes parties involved get sloppy.
However it’s almost always a circumstantial case and usually not even brought. One might say things seem obvious and shouldn’t it be up to a jury to decide and that’s a fair point. Still, we are talking about rich and/or powerful people and the ugly fact is that different rules apply – equal justice under law doesn’t apply anywhere near the same to the rich and/or powerful as it does to most people.
It’s nothing new either. It’s ALWAYS been that way, and always will be the case. I don’t like it any more than the next person but that’s cold, hard reality.
Clarence Thomas reminds me of reprehensible John McCain & his involvement in the Keating 5 corruption scandal. You may recall that McCain took $112,000 from con-man head of Lincoln Savings & Loan’s Charlie Keating. Keating skimmed billions of $$$$ from his S&L, using the $ to pay for his private jet, yachts, purchased island estates in the Bahamas and elsewhere in the 1980s. John McCain and family were personally treated by Keating to numerous free trips on Keating’s jet and other lavish vacations to the Bahamas & all over the world with Keating.
When the scandal broke, in a quid pro quo – McCain did everything he could to stop the congressional investigations of Keating – resulting in Keating only serving 4.5 years in prison after being convicted in state & federal courts for fraud, racketeering and conspiracy. Keating caused un-measurable suffering of 23,000 working middle class & retiree familes who were stripped of their life savings by a slimy Trump-like sociopath.
US taxpayers ended up having to bail out Lincoln Savings & Loan to the tune of $34 Billion.
Link to 1989 Phoenix New Times expose on McCain & Keating: https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/mccain-the-most-reprehensible-of-the-keating-five-6431838
Well old Clarence tears at the very fabric of common decency. There are a lot of things that I could say but common decency prevents me. But on the other side you have Mr. Thomas and he is using the very same argument that I can’t against us as a whole. And don’t ever forget it. The good and honorable Clarence Thomas is using what color he is to game us stupid idiots that are trying to keep a civil tongue 👅 in our mouths. And then we get to Miss Ginni. And don’t get excited about the way I address Miss Ginni, from the era that they are trying to say they are emulating that would be how you would address a rich white woman that would be the head of the household. Of course, she wouldn’t be married to a black man and I don’t care what occupation he has. I’m just passing on the rules of the day. And that’s another thing about this that escapes me. Harlan Crowe would have been from this era. And the fact that he’s hanging around with a black guy surely does puzzle me. It surely does because these people all came from the south and I was down there about this time and I just don’t understand.