Via Sullivan, I see that if Rick Perry has his way, therewill no longer be only steers and queers in Texas– It will be just steers and bigots:
In a ceremony filled with religious references, Gov. Rick Perry signed a bill at a church school gymnasium Sunday that imposes more limits on late-term abortions and requires minor girls to get written parental consent for abortions.
“And it has been a tragedy of unspeakable consequences that for decades activist courts denied many Texas parents their right to be involved in one of the most important decisions their young daughter could ever make — whether to end the life that was growing inside her,” Perry told a crowd of about 1,000 people gathered at the Calvary Christian Academy. “For too long, a blind eye has been turned to the rights of our most vulnerable human beings — that’s the unborn in our society.”
During the 1 1/2-hour program, Perry also signed a resolution to amend the Texas Constitution by banning same-sex marriages.
“Texans have made a decision about marriage and if there is some other state that has a more lenient view than Texas then maybe that’s a better place for them to live,” Perry said.
However, that signature was only ceremonial, since voters must approve the same-sex ban in November.
“A nurturing home with a loving mother and loving father is the best way to guide our children down the proper path,” said Perry, who was joined by several legislators. He also thanked the “pro-life” and “pro-family” organizations.
Unless they stray from the proper path and engage in the demon vices of gay love. Then you cast them aside and make em move to Arkansas.
Really, though. It’s about the sanctity of marriage. That’s why the Texas governor is telling homosexuals to just leave. Bigots, the whole lot of them.
Stormy70
Noone I know likes Perry. He will have a tough reelection battle. Generally, Texas axes their Governors after one term. Bush was the first to win a second term in about 100 years. This is a desperate move for him, and stupid to say such a bigoted thing. I will vote for Kay Bailey Hutchinson if she runs.
KC
Wait a minute . . . I thought Rick Perry was gay?
ppgaz
Perry is right, sort of. A nurturing home with loving parents, blah blah blah …
However, Texans, apparently, like so many others, think that the sizzle is worth more than the steak. It hasn’t occurred to them that government has (a) no business, and (b) no process for trying to “ensure” that homes are nurturing and parents are loving.
What moron would choose the government as the means to get such a thing as a “nurturing” home and “loving” parents?
But in the upside down, make-it-so-by-saying-it’s-so world of rightwing politics, that doesn’t matter. What matters is the symbolism, the appearance of rectitude, not the actual right thing or correct thing itself.
In Perry’s world, a scenario in which people TALK about nurturing and loving, and the correct kind of loving, is more important than the fact that a lot of homes have a father and mother who aren’t nurturing, or just a mother who is struggling to make ends meet, or a father and no mother, or an uncle, or two women who want to live together and raise a family.
The real world and real people don’t matter to people like Perry. He’s just mouthing words and slogans and pandering. He is a liar, and he is evil.
In short, he’s a Republican. Gotta love ’em. But I don’t gotta nurture ’em.
Katinula
I’m assuming single mothers, widows of both sexes and orphans will be the next ones to be shown the door in Texas as they also have no ‘loving mother and loving father’-type situation in their lives. Only then will Perry not be a sexist, egotistical, lying hypocritical bigot (apologies to Jane Fonda and 9-5 fans!).
shinobi
There is no evidence that children of gay couples are in any way less good than children of straight couples.
This guy makes me want to commit hate crimes, against Texas govenors.
ppgaz
Oh, and BTW …. next time you hear Republicans doing their hyena laugh over Howard Dean, remember this topic, and observe what is really going on here.
Howard Dean knows that hanging the albatross of the so-called “christian” right around the neck of the Republican party is exactly, precisely and absolutely the right thing to do.
He knows that “real” Dems are fired up by this stuff. He knows that there are a hundred more Perrys out there to shoot their party in the groin with their hypocrisy and their lies and their phony preachments. He knows that they’re wrong, and he knows that the long term politics here are going to work in our favor (“our” as in large-D politics).
And make no mistake, Republicans. You own Perry. You own Dobson. You own Frist. You own the whole smarmy lot of them and their bullshit, and we are going to hang it around your necks with a pink ribbon as much as it takes and as long as it takes for you to come to your senses.
Don’t like it? Too bad. You brought these potatoheads to the party, and you are going to drive them home. It is not seemly for you to try to run away from them, now that you used them to get power. You can run, but you can’t hide.
I don’t get mad when a Perry makes an ass of himself. I get happy, because I know that every day that passes while Repubs who sold their soul to this devil do nothing to repudiate this stuff, is a day closer to then end of this national nightmare.
Rick
Well what if the voters don’t pass it? The status quo survives.
Anyway, better in the hands of the people, or their representatives, than in the hands of our would-be betters on the benches around the land.
Cordially…
ppgaz
No, actually, the benches are there to keep the legislative branch in check.
That’s a primary function of the judiciary, it’s necessary, it’s proper, and it’s not going away.
It doesn’t matter how much the Potatoheads on the right slander the judiciary. The legislative branch is such a pit of greed, corruption, foolishness, ambition, and misguided good intentions that the bench will never sink below it in the estimation of those who are really paying attention. I am saying this with respect to the federal, as well as the state, level.
Rick
Per the state and Federal constitutions, and not on the whims of judges. That’s what’s necessary and proper.
But not to quash the self-government of the people. I would expect more praise for the Texas action–not fiat (“stroke of the pen, law of the land; kinda cool” as one who truly resembles a potatohead memorably stated), but amendment process.
“Really paying attention.” LOL! Really nailing your point.
The people will speak in November. The bastards.
Cordially…
gratefulcub
We don
willyb
Bigot — a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices.
It seems to me there are bigots on both sides of this issue.
Justin Faulkner
Perry simply reveals his prejudice that only certain people can provide loving, nurturing homes. Like good, Christian, conservative, Bush-voting folk. It makes me sick.
gratefulcub
Not really. I am sure there are a few that are bigoted against straight people, but I don
Rick
It makes me sick.
Now there’s a major consideration in policy matters and amendment processes.
Cordially…
ppgaz
Rick … “whims” of judges?
That’s just a manipulation, Rick, and not a particularly clever or even effective one, at that.
Better the “whims” of judges than the brain farts of ambitious and cynical legislators, or confident, and wrong, presidents.
There’s a reason for the spread of powers among branches, Rick.
Read up on it, it’s probably in your 9th grade civics book.
MunDane
Is there really any point to restricting marriage at all? Why limit it to just two people anyway. I mean if you have three people who love each other, why can’t they get married? Why not a single person marry themself and get the married tax rate? Why not allow any combination of people declare themselves married, collect the fee (maybe a sliding scale to allow the State to collect more from polyandrous or polygynous families) and just Go and Be Happy!
And really why limit it to people at all. You have Prof. Singer at Princeton who holds that a sexual relationship between human and animal can be “loving and nuturing for both parties.” Just like marriage!
The Texas Governor is an idiot. But to paint all Texans with that kind of brush is unkind and untrue. Every tent, including the Republican Tent, has an edge. Crap like this, and the Chicken Little predictions it inspires, are equally and patently stupid.
Nice to know that there is a contraterrene Howard Dean in the Republican party, too. Balance to the Universe is restored.
ppgaz
Fools. Dean is not a balance. This is not about balance, or fairness.
It’s about hanging the albatross of the extreme wing of the Republican party around GOP necks.
Like I said, you guys brought these crazies to the party. Now you are going to have to dance with them and take them home.
Really, it’s unseemly for you to be trying to run away from them so fast. Careful you don’t piss them off, they’re mean.
MunDane
Yeah, cause you know all us pale christers are but one tiny step away from breaking out the pillowcases and bed sheets along with a can of spray starch and demanding that the ultimate leader make Leviticus a part of the Constitution.
Wait. I meant the only part!
Yeah.
Meanwhile, those that break out the microscopes to find religious iconogrpahy on currency and county seals and those that campaign ceaselessly to keep the Boy Scouts from holding meetings in a classroom after school are just normal people?
And, oh yeah, all of the devout Hispanic and African Catholics and Korean Baptists quietly wonder if they are the crazies you or Dean refer to…
Rick
There’s a reason for the spread of powers among branches, Rick.
ppaz,
Which you seem to deplore by asserting a primacy of the judicial branch. Must’ve been your 6th grade civics.
Well, if you’ll look your Random House Big Picture Book of Separation of Powers (for ages 13 and up), you’ll realize that judges aren’t supposed to make laws. Neither ones you like, nor ones you don’t like.
Gosh, I’m hoping you’ll *judge* that to be clever and effective. Means a lot to me, it does.
Cordially…
Sojourner
MunDane:
Apparently you weren’t paying attention. There are quite a few people upset over the Boy Scouts’ anti-gay policy. Your assumption that only the far left cared about it is simply not the case.
John Gillnitz
Perry is the lamest Governor I can remember. I don’t know a single person who is happy with Perry or the Ledg.
Given the rumors that Perry was cornholing the former Sect. of State (and got busted by his wife) maybe he should just STFU.
ppgaz
Rick, you apparently just make things up and toss them out there.
I asserted no “primacy” of the judicial branch. It’s the third leg of a three-legged stool.
You apparently want to saw it off.
I don’t.
I want it to be strong, independent. Without that, it cannot function.
Hokie
Is there a disanalogy between Perry’s statement and one slightly modified:
“Texans have made a decision about segregation and if there is some other state that has a more lenient view than Texas then maybe that’s a better place for them to live.”
In terms of the actual principle, that is, not whether one happens to find gay marriage icky or not. I’m not saying there’s none, I’m honestly asking if someone can find me one, because I’m not coming up with anything.
Darrell
Attempts to paint those who oppose same sex marriage as extremists and bigots simply because of their position on gay marriage seems dishonest to me.
I’ve said it before, 60% of Californians, one of the most liberal states in the union, voted against allowing same sex marriages. So whether or not you agree or disagree with same sex marriage, can we agree that those who oppose it are decidedly in the majority in this country? not just a group of extremist bigots, but a majority which includes lots and lots of fair minded Democrats as well as Repubs
I think Perry could have handled it a little better, but his comments weren’t anything approaching ‘bigotry’.. unless of course, you think that everyone who disagrees with allowing same sex marriage is a bigot. Because that would be a whole other kettle of fish
Darrell
Is there a disanalogy between Perry’s statement and one slightly modified:
How about this one?
“Texans have made a decision about polygamy and if there is some other state that has a more lenient view than Texas then maybe that’s a better place for them to live.”
ppgaz
Opposition to “gay marriage” is entirely irrational. There is no rational basis for it whatever.
Which does not make it good, bad, right or wrong. But it makes it what it is, and what it is is an idea that will fade with time because the truth is, who marries whom is largely nobody’s damned business. It’s the purview of the busybody, the meddler, the scold, and the bully.
Marriage itself is not the purview of government, but of the church. What society gets by having government regulate marriage has not been made clear, and IMO, the reason for that is that the answer is: Nothing. Society gets nothing from the practice. There is no gain, and no benefit.
The entire subject is just a means of manipulation. When people get tired of being manipulated, they’ll realize that nobody cares who lives with whom and who establishes a family.
On that day, a lot of shitheads who right now have a path to power will lose that path, and good riddance to them.
Ben
Darrell,
I bet you could still get a majority of Americans to take us back to pre-Jim Crow. How does civil rights legislation and the abolition of slavery occur in a direct democracy?
Hokie
Actually, Darrell, to be honest, assuming you could work out issues with taxation and the like, if everyone consents, I can’t see why polygamy is anyone else’s business.
If the government’s not going to allow it, though, I think the way it would mess up taxation would be a reason, though I don’t know how good a one.
But for that reason, I don’t think it’s on the same level of analogy.
John Cole
“Texans have made a decision about polygamy and if there is some other state that has a more lenient view than Texas then maybe that’s a better place for them to live.”
Except that would count for everybody- no one would be allowed to legally have multiple spouses, when what is being promoted here is an attempt to determine who can and who can not have ONE spouse.
And the notion that Rick Perry saying erssentially “Texans have spoken, homosexuals can go elsewhere” is anything but bigoted doesn’t even pass the laugh test. Mine, at least.
ppgaz
Polygamy, as practiced out here in the West, is a big problem … mianly because it is entwined with sexual abuse of children, and abusive power relationships between adults.
If you could tweeze those things out of the equation, you could probably make a theoretical case for leaving polygamists alone. But that’s easier said than done. The practitioners, out here, use the libertarian principle as a shield to cover up what they are really doing.
See: Colorado City, AZ + polygamy.
Hokie
Oh lord, the FLDS.
Yeah, ok, they’re the perfect example for why polygamy probably shouldn’t be legal.
And I think John’s hit on why segregation doesn’t come up as disanalagous for me. In both cases, you’re talking about denying certain groups rights that are freely given to others.
This amendment, as best as I can tell, would also ban civil unions, wouldn’t it?
I’d have a lot more sympathy for the “We’re not bigots, we just don’t want the word ‘marriage’ used in a different way” crowd if they’d come out in support of civil unions, to at least give gay couples the same legal rights as other couples. And certainly, I don’t describe people taking the position that they’re uncomfortable using the word marriage in this way but they’re all for equal rights as bigots (though I would describe them as silly). But John’s right. This is completely an act of bigotry, nothing less.
Darrell
Except that would count for everybody- no one would be allowed to legally have multiple spouses, when what is being promoted here is an attempt to determine who can and who can not have ONE spouse.
I respectfully disagree. What is being promoted here is a particular definition of marriage. In that context, the issue of polygamy is analagous to same sex marriage in how we, as a society, want to define marriage
Darrell
Darrell,
I bet you could still get a majority of Americans to take us back to pre-Jim Crow
Talk about not passing the laugh test
John Cole
I’d have a lot more sympathy for the “We’re not bigots, we just don’t want the word ‘marriage’ used in a different way” crowd if they’d come out in support of civil unions, to at least give gay couples the same legal rights as other couples.
That was my position about a year ago, and then all I saw was repeated acts not to protect marriage, but to simply put homosexuals in their place and let them know they are second class citizens.
Ideally, the government wouldn’t be in the marriage business at all, and would instead proffer legal protection to any couple under civil unions. There could be a civil ceremony for that and a church ceremony in which the civil union could become a church sanctioned ceremony. Or something like that…
Hokie
John: Well, yeah. I know most of them actually are just bigots, hiding behind a silly word.
Unfortunately, I can’t see the government ever getting out of the marriage business at this point. Too much is tied up with it. Tragic, that.
Ben
Darrell,
If you don’t think a majority of Americans would like to send blacks back to 1964, then you need to put the crack pipe down and back away slowly. FMA supporters/fag haters have simply found a different group to discriminate against only because blacks are protected by law… fags aren’t. I can’t believe anyone is stupid enough to believe that the jesus freaks won’t come after them next.
Rick
No, actually, the benches are there to keep the legislative branch in check.
That’s a primary function of the judiciary, it’s necessary, it’s proper, and it’s not going away.
ppgaz,
Gee, I don’t know where I got the idea that you viewed the bench as being somehow “over” the legislature.
All equal, and all subordinate to the people. For now, until “progressives” get their way.
Ben, are we to read your comment as a cry for help? Maybe you should outline your reading interests.
Cordially…
hugh
“Polygamy, as practiced out here in the West, is a big problem … mianly because it is entwined with sexual abuse of children, and abusive power relationships between adults.”
Sounds like alot of the news headlines we hear about every day in so-called “real marriages”.
“FMA supporters/fag haters have simply found a different group to discriminate against only because blacks are protected by law… fags aren’t. I can’t believe anyone is stupid enough to believe that the jesus freaks won’t come after them next.”
Too late. It’s already come in the form of voter discrimination in states like Florida. “Law” is now a loose ideal and only dependant on the needs of those in power.
Hokie
Sounds like alot of the news headlines we hear about every day in so-called “real marriages”.
It’s actually really not. For more details, see for example Under The Banner of Heaven.
Kimmitt
Ideally, the government wouldn’t be in the marriage business at all, and would instead proffer legal protection to any couple under civil unions. There could be a civil ceremony for that and a church ceremony in which the civil union could become a church sanctioned ceremony. Or something like that…
We aren’t just on the same page; we’re on the same line writing the same sentence.
ppgaz
I really can’t believe some of the extraordinarily dumb things I am seeing here.
The judiciary “over” the legislative, because it acts as a check?
Three branches with shared powers, acting as checks against the other two. It’s a delicate balance, but nonetheless, a balance. Balance is the point, not “primacy”.
If the courts are not there to parse the law and resolve conflicts in the laws, then the process cannot work.
If the courts are not politically independent …. that is, free from political twists and turns to the greatest possible extent … then the process cannot work.
The courts must be as free as possible from those twists and turns for the same reason that the legislative branch must be sensitive to them …. without those distinctions, then the forces that make the process work are not present. Each branch represents — and I mean, represents in the sense that they act to speak for, not in the sense of a symbolic representation — a different set of imperatives in the mix of forces that must interplay in order to avoid the ONE THING that the whole constitutional construct is there to prevent: Tyranny.
When legislatures can ram the will of a narrow majority down the throats of the minority, you have tyranny. When the executive can impose its will without oversight or restraint from the legislative, you have tyranny.
There is a difference between the imperatives that drive the executive and the legislative, from those of the judiciary: the first two are about will. The third is about objectivity and judgement.
Of course, any moron who doesn’t understand the delicate workings of a finely made watch can take a pipe wrench to it and muck it up because he’s frustrated that he’s not getting his way.
The courts have not failed the people when they check the power of the other branches. They have served the people by acting as a rudder, guiding the process in what it judges is the right direction for the very reason that this guidance produces better work from the other two branches.
One might say, well, that’s a fine theory, but it’s not perfect. Of course it’s not perfect. It’s an attempt at self-correction, not self-perfection. It’s a mechanism that gets from A to B by zigzagging and sometimes going around in circles. That’s exactly how it is supposed to work. It imposes deliberation on an impatient populace or on an ambitious political machine.
Even though you couldn’t tell it by reading some of the remarkably ignorant commentary in here, the people understand this in their own odd way. They saw the grotesque overreaching of the legislative branch in the Schiavo debacle, and they appreciated the restraint applied by the courts. Without knowing exactly how and why the finely made watch works, they know that it told them the correct time, mostly. They know instinctively that when narcissistic legislators can pass laws at midnight on Sunday to force ordinary people to bend their lives to the will of a selfish and narrow-minded political power, then liberty becomes a farce, and democracy becomes just a means to employ tyranny over other people.
You court-bashers can believe what you want, and you can do what you like, I don’t care. What I am describing here may not be academically precise, but it’s correct nonetheless, and it’s the only damned thing built into the government that is standing between you and the loss of your freedoms, whether you know it or not, or appreciate it or not, or understand it or not. And for that reason, those of us who do understand it will fight like rats to protect it from you.
And it’s not going away, no matter how eager you are to trash it.
Sojourner
ppqaz, this is the best description I’ve read in a long time about how it’s supposed to work.
“And it’s not going away, no matter how eager you are to trash it.”
I do hope you’re right.
Rick
…the mix of forces that must interplay in order to avoid the ONE THING that the whole constitutional construct is there to prevent: Tyranny.
Yes, and when laws are made from the bench, say in the school case in Kansas imposing a tax on the populace, we’re nearing that tyranny.
The three branches should be in balance; the legislative branch, being closest to the people–answerable to and routinely checked by them in elections–should take greater care in checking the aggrandizement of the others.
Legislatures don’t go handing down jail terms and issuing rulings; judges should avoid making legislation. Striking down legislation on its merits or demerits is a judicial function, but not imposing a substitute.
Because this: The third is about objectivity and judgement is eroding. Whether you know it or not.
Please, do fight like a rat to protect me from such judges.
Cordially…
ppgaz
You know what, Rick? We do not live in a vacuum. We live in the times in which we live, and the times have signatures of language.
Whether it is fair to you or not, when you say things like “make laws from the bench” you are talking in Limbaughspeak, the language of the liars and the manipulators. Whether it is fair to you or not, what I hear is “The judge made a decision I don’t like, so I will deride it and call it ‘making law from the bench’, or ‘judicial activism.'”
Don’t lecture me on protecting you. I’ll carry out my citizenship as I see fit. If you get protected, and I hope that you do, from the things from which you really need protection, well, good. But with all due respect, I’m not taking any such direction from you because your language marks you as a person who doesn’t really understand these things and who sees everything through the lens of a partisan viewpoint.
In those rare cases where a judge or a court makes a mess, then so be it. Processess, in the fullness of time, will most likely repair the thing. You either believe in the American experiment, or you don’t. I am amazed by the extent to which people (not you, I am talking in generalities here) talk about “people of faith” and yet seem to have no faith in the American system at all. They seem to think that if things aren’t going their way, then it’s all fucked up. Things aren’t supposed to go your way all the time, or mine. They are supposed to meander slowly and infuriatingly in approximately the right direction. If you have a better system in mind, by all means, go into politics and promote it. Run for office and make it your platform. That is the American way, and I wish you all the luck in the world. Really.
Meanwhile, let judges be judges, with their chin-stroking and big egos. Let legislators be politicians, with their slogans and their empty promises. It’s all good. Even when it’s bad, it’s all good. Even at its worst, it’s good. This messy and pokey government is still the best hope for mankind, even if you don’t like how it’s going at the moment. I don’t like how it’s going, either, for quite different reasons, but I still consider myself one lucky sumbitch for being born an American.
Simon
It is obvious the opponents of homosexual marriage are not the ridiculous marginalized oafs most here claim them to be. The increasing numbers of successful state anti-homosexual marriage amendments support this. They are everyday decent Americans who have legitimate concerns about approving what they instinctively sense is a human distortion.
They may not generally be able to articulate the essential reason for their discomfort, but that reason exists, is most profound and valid. It drives humans even in countries that openly accept homosexuality. It underlies my belief that over the long haul, acceptance of homosexuality will plummet.
I am unashamedly, openly and freely hostile to homosexual marriage and even to homosexuality in principle (though I can be a dear friend to any willing homosexual). It has nothing at all to do with religion and everything to do with human logic.
One may call me names and such for my opinions, but I have spent a great deal of time forming them and will not fear something so trivial as this sort of childishness that I will change because of it. I most sincerely think it is proper to reject homosexuality as a principle and homosexual marriage specifically. I don’t take the position to harm anyone. I think it is the human thing to do.
Embarassing Myself
Okay, I’ll admit to being an infrequent poster here, and this isn’t my usual handle.
I’m a polygamist, in most everyone’s eyes here. I prefer the term polyamorist due to the loaded term of polygamist. But heck, even I hate the smashing together of greek and latin to build a created word.
But anyways, I digress.
Now what’s changed in your life because I have a wife who I love dearly, and a girlfriend who I love dearly?
No really.
What’s changed in your life?
And before you ask, yes we do live together, we all sleep in the same bed, share finances via a joint checking account, and are planning on having a committment ceremony for the three of us.
And, of course, spending the several thousand dollars to try and make sure that we have all the rights that my legal wife and I have for signing a bit of paper at the county courthouse 3 years ago.
What’s wrong with multiple marriages among consenting adults? What’s wrong with marriages among consenting adults?
Other than the fact that my schedule is continually full and utterly packed with activities for the three of us so I have little free time that is.
Ben
Simon,
A human distortion? Kinda like heteros that are serial divorcers, adulterers, pounding out illegitimate kids, and aborting fetuses? The most troublesome thing about the gay marriage debate is the absolute hypocrisy amongst the heteros that will discriminate against homos. One of the most popular arguments is that a mother and a father is the best way to raise a child… been to a school or around children lately? Heteros aren’t doing a very good job of child rearing probably because they are spending so much time bashing fags. It is easier to preach and hate homos than it is to keep your own house in order and most heteros aren’t doing that.
Simon, you make this statement “I am unashamedly, openly and freely hostile to homosexual marriage and even to homosexuality in principle (though I can be a dear friend to any willing homosexual)”. That is like telling a black person that you will be host to them in your home but in the end you will lynch them… kinda like when people say “I’m not a racist, I know black people”. Your defelcting the fact that you hate gay people, have passed judgement on them and are superior in every way. Good luck when you meet your maker.
Hokie
What’s wrong with multiple marriages among consenting adults? What’s wrong with marriages among consenting adults?
Hey, fix the tax code and decide how to handle issues of decision-making (for multiple marriages), and it’s cool with me. I can’t think of how to handle some of the issues, but that certainly doesn’t mean nobody does.
Sojourner
“I am unashamedly, openly and freely hostile to homosexual marriage and even to homosexuality in principle (though I can be a dear friend to any willing homosexual).”
Hey, I despise what you are but I’ll be happy to be your friend. Wow, what a deal!
What a crock.
ppgaz
Sounds like “I have friends who are negroes.”
Compuglobalhypermeganet
Checks and balances are great…except that they are a farce when it comes to the Judiciary.
The problem with the current system is that there is no check on individual rulings of the the judicial branch. The judiciary gets almost a free pass in the checks-and-balances game, and that’s a) why the liberals have so much riding on confirmation of conserative judges, and b) why they like activist judges so much.
If Congress passes an undesirable or unconstitutional law, both the President and the Judiciary can strike it down. Further, they are subject to regular elections from the Ultimate Check, the Vote.
If the President vetos, he can be overridden. If he passes an Executive Order, it can be struck down by the Judiciary. Further, he faces the Ultimate Check, and further than that, he has a two-term limit.
So what’s the check on the Judiciary should they choose to make law from the bench by declaring contrary laws unconstitutional (and we’ve seen how tenuous — or imaginary — a legal link these Justices need to make certain actions legal and illegal)? Ummmmmmm, well, the President nominated them once upon a time, and the Congress confirmed them once upon a time (and confirmation was prolly done without much rigor). Pretty underwhelming, especially if we believe the “power corrupts” scenario. So the only check on a runaway, lifetime-appointed Court seems to be “gosh, I sure hope these judges are good folks and true!” Well, some are, and some aren’t — some serve a political agenda, and some don’t.
The last three decades of judicial activism is what brought us to the “nuclear/constitutional” option. Congress knows that the only chance one side has to prevent the other from having lifetime carte blanche to pass whatever laws they want from the Benches is to prevent the opposition from getting “their” judges.
No one should pretend that the Judicial Branch is checked to any real extent. If it were, we wouldn’t be talking about filibusters.
DecidedFenceSitter
Also Compu, it needs to go to them. They can’t actively do anything. They are the passive branch. Someone, who has actually suffered damages, or thinks that they have, needs to come before them. Sure that’s a minor roadblock, but if no one challenged it, there can be no ruling on it.
The war powers act comes to mind. It’s probably unconstituional, but the executive branch doesn’t want to risk it, nor does the Legislative branch, so both sides play brinkmanship.
Compuglobalhypermeganet
Good point on the receptive nature of the courts. Once upon a time, it was probably a considerable check. But with a nation of lawyers, almost every facet of every issue that matters to anyone will eventually make it to the Courts.
Ah, the WPA…Passed solely for political PR effect, considered unconstitutional by every President, broken regularly, and no one who matters wants enforcement.
A grand Republic, indeed.
Sojourner
Amending the Constitution is the way to get around a court ruling that is unpopular.
Sojourner
And by the way, the ultimate check is not the vote, it’s the Constitution. Which means that individual and minority rights are to be protected even when the majority doesn’t like it – something the Repubs seem to have forgotten.
Rick
I’m not taking any such direction from you because your language marks you as a person who doesn’t really understand these things and who sees everything through the lens of a partisan viewpoint.
Kettle,
“Ditto.”
Cordially…
the Pot
ppgaz
Nope, not gonna roll over on the GOP talking points here.
“Judicial activism” — code word for decisions not liked by the speaker.
You don’t have to take my word for it. Just watch the traffic.
Controversial decision?
Here’s how it works:
Not Favored by right wing: “Activist”
Favored by right wing: “Okay”
It’s a simple as that. It’s one hundred percent dogmatic, party line, partisan. Not an ounce of intellectual integrity in the lot.
The Constitution gives you all the instructions you need for how to interpret it: None.
Interpretation is left up to us.
Some will insist on “original” interpretation, which is right up there with Creationism and Original Sin as great intellectually sound ideas in the history of man. But anyway, it’s a point of view, and so be it. But it’s not any more valid than the alternative, which is ….
Trying to see the true intent of the document in terms of changing times.
Frankly, I think that in most case, “originalism” is nothing but a smokescreen for ideas that have no other intellectual value.
The original document is so spare, and so economical, that its intended purpose is clearly to guide the law into the unforseeable future tempered by that future. Which is to say, the present.
I mean, it’s clear that it was done that way for that reason, and that it must have been so inspired by an Intelligent Divine Being, right?
Otherwise you’d have to imagine the Founders sitting there and saying, ya know, they have to take this stuff literally even two hundred years from now when everything we accept as reality has pretty much gone away.
The point is arguable, of course, and that IS the point. It is arguable.
If it’s arguable, then it’s a thing which can be settled by a court. If it can be settled by a court, then the people have a right to expect that courts will be non-homogenous in their thinking and application of law, as time goes on.
Who died and made GW Bush king? Who agreed to let King George order that all future judges shall be originalists? Not just originalists, but originalists with a particular “original” spin?
Who made him king and let him declare that henceforth throughout the land, court decisions that are not congruent with a narrow and particular point of view shall be called “activist”?
Nobody, that’s who, and the jig is up. We’re onto the game, and the game is over.
Simon
Ben
Two things:
Firstly, if there was a divorce lobby or an adultery lobby, etc. forcing the federalization of divorce via the ploy that these unfortunate occurrences are normal and healthy alternatives to marital permanence and faithfulness, then I would take a harder public line against divorce and adultery. But such views are not the rule in America.
We generally accept divorce as an evil, an unfortunate event that can happen to any marriage much like death. Few of us enjoy divorce, and even fewer of us start our marriages celebrating adultery.
Homosexuality is quite another ballgame. It is being treated, and quite falsely, as an acceptable state wholly in conformity to human logic. It is being taught to our children as such. It is being pushed on our courts, and by those courts upon our society. Its proponents do not aim to live and let live. They aim to exploit the might of government to force all Americans to accept what most Americans intuitively know is wrong.
Secondly, rejecting homosexuality but accepting the homosexual is nothing like promising friendship to blacks and then lynching them. We ought not misrepresent our opponent
AnnCoulter's hair
They commit a gross error against human freedom.
so blind. they are the most current example of human freedom and you want to deny them that same freedom. This is a test of our democracy. Can people who disagree at least agree that we all deserve the same freedoms? You would seem to say no. That is a failure. You are free to disagree or make claims such as ” They commit a gross error against human freedom.”
However you may choose to phrase it they are ENTITLED to the same rights that you enjoy. Go on and dislike them but deny them their rights and you are moving out of the Democratic experiment and into something else, something ugly and un-American.
Simon
They do not have the right to force me to acknowledge what is contrary to human existence and biology. Yet that is quite exactly what they aim to do when they try to force homosexual marriage by law.
Homosexual marriage is not a matter of individual rights because an individual cannot marry– couples can and do. This is an issue concerning whether we have the right to force others to accept couples whose very image distorts the logic that underlies us all.
No one legitimately has this right.
ppgaz
Nobody is asking you to ‘acknowledge” anything. You can rail against gays all you like, within certain speech limits (for example, theater patrons might stop you from shouting “FAGGOT” in a crowded theater).
However, you cannot use your disapproval to employ the law and the government to act it out. The law doesn’t belong to you, or just to people you like, or approve of.
The KKK can hold meetings and print pamphlets and stage demonstrations. But it can’t move to have the law act out its disapprovals.
Like the KKK, you can think what you like. But you can’t twist the law to have it express what you don’t like at the expense of the rights and protections of others.
Sojourner
“They do not have the right to force me to acknowledge what is contrary to human existence and biology.”
Do your homework. There’s a rapidly growing body of research demonstrating the biological basis of homosexuality.
Bigots are people too so I guess we have to respect them as people even if we despise what they think.
Simon
Do your homework. There’s a rapidly growing body of research demonstrating the biological basis of homosexuality.
There is perhaps a biological basis for suicide and depression. But this still gives us no cause to accept these problems as anything other than the humanly contrary behaviors that they obviously are. The same applies to homosexuality.
Sojourner
Ah, Simon. I feel so sorry for you. Do you have homosexual tendencies that you find uncomfortable?
Another one of these “logical” patterns is the tendency for those who are ashamed of their homosexuality being the most virulently anti-gay.
It’s okay, Simon. You can be gay and a good person.
Mary Ann
We in NYC have long held the belief that all the gay people in all the rural communities should move to East and West Coast cities. It’s safer for the most part. Another real reason is that if all the gay people moved it would be detrimental to the economies of these bigot States. MOVE TEXAS MOVE!!!
Sojourner
But the closeted gays in the Repub leadership would be so lonely!
Actually, Mary Ann, you’re exactly right. Help stomp out bigotry by cutting off its funding sources.