This went under the radar, eclipsed by the phone call to Anita Hill that preceded it, and later events:
Virginia Thomas, political activist and wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, has decided to relinquish control of Liberty Central, the conservative group she founded less than a year ago, so that the organization can escape the “distractions” of her media celebrity, a spokeswoman said.
Liberty Central blamed a staff error for a memo with Virginia Thomas’s name on it declaring health-care legislation unconstitutional – perhaps reflecting a new sensitivity to the relationship between her activism and her husband’s job.
It’s great she resigned, but did she have to wait until after the lobbying group she founded and ran declared the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional?
She didn’t violate any written or unwritten rule, and she has certain rights. Okay. Great.
What I’m wondering is whether it’s fair to ask people in these positions to consider voluntarily sacrificing some activities or actions?
They have the right to do these things. They’re within the rules. But rights don’t have to be exercised. Any person can voluntarily decline any opportunity, whether it’s an investment opportunity, running a lobbying shop, or working for Citibank.
They can choose to decline simply because pursuing that particular activity or opportunity might raise an issue for some segment of the public.
Are we, the public, in this at all when these things are revealed, or does this entire discussion continue to center on the rights of the person who chose to participate in an activity where “the optics aren’t good”.
When do we discuss the flip side? Not rights, we’re all for rights, no one is disputing that, but the responsibility that they might voluntarily take up as individuals to consciously avoid these situations?
“You know what? This looks bad. I’ll pass on this opportunity and pursue any one of the million other options available to me as a powerful and influential person.”
Or is suggesting that (now) inconceivable, and too much to ask of them?
Mark-NC
As stupid as it sounds, you have to say the rules are: IOKIYAR.
For example: Cheat on your spouse as a Dem (John Edwards) and your career is over. Not the other way (Gingrich, Vitter).
Suggest someone in politics is a Nazi as a dem (some website) and you get condemnation by the House of Representatives. If Glen Beck, et. al. call Obama a Nazi ten thousand times – no problem.
The rules are not likely to change, and Thomas will never recuse himself from legislation.
chopper
the first thing you have to remember when it comes to virginia thomas is she’s fuckin crazy. questions as to responsibility are meaningless. she’s nuts.
Zifnab
Of the rich, powerful, and connected? No. Never.
Virginia Thomas isn’t coming under some federal sanction or facing an indictment for her actions. She’s paying a price, socially, for breaking decorum. And that’s what she’s complaining about. Virginia Thomas doesn’t think public opinion should be allowed to touch her. She wants to be immune from criticism.
That’s all this fight is even about. She made an ass of herself, but objects to others calling her on it.
jwb
These sorts of concerns are only for Democrats. Therefore the scumbag Peter Orszag clearly had no business going to work for Citi, but upstanding Republican judges owning parts of political lobbying firms are clearly nothing to worry about nor is Virginia Thomas working for a group that might have a case end up before her husband on the Supreme Court, because we all know that Republicans are morally superior, very serious, good people who would never doing anything to violate the trust the fine American people. There are simply no optics to worry about when there is nothing to see.
Jewish Steel
That folks do anything other than the thing brings them the greatest advantage? Under any circumstances? That would seem to require some kind of civic moral conscience.
I would imagine if you asked these titans and their spouses they would reply that they were already making a great sacrifice by generously donating their time to the commonweal at a fraction of what they could make on Wall St, private practice, the corporate boardroom.
Fair play is just not an American Value. Was it ever?
mk3872
The Obama DOJ needs to insist that Justice Thomas recuse himself from the HCR cases that go before the SCOTUS.
Particularly if Kagan does the same.
Hunter Gathers
It’s about the money. Plain and simple. Who needs shame when you have money? After all, we worship our Gaultian overlords in this country. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have 17 different articles about how billionaires like Mike Bloomberg are our only path to political salvation to read.
Kay
@chopper:
See, I don’t think she is. What I’m struck by when I listen to her and her supporters is how the entire focus is on her rights. It’s ALL about HER.
But don’t we (the public) have an expectation here too? That she’ll avoid situations like this? Where her name appeared on a memo declaring health care reform unconstitutional, forcing her resignation? What about us?
jwb
@mk3872: ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Thanks for the laugh.
Southern Beale
If healthcare act lawsuits go before SCOTUS as it appears they will Clarence Thomas must recuse himself seeing as his wife founded and ran an organization declaring the act unconstitutional. If he does not he is should be removed from the court.
In my inexpert opinion.
Martin
Well, this is much of the same issue as religious pharmacists who refuse to fill certain prescriptions. They do have rights, until those rights bump into other rights, and then you have to work out the conflicts.
The problem is that Clarence Thomas as a federal judge is expected to recuse himself from cases where there is the appearance of a conflict of interest. If Ginny is out there putting her name on how she feels cases ought to be ruled, then Clarence can no longer serve in his capacity as an impartial federal judge, and the public has a right to an impartial court. So, either she needs to not do that, or he needs to step down.
Her rights and our rights come into conflict by way of the exceedingly large responsibility carried by her husband. Is it fair? I don’t know, but that’s what it is – and there are options for the two of them to resolve it.
eemom
But Kay…..surely Justice Thomas will recuse himself when HCR reaches the Supreme Court!
Surely a SCt Justice, ever conscious of the example he must set for humbler members of the profession, would ALWAYS adhere MOST rigorously to the ancient maxim, ” a lawyer must avoid even the appearance of impropriety,” amirite?
bwwwwwaaaaaahaaaaaahaaaaaahaaaaaa
PurpleGirl
When Rudy Giuliani became mayor, his wife, Donna Hanover, gave up her job as a local news anchor. This had a great impact on them as it was her salary (low 7 figures) that allowed them to buy the condo they had and the unit next to their’s for Rudy’s mother. Note that when they separated, he expected her to continue paying the mortgage on his mother’s unit.
jwb
@Southern Beale: Who’s going to force the issue? How could the issue be forced? I’ll be shocked if Thomas recuses himself.
Ross Hershberger
@Kay;
Rhetorical question. No Righty with power and money gives up anything they’re arguably entitled to over principles.
Southern Beale
Meanwhile, Yahoo is laying off 700 employees. Merry Christmas, now fuck off!
Poopyman
@eemom: Sure, and a Supreme Court justice can be impeached just like any other govt official.
Unfortunately, that means impeachment by the House O’ Reps, and we know what the odds ofthat are.
MBunge
“She didn’t violate any written or unwritten rule”
I’m pretty sure having the spouse of a Supreme Court Justice so explicitly involved in politics does violate an unwritten rule, but nobody in the Beltway cares about any of that stuff anymore.
Mike
Poopyman
@MBunge: I believe you’re confusing “rule” with “moral obligation” here.
Zifnab
@Mark-NC:
Meh. I see it go the opposite way for liberals. Gingrich gets crucified, but we all still love Clinton. Someone busts out the Bush is Hitler sign and we all shrug and agree that Bush is a dick. Someone busts out the Obama is Hitler sign and we roll our eyes and call Godwin. That’s normal political tribalism.
The problem is that media picked it’s tribe. So turning on CNN or FOX will get you wall-to-wall right wing whining. There’s just no comparable enterprise on the left. At best, MSNBC gets you an Olberman Final Comment. And his ass is perpetually at risk of getting canned. Stewart and Colbert are good, but they’re very equal opportunity.
If you want left wing righteous indignation, you’re stuck with the blogs. Cable TV is not your friend.
jwb
@MBunge: They do, but only if it involves Democrats.
Southern Beale
@Martin:
They have a right to find another fucking line of work. Jeeezus I hate this argument. How many militant vegetarians work at the butcher shop? How many Scientologists working at the local psychitatric hospital?
If you think you can’t be a Christian AND dispense birth control or morning after pills at the local CVS then GET ANOTHER JOB, asshole.
Funny how these people never have a problem giving unmarried men Viagra, either.
@jwb:
The DOJ of course. They are defending the legislation, right? But we liberal activist types can certainly start forcing the issue NOW. Of course no one in the media listens to US…
eric
@Kay: Irony Police: Conservatives L.O.V.E. to remind people of the distinction between “the right to do something” and the “responsibility not to so something, even if it is your right to so.” This is their mantra when they want to acknowledge first amendment rights to say and do things like protesting, while still claiming that said protest should not be undertaken at all as it violates the common good.
liberal
@Southern Beale:
He should be removed for lying before Congress during his confirmation hearings. Probably won’t happen though.
Hogan
@jwb: You mean he’ll follow the high moral example set by Scalia?
petesmom
“What I’m wondering is whether it’s fair to ask people in these positions to consider voluntarily sacrificing some activities or actions?
They have the right to do these things. They’re within the rules. But rights don’t have to be exercised.”
It seems to me that the answer isn’t for her to decline to head a tea party group/advocate for repeal of healthcare, etc.; the answer is for her husband to recuse himself on any cases that touch on her advocacy, however slightly.
kay
@eric:
Oh, I agree. I bring it up constantly with them.
It’s odd that a LOT of high profile conservatives have all seized on this bizarro interpretation of what they’re calling the “First Amendment” that seems to mean they can’t be questioned without taking HUGE umbrage and getting all outraged.
I don’t think that’s the rule.
aimai
@Zifnab:
Uh, Clinton *didn’t leave his wife when she was being treated for cancer.* He didn’t leave his wife *at all.* Gingerich isn’t, in fact, excoriated for having had an affair but for the brutality with which he dumped each of the first two wives and the sanctimony with which he preached sexual morality while behaving immorally. And, of course, plenty of people on the right and the left complained about Clinton’s sex life.
aimai
cyntax
Ha! Here’s a little synergy: I just finished my corporate compliance training at my day job, which consists of a series of online tutorials outlining hypothetical situations for which you’re asked to determine if the company’s etchics code is violated. In one such scenario a bid is put out by a person in the company, and the lowest bid comes from a company this person’s wife is on the borad of. Can the contract be awarded? Answer is no. The company wants to avoid even the appearence of complicity.
Moral of the story: the company I work (a fortune 500 one) has better ethics than Clarence and Virginia Thomas.
Invisible Hand, Bitchez!
Southern Beale
My comment is awaiting moderation and I don’t know what I said wrong. There needs to be a list of banned words somewhere.
@jwb:
The DOJ of course. They are defending the legislation, right? But we liberal activist types can certainly start forcing the issue NOW. Of course no one in the media listens to US…
aimai
@Hogan:
Hogan beat me to it–if that link leads to Scalia’s hunt with Cheney. Hey Hogan! Hope things are going well.
aimai
Stillwater
@Kay: But don’t we (the public) have an expectation here too?
Yes. Our expectation, both dems and cons., is that Conservatives will violate any principle, agreement, restriction, rule or law if it will advance their agenda.
Southern Beale
IOKIYAR has been the national mantra for 25 years now, people. It’s always OK if you are a Republican. C’mon this is nothing new!
Hillary Clinton gets choked up and the wingers are all nuts about how she “doesn’t have what it takes” to be president. Boehner bawls like a baby at the drop of a hat and … crickets.
Teanuts can get as pissed off as they want, arm themselves to the teeth, shout over everyone in the room at the Town Hall meeting their congress critters organized, but it’s the LIBERALS who are “too angry” to be elected.
Fuckit, our discourse has been upside down for years. It just proves how phony the whole charade is. It’s all theater. The media doesn’t give a shit, hell they can’t even be bothered to fact check anything. Fuckit, they’re complicit. More election year advertising revenue for them!
I wash my hands of the whole damn lot of them.
harokin
There’s a difference between, “Honey, did you see that ACA law? OMG it’s clearly unconstitutional” and “Honey, just so you know, if you strike down ACA my firm will get a $500K bonus from the insurance industry.”
I have no idea whether either of those happened here, or what precisely the Post thought was the problem. The article seems to be premised on the concept that judges (and I guess their families) should be blank slates, which is unrealistic and untrue.
If Foucault is right about every act being political, what is left for judicial spouses to talk about?
News Reference
Didn’t Virginia Thomas claim to resign and then renege on that resignation once already?
Mnemosyne
@Zifnab:
That’s really the issue. You’re always going to have a certain amount of tribalism in politics, but when only one group has access to the media, that’s where you get the serious disparities.
Southern Beale
Speaking of … y’all will love this headline:
Scalia To Teach Tea Party Caucus’ Constitution Class
I mean really, what can you say. Clowns, every last one of them.
kay
@aimai:
This is why I disagree with most liberals on whether we can raise infidelity by religious conservatives.
I think I can. They opened the door, when they stood in judgment. I didn’t tell them to start yapping about Bill Clinton, they freely chose to do that.
So, tough shit. Fair game.
Omnes Omnibus
@harokin: While judges and their families are not, and cannot be, blank slates, I think there is something worth noting when the wife of a Supreme Court Justice is prominently advocating against a law that will come before the Court for consideration. I think it is disingenuous to suggest that the article was saying anything else.
jwb
@Southern Beale: What can the DoJ do? I think the only body that has control over the SCOTUS is Congress, which can impeach, but that’s not bloody likely with a GOP controlled House.
News Reference
“She didn’t violate any written or unwritten rule, and she has certain rights. “
Her husband violated the written rules of how Judges are supposed to act and should be impeached.
See: Codes of Conduct
Since John Roberts and Samuel Alito, have no “integrity”, “independence”, nor “impartiality”, impeachments efforts for them would be legitimate as well.
John Roberts perjured himself during his Senate hearings and both he and Samuel Alito have shown naked partiality and impropriety, Alito most recently by showing up at extreme right-wing money-lobbyist-meetings.
Mnemosyne
@harokin:
There is, and Virginia Thomas is very clearly the second case: her company will make money if the ACA is struck down.
But a judge should know what his/her spouse does for a living that might potentially impact the cases that s/he hears and recuse him/herself from any conflicts. Having a conversation with your spouse is not a conflict. Making a judgment on a case that you know will affect your spouse’s business is a serious conflict.
Of course, on this Supreme Court, it’s A-OK for a justice to have a direct conflict of interest, so I guess it’s nitpicky to say that spouses should not be allowed to financially benefit from the decisions of the nation’s highest court since the justices think they themselves should be allowed to.
News Reference
Formatting question: How do you get [blockquote] to include multiple paragraphs?
Omnes Omnibus
@News Reference: I believe you need to separate the paragraphs and put 3(?) underscores on the line between each paragraph.
kay
@harokin:
I’ve been following this with some interest. It’s not that simple:
Again, she does not have to disclose.
But I have an interest in this. Doesn’t she have some responsibility here? Is it so outrageous to think that she might do something without a court order?
I listened to C-Span testimony of federal judges asking Congress for a raise. I’m fine with them getting a raise. But the whole tone was as if they are doing me some favor, by “serving” when they could be raking in big bucks. I don’t think they are doing me a favor. I think that’s an incredibly prestigious and powerful position, and small sacrifices are part of the deal they made.
JR
The onus is supposedly on the judge to recuse himself when there’s any appearance of impropriety. That’s why Justice Breyer has a hard and fast rule about recusing himself in any cases where his brother, Charles, was involved (Charles is a federal district court judge in California).
In theory, Virginia Thomas should be able to do whatever the hell she wants with her life, and the task falls to Justice Thomas to recuse himself when his wife’s career or investments intersect with the Court. The problem is that he won’t.
The thing is, any sort of spousal career has a chance of being impacted by the Court’s business, since the Court reviews cases on every subject from corporate law to local zoning ordinances. It’s not fair to say to every jurist’s spouse that they have to sacrifice whatever independent career (and earnings potential) they might have worked to build simply because their better half got a new job and might–in one case out of the thousands they’ll review each year–have a conflict of interest. It’s far better to put the burden on the judge to recuse himself or herself when a conflict arises.
At the same time, for some reason, the Court leaves recusal decisions to the judges and Justices themselves. As we saw with Scalia and Cheney, this is a terrible system. An independent body of judges tasked with reviewing potential conflicts should be created to advise other judges on recusal.
Comrade Sock Puppet of the Great Satan
“Meanwhile, Yahoo is laying off 700 employees.”
I wonder how Yahoo’s doing personnel-wise given their best talent’s probably decamped for Google and Facebook yonks ago.
FlipYrWhig
@Omnes Omnibus: Two underscores actually.
What I still haven’t sorted out is how to stop the blockquote from bolding everything. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn’t. Also, nested blockquotes rarely work. FYWP!
Omnes Omnibus
@FlipYrWhig: Two then. I was not sure on that point.
harokin
@Mnemosyne: I think you’re right and I wish the article had stressed that more. The sense I got from the article was the Post assumes judges et ux are supposed to wink and say, “Now y’all know I can’t talk about that.” I think there must have been something much more pernicious that the Post just decided to ignore once she issued the disclaimer.
News Reference
Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito have clearly violated the “Code of Conduct for United States Judges”
Clarence Thomas received family income that was clearly designed to “influence judicial conduct or judgment.”
Samuel Alito clearly lent “the prestige of the judicial office to” … “convey or permit others to convey the impression that they are in a special position to influence the judge.”
kay
@Mnemosyne:
My sister thinks it’s worse that she’s a spouse, not a judge, and she has a point. Ginni is accountable to no one.
That’s why I don’t think the Ed Rendell comparison Thomas always makes works. Rendell is elected and his wife was appointed.
Comrade Sock Puppet of the Great Satan
“Gingrich gets crucified, but we all still love Clinton.”
Gingrich didn’t get impeached for a female staffer orally servicing his Gavel of Love, which allegedly was going on during the whole impeachment scandal.
Gingrich got crucified because he was a bombthrowing assclown who [justifiably] thought he could push Democrats around, but went too far and got his ass handed to him in the 1998 midterms. That’s why he resigned.
And if not for Justice O’Connor and a bad design of ballot in Palm Beach, Gingrich would be being blamed for a decade-and-a-half at least of the GOP being in the wilderness. As it is, the impeachment debacle put the 2000 election close enough for the SCOTUS to appoint Bush. So I guess the GOP owe Newt something.
Benjamin Cisco
@Omnes Omnibus: Removed due to redundant redundancy. Also, it had already been said once already.
Omnes Omnibus
@Benjamin Cisco: You can say that again.
Cheryl from Maryland
@Jewish Steel: No. To quote John Randolph of Roanoke, a very minor founding father, “I love Liberty; I hate Equality.”
Alex
Somewhat, but not entirely, ironic that EVERY one of the arguments listed in this post was employed by various conservative commentators who opposed the construction of the Park51/Cordoba House mosque. Somewhere, a shark has been jumped.
News Reference
(Second formatting attempt.)
From: USCourts.gov Codes of Conduct
Dick Cheney’s hunting buddy Antonin Scalia clearly had “personal bias[es] concerning” the Court cases that involved Dick Cheney and his Corporate paymaster Halliburton.
News Reference
FlipYrWhig, Omnes Omnibus, thanks for formatting help.
cyntax
@Alex:
No, not really. How could the muslim congregation in question exert undue influence on the government (in this case the Supreme Court)? That’s a very germane difference that you’re over-looking, but not by accident.
Mnemosyne
@Alex:
Whose wife was on the city board that approved the application to build? I’m not seeing the connection.
licensed to kill time
@News Reference:
Alex
@cyntax @Mnemosyne:
I should have been more precise. I was referring to Kay’s broader point about the (justified) distinction between the “right” to engage in some action and its propriety. When she says people “can choose to decline [to do something] simply because pursuing that particular activity or opportunity might raise an issue for some segment of the public,” it immediately harkens back in my mind to the arguments employed by a score of conservative figures against the construction of the Cordoba Mosque. My suspicion was that many progressives, in dismissing this type of argument as a mere rationalization for accretions of bigotry, hadn’t fully explored the distinction. This example buffers my original intuition.
Alex
I’d provide as a further example the decision by Charleton Heston and the NRA to demonstrate in Columbine shortly after the school shootings. Jon Stewart, who had criticized them at the time for doing so, publicly retracted this decision on his show during the Cordoba affair, saying that he had wrongly minimized the importance of exercising one’s rights when one deems it necessary to do so — even, as Kay says, when the “optics are bad.” I guess my larger point is that it is much tougher than she makes it out to be to decide when exercising a right — in this case, Virginia Thomas’s right to engage in constitutionally-protected political advocacy — is necessary or “inappropriate.”
Jewish Steel
@Cheryl from Maryland:
Another quote from his wiki page:
Even more apt, eh Clarence?
Tim in SF
Why are you mentioning rights at all, Kay? Rights are not germaine to the issue. What matters here is propriety and how little of it the Thomases have. The appropriate remedy here is shame.
Jackie
Mrs. Thomas resigned because the idea that there was a conflict of interest in citizens united started to get traction. The people who gave large sums to her group to reward her husband would have been displeased. No doubt she’s got a loose screw but she ain’t that crazy. She disappears and suddenly so did the issue.
Steeplejack (phone)
@FlipYrWhig:
No blank line between end of regular text and start of blockquote. WP inserts it automatically and unemboldens. Nested BQ tonight if you’re interested. Home about midnight EST.
Mnemosyne
@Alex:
The problem is that the “inappropriate” part has been twisted around by conservatives. It’s not inappropriate for Virginia Thomas to hold that job. It’s inappropriate for Justice Thomas to not recuse himself from cases that directly affect her job.
Since unfortunately he refused to do his clear duty as a jurist and recuse himself from the Citizens United case that his wife worked on because it was a major conflict of interest, now the poor woman has to lose her job. If he had done the right thing and avoided the appearance that he gave the case a favorable ruling because his wife was defending it, none of this would have happened.
If you’re going to blame anyone, blame Justice Thomas for ignoring his duty as a jurist and getting his wife fired because of it.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
.
.
It’s like I was telling Ginni just the other night: “You have the right to remain silent, and get me a Coke, bitch.”
And you others – quit telling me what to do. That’s Fat Tony’s job.
.
.
rikyrah
I believe she’s leaving because she hopes it will stop this two-part question from being asked
1. a)who gave you the money Mrs. Thomas
b) did any of those donors have a case coming up before the Supreme Court?
it’s a simple 2-part question that I believe the American people have the right to know the answer to, and if the question to part b is YES, then I think it’s time to draft those impeachment papers for Unca Clarence.