A CNN article on “the inside story of how John Roberts failed to save abortion rights” contains no real surprises. GOP political operative/Chief Justice John Roberts allegedly worked on Kavanaugh all spring to soften the majority opinion, hoping the court would gut Roe but leave a fig leaf in place — as the wingnut majority had previously done to the VRA — to mitigate potential backlash to the Republican Party.
As previously surmised, when the Alito draft leaked in May, the players were basically frozen in place:
Roberts and his colleagues spent a few anxious days quietly awaiting publication of the document, stretching through the afternoon of May 2, when all nine were together for a live-streamed memorial at the court for the late Justice John Paul Stevens. Politico first published its story about the draft that night at 8:32 p.m.
Roberts launched an investigation into who might be behind “this betrayal of the confidences of the Court.” He vowed that court’s work “will not be affected in any way.”
But, of course, it was, most notably in diminishing whatever chance he had to dislodge the five-justice bloc set to overturn Roe. The aggressive leak investigation worsened the existing strains among the justices, their law clerks and other employees in the nine chambers… Friction among all intensified as protests began, fencing and barricades were erected around the court, and some usual end-of-session lunches and parties were dropped.
Not the usual lunches and parties!
I have lots of sympathy for Justices Sotomayor and Kagan and retired Justice Breyer (what a shitty way to go out), plus incoming Justice Jackson. But maybe it’s best that the artificial comity was stripped away as their Republican operative colleagues exercised raw political power.
Everyone else knows the “balls and strikes” model Roberts tried to sell us as he prepared to rig future games is complete bullshit. So the justices needn’t pretend to be opera buddies anymore.
As for the leak, ask yourselves who it served. A couple of days ago, the AP published a piece on the status of the investigation:
The Supreme Court won’t say whether it’s still investigating.
The court also won’t say whether the leaker has been identified or whether anyone has been disciplined.
Or whether an outside law firm or the FBI has been called in.
Or whether the court will ever offer an accounting of what transpired.
Or whether it has taken steps to try to prevent a repeat.
To these and other emailed questions, Supreme Court spokeswoman Patricia McCabe said by email: “The Court has no comment.”
The AP piece also says “the public might never know.”
My guess is former and current cult member Mrs. Justice Thomas is the leaker. She already tried to overthrow the government, so what’s a draft opinion leak to the likes of her? Since the unaccountable star chamber doesn’t feel we’re owed an explanation, we’ll have to draw our own conclusions.
Open thread.
ETA: Paul Campos at LGM theorizes that Alito leaked his own draft. I think that’s a better theory than my Ginni Thomas guess.
Dorothy A. Winsor
LGM has a piece arguing that Alito leaked his own draft.
Baud
The silence at least proves the leaker wasn’t a liberal.
CliosFanBoy
@Dorothy A. Winsor: I was about to post the same thing. I think their argument makes sense. Alito wanted to lock-in Justice McRape
ETtheLibrarian
The lack of info is the most telling thing. That we haven’t heard anything even though SCOTUS is famously closed-mouth, means they know who it is and are burying it. The only people they would bury this for are justices and spouses. They would throw a clerk and anyone else out on their ass and we would have heard about it by now.
matt
Someone should leak the results of the leak investigation.
Villago Delenda Est
These arrogant motherfuckers will be their own undoing. And I will be pleased to observe their demise.
robmassing
LOL John Roberts had no intention of saving abortion rights. His own reputation, maybe, but he’s just as much an Opus Dei fascist as the rest of them and was none too unhappy with Dobbs, I am sure.
Betty Cracker
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Okay, after reading that, it makes more sense than my theory.
Villago Delenda Est
@robmassing: He need not worry about his legacy, he’s well on the way to challenging Roger Taney in that regard as being the lowest of the low, and there’s no possibility of redemption.
Betty Cracker
@robmassing: Agreed. If Roberts got his way, Roe would still be gutted, but it wouldn’t be a full-out reversal and probably wouldn’t have garnered the media attention we’re seeing now. Roberts was trying to contain backlash against Republicans, nothing more.
Leto
Steve Bannon to air ‘special’ to prepare ‘4,000 shock troops’ on ‘deconstructing’ government; sentient coat rack again laying the plan out in the open.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Leto: Bannon’s carrying on like a guy who wasn’t recently convicted of a politically-motivated act of contempt. I think I read he’s got a couple of months to wait out a slim chance at a successful appeal and then sentencing. You’d think one of his lawyers could give him a list of “Don’t talk about….” subjects for his little show.
Leto
Also can’t wait for this SCROTUS to overturn child labor laws:
The Moar You Know
I have always thought Alito leaked his own draft. If the question “who benefitted by such leak?” is asked, the only answer is Alito.
Leto
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: it’s almost like he knows there’s minimal consequences for him, so will continue to do it. Lol, what are they going to do? Put him in prison? hahahahaha
Villago Delenda Est
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: He didn’t hire his lawyers for advice, only to prevent himself from being viewed as having a fool for a client.
Lacuna Synecdoche
Betty Cracker @ Top:
We’ll know, someday. Maybe tomorrow, maybe in 50 years. Eventually someone, probably one of the justices after they retire, will tell the press or publish it in a memoir. The only way to keep a secret is if only one person knows it – and we’re way beyond that already. The leaker(s), the journalist, and the editor all know. Plus whoever they told. Plus anyone who figured it out in the “investigation.”
geg6
I think Campos is right. Why wouldn’t Alito do it? There’s no reason not to and Roberts had his nuts cut off in the bargain. Roberts should just resign. He has no control over the court. It’s Thomas and Alito in charge. Jesus.
Princess
Ginsburg and Scalia weren’t pretending to be opera buddies. They were opera buddies.
Lacuna Synecdoche
Betty Cracker @ Top:
I’ve been pushing the “Alito (or one of his clerks) did it” theory since the day it happened, but I think both theories are equally valid. Hell, it might have been leaked by Ginni at Alito’s request.
Baud
@geg6:
Roberts can get at least one nut back by outing Alito as the leaker. Don’t think he’ll do it though.
Villago Delenda Est
@Baud: He’s too cowardly to do the slightest thing about it. He’s been made chump change, and he seems to be fine with it.
James E Powell
@robmassing:
Exactly. This article is pushed by some Roberts stan who wants to make him look like less of a right-wing radical. He’s an asshole. He has no redeeming “moderate” tendencies.
James E Powell
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
He’s carrying on like a guy who is confident he will never be punished. In fact, he expects to be rewarded for loyalty when all this investigation nonsense goes away.
Can anyone really be sure he’s wrong?
Steeplejack
@Betty Cracker:
Yeah, they would have loved to publicly flay some hapless “Democrat” clerk if they had even a wisp of evidence. Perhaps even if it was a “misguided” or careless clerk of a right-wing justice. But this silence seems to indicate that it’s someone high up on the right end of the court. Mrs. Justice Ginni seems likely. I’ll have to read the LGM piece.
trollhattan
@robmassing: Exactly. A “kinder, gentler” execution of reproductive rights is still an execution of reproductive rights. This was baked in with Coathanger’s flashmob confirmation.
What law did the leak break? None, I figure. The faux rage should be highlighted as yet another stain on the Roberts court. He should resign in disgrace, if he’s so concerned. [as if]
SFAW
@Lacuna Synecdoche:
Or vice versa.
Trigger warning!
“Sam and Ginni lay back in bed, exhausted after their mutual efforts. A few minutes later, after Sam/Ginni had caught his/her breath, he/she rolled over to face his/her lover, and said ‘Honey, there’s a small favor I’d like you to do for me …’ ”
Can’t say I didn’t warn youse.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@SFAW: That’s some tricky pronoun use, libtard
Major Major Major Major
Every right-winger on Twitter is convinced that a lib leaked it, so Occam’s Razor says a conservative did it.
@Dorothy A. Winsor: a real libtard would just use they/them
hueyplong
The most disgusting thing isn’t which of them leaked it. It’s the way they all immediately hit volume 11 on how it was some dastardly liberal, an absurdity echoed (as usual) by the idiots who comprise the supposedly neutral sectors of the media.
trollhattan
@geg6:
Alito is every bit as pompous as Scalia was (hence “Scalito”) and one presumes was super-proud of his 16th(?) century precedent argument, so had to get it in circulation in case it got deleted in a later draft, or whatever they call versions of opinions.
Tony G
@matt: Somebody should leak a video of the leakers taking a leak. There is not right to privacy, so nobody should complain about that.
Steeplejack
@Steeplejack:
Paul Campos makes a good case in the LGM piece. It strikes me that Ginni Thomas is more of a bomb-thrower, and this leak was a calculated operation.
Tony G
@trollhattan: Alito, Thomas, Boofy McRape, Roberts and Saint Coney Barret are all so despicable in different ways. Choosing the worst one is like fans choosing their favorite Beatle back in the Stone Age. The choice says a lot about the psychology of the person choosing.
Bill Arnold
@James E Powell:
The Biden(/Harris) administration will be in charge of the Justice Department for the next 2.5 years.
Bannon also hasn’t won anything recently, except scoring a Trump pardon in a fraud case. Nearly all of his initiatives have fizzled, in part because for the last few years he has had a broken (as in not predictive) mental model of the USA electorate.
eclare
FYI…I keep with People.com (yes, I like celebrity gossip), and it has an article up about that TX Moms Against Abbott ad that we have posted about today. So the ad is getting attention. I can’t link, but it’s on People.com. No paywall.
Spanky
@Leto:
As long as they’re not playing chess with Russian robots.
lowtechcyclist
Anyone remember what the wingnuts (including Fox News, of course) said about how the leaker should be punished?
SFAW
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
If yer talking about the “youse,” that’s a bona fidey New Yawk pronoun. Not that a former Iowan would know about dat.
If you’re talking about the “his/her” thing, that was because I don’t know which of them initiated it, and wanted to leave it open. I guess I could have put [brackets] around the [his/her] et al., but I don’t know if that would have made it clearer.
Damn straight!
SFAW
@trollhattan:
You figure worng. US Code has a whole Section devoted to punishment for “Stuff Which Lie-berals Say or Do Which Make Real ‘Muricans Feel Bad, Guilty, or A Teensy Bit Uncomfortable.”
Anyway
@Tony G:
Gorsuch is EVIL too.
kindness
I saw Paul’s piece at LG&M this am. I wasn’t impressed enough by his argument to change my mind that Ginni was the leaker but will admit there may have been more than one leak. Alito is Opus Dei enough to try to burn any moderate bridges to Roberts. Funny how a Reagan lawyer flunky who’se life’s ambition is to overthrow the VRA, can be called a moderate. (hint: He’s not.)
trollhattan
@SFAW: Well, when you put it that way. Also, “stuff that Fox says is bad, m’kay?”
Paul in KY
@SFAW: Yeeeeickkkk! You did warn me, though.
danielx
It does seem that letting dear old Felix out of the bag would serve Alito’s purposes in several ways.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I think that’s a good thing. People who read politico, even who know what politico is, are probably pretty set in their opinions
EarthWindFire
@lowtechcyclist: None of that on Fox anymore either. Conservative politicians (and conservative judges are politicians) are damn lucky none of their supporters can read the room.
sab
@Leto: Jeezus! 12 year olds in a stamping plant? That’s dangerous work for adults.
CaseyL
Since the GOP has gotten away with eroding women’s health rights over the last 20 years, and SCOTUS has gutted the VRA without overturning it outright, there is logic to the idea that Roberts was hoping to do the same thing with Roe on a national level: hollow it out, but leave the bare stem remaining. That way, white women who vote GOP could reassure themselves they could still get abortions, so the new restrictions wouldn’t apply to them.
Dobbs removed even that fig leaf, and the GOP-run state legislators are having fun playing “Can you top this?” with restrictions that try to outdo one another in their cruelty, invasiveness, and malign indifference to peoples’ health. So white GOP women don’t have that comfortable rationalization anymore.
Whether that will change their voting behavior in sufficient numbers to affect outcomes… is something we’ll have to wait and see about. Christian/White Supremacy is a powerful drug.
Edmund Dantes
@geg6: Alito also still holds a grudge about not getting the Chief Justice seat that he thought belonged to him when Rehnquist up and died unexpectedly shuffling the whole O’Connor replacement thing the GOP had planned.
I bet he thinks he should have gotten the Rehnquist nomination and they should have kept Roberts as the replacement for the retiring O’Connor.
sab
@Villago Delenda Est: He’ll never even be a Taney. Taney was out of step with subsequent history, but never regarded as weak.
Paul in KY
@Tony G: I’m partial to Kegger McBarfo, myself.
Captain C
Using this analogy, Roberts and his court make Angel Hernandez look like the pinnacle of umpiring.
eclare
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I think so too, I was glad to see the article. The more people who see that (and I assume the readership is overwhelmingly female) while checking out the latest on Bennifer, the better.
Tony G
@Paul in KY: The man has many aliases.
Tony G
@Anyway: Sorry. Didn’t mean to overlook Gorsuch!
Soprano2
I just read a story in WaPo about the rain in St. Louis, and holy cow – some parts of NW St. Louis got 10″ of rain in 6 hours! Words fail me of what that was like. Predictably, when I was talking about it in the lunchroom one guy said “Well, if it’s ‘certain parts’ of the city that’s not a big loss”. I said that wasn’t funny, people get hurt and die when things like this happen and it’s never OK no matter where it happens. I’m sure he meant the black-black-blackity part of the city, because that’s always what they mean when they say stuff like that.
Soprano2
@Leto: Yeah, now I feel guilty that I own a Hyundai Sonata, but I’m not going to get rid of it.
Ivan X
I always thought the draft was leaked to blunt the surprise. If the ruling was issued out of the blue and no one saw it coming except court watchers, there might have been literal riots.
cmorenc
@ETtheLibrarian:
Exactly. The hard-core 5 are circling the wagons to shield the leaker, and Chief Justice Roberts is reluctant to challenge them by forcing discipline or disclosure upon them, because he doesn’t want to lose whatever remaining influence and leverage he has with them in order to shape future SCOTUS decisons. He realizes they could react by freezing him out indefinitely from influence, just as they already give the to the moderate 3 the “la la la can’t hear you” treatment, because they have a controlling 5 votes without him and hence can do whatever they want to impose their far-RW fever dreams upon the law.
Ruckus
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Steve’s lawyers likely agree with him politically. Maybe, maybe not as far outside the box as he is but still, is he going to hire someone completely sane? Because he likely couldn’t even make a sane decision, he “functions” in a world that even in the worst of times wasn’t as bad as the world inside his disgusting pudding bowl of a cranium.
Baud
@Captain C:
Really brings home how bad the Court is right now.
Paul in KY
@Soprano2: That person is a dick. Has outed themselves if you hadn’t thought of them as one, prior to their odious comment.
Ruckus
@James E Powell:
“He’s an asshole. He has no redeeming “moderate” tendencies.”
Me thinks you are being too kind here…..
Tony G
@cmorenc: Roberts still wants to be invited to respectable cocktail parties. The other five don’t care about that. In a way, he’s worse than they are.
Leto
@Soprano2: wouldn’t say get rid of it, but this is another piece for anyone’s next vehicle purchase. Also just the current state of conservative thought wrt to children/labor market.
Leto
@Ruckus: some of the legal arguments his attorney tried to use, the judge shut that shit down with extreme haste. Even shut down arguments he might have brought up. But def agree that his lawyer swims in the same scum pond Bannon does.
trollhattan
@Tony G: Lunch on the Vineyard with Dersh?
Tazj
@Ivan X: I always thought that too. Leak it and let the outrage die down and then grim acceptance before the decision is released. Anti-abortion politicians and religious leaders were never actually afraid of violence from pro-choice people but they sure hyped the potential for it.
The leak was the most horrible thing that ever happened to the Supreme Court until it wasn’t. Now you don’t hear about it anymore from conservatives and probably never will again.
The reasoning Alito gives for overturning Roe is so misogynistic but conservatives don’t care. They love it and they’re so smug about it. It was always a bad decision! It’s not in the constitution like the right to bear arms libtards!
eclare
@Soprano2: Ugh. Good for you for speaking up.
soapdish
Some of the kids are all right.
https://www.npr.org/2022/07/25/1113508044/michigan-medical-students-walk-out-on-an-anti-abortion-keynote-speaker
Ruckus
@Soprano2:
How much does Hyundai own, what percentage?
How much actual control do they have?
I’m not saying this isn’t bad but what if they own 10% and have zero control of how the plant is run? Who are the owners of the part Hyundai doesn’t own? It may be extremely important or it may be total bullshit. Why is Hyundai the only automaker named? Is it their stamping plant or did they invest in it so they could be customers of a local plant among several others? And if so why aren’t the others named?
My point is it’s crappy reporting. It may also be Hyundai’s fault/problem/responsibility, but it may be that they didn’t even know.
It’s crappy reporting.
Lapassionara
@Soprano2: There was flooding in University City, which is close to Washington University and a middle class area. See Sarah Kendzior on Twitter. Also flooding in Ladue, as in “la-di-dah” Ladue. Flooding seems to be an equal opportunity destroyer.
The Moar You Know
I for one would like to congratulate Actual Chief Justice Samuel Alito on his promotion.
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: I have one too–mine, if I recall correctly, was imported from South Korea so was presumably manufactured there (not to say labor conditions there are necessarily better, and of course it’s still Hyundai’s responsibility to ethically source their stuff).
Hyundai has been working hard to attain more of an upscale, “cool” image over the past several years, and I imagine this kind of thing tarnishes that too.
Captain C
@Baud:
Which is why I will forever refer to this court as the Dred Scott Roberts court. A whole decade and a half-plus of egregiously bad decisions, and absurd rationalizations to support them (when they don’t just do the shadow docket ‘it’s this way and screw you, peasant!’ thing).
Leto
@Ruckus: Did you read the first sentence? I’ll post it again:
Bold is mine seeing how you missed it the first time. This isn’t a “10%” ooops, they don’t know what’s going on! This is same shit that Nike, and the rest of the fashion world is caught up in. They know what the fuck is going on. It’s not bad reporting. How the fuck is it bad reporting exposing child fucking labor? Also “I didn’t know” isn’t a fucking excuse. You should remember that from the Navy. And if they say, “I didn’t know”, it means they’re not performing proper oversight of their plant. So that would be another issue. Which from the reporting of amputations, they should look at safety and oversight more thoroughly.
Again, not bad reporting. Just again for those in the back:
Cameron
@Captain C: Balls and strikes? More like bollocks and shite.
Geminid
@Ruckus: Hyundai alway interested me because they were one of the world’s biggest shipbuilders before they got into automaking. Maybe the biggest.
trollhattan
A band of weather is rolling through N/CA along with “chance of thunderstorms” and all fingers and toes are crossed in hopes lightning doesn’t happen in the mountains. Dry up there.
Saw a good twelve, eighteen raindrops this morning.
The Moar You Know
@Ruckus: “majority owned” – I assume that’s over 50% – as per Reuters.
As per their own website, Smart Alabama LLC has one and only one customer: Hyundai.
Soprano2
@Baud: A Cardinal fan would invoke the name Don Denkinger, same idea.
Soprano2
@Paul in KY: Oh, I’ve heard a lot of stuff like that from him before. Probably half of the people I work with think or say similar things.
RepubAnon
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Sounds plausible. Also explains why no punishment occurred.
Soprano2
@Ruckus: True, crappy reporting seems to be more the norm than it used to be. This morning’s “On Point” was about why people tune out of the news, and this was one of the things that was brought up as a reason (one of many, it was an interesting hour).
Soprano2
@Lapassionara: With the rainfall totals I saw there had to be widespread flooding everywhere. I feel so badly for MSD (Metro St. Louis Sewer District). Sucks to be them right now. I can’t even imagine the calls they must have gotten about something they can’t do anything about.
Roger Moore
@Tony G:
I think it’s more strategic than that. Roberts understands the importance of maintaining good PR. He wants to undermine stuff subtly so people continue to respect the Court and its decisions as it guts the laws Republicans don’t like. The more radical members don’t care and just want to tear down the liberal order as fast as possible. The cratering public opinion of the Court shows how much harm the radicals can do to the Court’s public perception if they aren’t careful. IMO, that strategic vision is exactly why W chose Roberts as the new Chief Justice.
zhena gogolia
RIP Tony Dow.
West of the Rockies
@SFAW:
Worst fan fic ever.
scav
Those Opus Dei creeps have undoubtedly embraced the old Jesuit execrable doctrine of equivocation.
Ruckus
@Tazj:
I wonder if their “love” of all these disastrous decisions is because conservatives have been losing their “control” for a number of years and the only way they are going to be able to get their hate on is to reimpose doctrine from the 15th century?
PST
@sab:
My father worked in one once after high school while waiting for the navy to take him. He said, “You could estimate a man’s seniority by counting his fingers.”
geg6
@Ruckus:
No need to wonder. You’re exactly right.
Ruckus
@Leto:
Well, NO, of course not. My reading skills are almost as old as I am….
Yes, that does make my comment – wrong, incorrect, stupid, asinine….
I have awarded myself an F for the morning. I make no guarantees that I will be able to do better in the future, but I’ll sure damn well make the attempt.
So, NEVER MIND, I’ll shut the hell up now……
raven
@Ruckus: Morning????
Ruckus
@raven:
I was awake at 3 am this morning, woke up at 10:30.
This retirement stuff is hard on a person, sleep when you want, wake up late, do whatever the hell you want, time has ceased to run my life. So yes it was my morning….. And I’m sticking to that. And for anyone who might think it, I stopped drinking over 20 yrs ago…..
Redshift
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: The more Bannon wants to run his mouth, the better. Any “appeals” will be bogus arguments about how the judge was wrong to exclude his bullshit defenses (his “I should be allowed to call Nancy Pelosi and Benny Thompson” is equivalent to arguing a traffic ticket by saying the chief of police should be required to explain why traffic laws apply to you personally), so all this talk will do is provide copious evidence of lack of remorse for sentencing.
While any jail time would be great, possibly the most positive outcome is that he’s no longer someone with no previous record for purposes of sentencing guidelines, the next time he pulls one of his bullshit schemes and gets arrested. (Yeah, I’m an optimist, you don’t have to tell me.)
Redshift
@Roger Moore: Kinda weird that the Federalist Society didn’t take that into account, though. Considering what a long game they played, you’d think they’d realize that just because you’ve “won,” that doesn’t guarantee you’ve won forever, and would pay more attention to preserving their victories.
Gravenstone
@Leto: Someone dearly wants their ass to land in prison for a very, very long time.
Leto
@Ruckus: <3 I can see you’re enjoying retirement, and as a fellow retired, WELCOME! :)
Gravenstone
@Leto: Wondering if the families put their kids out there to get extra money, or if the plant put the squeeze on them under threat of turning them into INS?
Actually, I don’t wonder at all…
Leto
@Gravenstone: That’s the thing, Trumpov signed the “Section F” executive order in Oct 2020, but Biden rescinded it. That EO basically turned most non-political appointments in the Executive Branch into “at-will” employment. They’re planning on replacing everyone and installing “loyalists”. Another coup attempt, essentially.
Gravenstone
@sab: But the wee little scamps are just the right size to squeeze in between the presses. Just like in good old Victorian England!
raven
@Ruckus: Artemis the dog will have no truck with sleeping in!
Dangerman
@Soprano2:
The Don Deckinger game would be interesting now; it would have been overturned on review and World Series is over.
KC had another play that would have been interesting to end the WS. Royals/Giants and left fielder for SF completely bones the play. Royals player stops at third and doesn’t force a throw home. Good throw and he’s out, thus ending WS, but bad throw and game tied. Grow a pair, 3rd base coach.
ETA: WS has never ended on a throw home. Kinda like last weeks 8-5 triple play, woulda been interesting to see.
James E Powell
@Bill Arnold:
What Bannon thinks will happen =/= what will happen, but how confident are you that the Rs won’t win the house?
Bill Arnold
@lowtechcyclist:
Here’s one from the NY Post, May 3 2022:
The Supreme Court’s integrity demands its leaker be prosecuted — and the decision released now (Andrew C. McCarthy, May 3, 2022)
schrodingers_cat
We have to thank Nader voters in Florida for giving us both Alito and Roberts. With friends like the purity progressives who needs enemies
The conservative 5 brought to you by Nader and Stein voters.
Soprano2
@Dangerman: I’ve thought about that. I hated that we lost on a bad play like that. I don’t mind losing fair and square, but when the call is so bad that everyone but Kansas City and the ump could see it, well…..Plus, that was one of the best St. Louis teams I’ve ever watched, they totally deserved that World Series win.
raven
Insane goal by Russo for England!
Soprano2
@schrodingers_cat: They didn’t help, but the person who designed the Palm Beach ballot in 2000 is probably what actually cost Gore the election. I doubt over 3,000 people in that county meant to vote for Pat Buchanan, but that’s who they accidentally voted for. Even 2,000 votes the right way would have meant Gore was ahead, and things would have been different. Lots and lots of “what ifs” with that election. I still want to know what happened in Leon County, for example. I think that’s the one where they destroyed the ballots as soon as they could.
Jackie
@zhena gogolia: Apparently premature announcement; he IS in hospice. https://nypost.com/2022/07/26/leave-it-to-beaver-star-tony-dow-still-alive-wife-mistakenly-believed-he-was-dead/amp/
catclub
@Captain C:
Dread Pirate Roberts ref!
James E Powell
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
I agree. My theory is that he did it to show any wavering votes that the reaction would not be extreme. They were always going to do it. That was determined when RBG died. Their only concern was whether it would blow up in the Rs faces for the midterms. The reaction to the leaked opinion was pretty mild, so they went ahead and did it.
It remains to be seen whether Dobbs has any outcome determinative impact on the midterm elections. We can hope it will, we can say it should, but I will be surprised if abortion rights causes any R to lose. I can’t think of a recent election when it did.
cain
@Captain C: I’m glad that you didn’t insult the whole thing by calling it Dread Pirate Roberts instead.
ETA – thank you – 115. I’ll take it.
trollhattan
@raven:
Managed to find the video (not able to watch). Holy hell. A nutmeg to boot.
https://twitter.com/JeffKassouf/status/1552027851926474754?cxt=HHwWhMC4uffG9IkrAAAA
Not even Sam Kerr…..
cain
@Ruckus: Well you sure caused a Ruckus. The name fits? :-)
Bill Arnold
@James E Powell:
Bannon has already been convicted. He can try to get it overturned, but it was a straightforward case. The new House could I suppose ask that the charges be dropped, but the offense would have been against the previous House, and it was committed. Definitely am not a lawyer though.
As to confidence about the outcomes of the Nov 2022 elections, well, they are a (adversarial) work in progress.
ETA the DoJ also appears to be interested in S-Bannon for insurrection-related reasons.
Dangerman
@Soprano2: I just watched an interesting YouTube. Top 5 reasons you can’t blame Dekinger. I thought the play at first was 3rd out but it was lead off.
Only play I can recall that was that bad a call was Yankees Twins a few years ago. Fair or foul down 3rd base line and Ump flat blew it. I recall it being fair by a foot.
There was a Braves game (against Cardinals, IIRC) where there was a questionable infield fly call but at least that one was debatable.
Instant replay that stuff goes away.
Uncle Cosmo
@Captain C: Extreme Court of the United States – XCOTUS, pronounced “Execute us!”
raven
@trollhattan: What’s a nutmeg?
Ruckus
@raven:
Now that would be a great way to be woken up!
sab
@Uncle Cosmo: Works on signs but might get you in trouble if you just yelled it in the wrong circumstances.
Leto
@raven: when a player moves the ball between another players legs. So kick it between their feet: nutmeg.
trollhattan
@raven: @Leto:
Yes, in this instance the keeper’s legs, which is mortifying to a keeper.
Ruckus
@cain:
Didn’t choose it without intent…….
HinTN
@Soprano2:
You should have just said so. Fuck these fucking fucktards.
raven
@trollhattan: Aha, even in the women’s game!
pajaro
@Dangerman:
If the Don Denkinger call is overturned, there’s one out in the Ninth.
raven
@Ruckus: She’s so funny. If I get up before 5am she can wait but, any later, that long tail gets ta waggin!
Leto
@trollhattan: oh god… yeah, that’s bad. I mean, I’ve seen it in all levels but it’s always like… poor keep =/
sab
@raven: I can never say No to a pitbull tail. Persistent little whips those guys have on the back end.
pajaro
@Bill Arnold:
One of the things that points to the conservatives leaking is the fact that there was an actual leak the preceding week to the Wall Street Journal (no liberals need apply) describing the worry of “some” on the court that Justice Boof might not be 100% reliable and might fall victim to Roberts’ effort to craft a compromise.
The Journal article both shows that someone on the right might leak, and it also establishes a motive for someone on the right to leak the draft.
r€nato
anybody read Chris Cilizza’s latest bOtH SiDeS!?!?!!!??ELEVENTY!!??!?! bullshit?
I can’t even with this guy.
eversor
I’m going to vote R this ticket, we won’t tackle the Christian issue so fuck it drive it home. I’ll vote D again when when we have a plan to strip their rights and kill them. Till then. we should lose, and I support our death.
Baud
@James E Powell:
A decent chunk of the reaction was blaming Democrats.
Cacti
If a left winger had leaked it, the info would be public by now.
rikyrah
Knew that it was a right-winger that had leaked it.
When they stopped bringing it up.
Betty
@zhena gogolia: Already corrected. Still not good news though.
James E Powell
@Baud:
I sometimes wonder if people really believe that or if it’s just a reflexive reaction to everything.
So much of what passes for political discourse is just a thrown together mix of tropes & phrases that are deeply ingrained. They seem to explain things – both sides, the left is too extreme, Democrats in disarray, voting is a waste of time – but they actually work to obscure what is really going on. They seem to be pretty effective. Like a drug people take to relieve them from the pain of thinking & acting.
Cacti
And for the love of all that is good and wholesome, would the liberal Justices PLEASE stop making a point to say what swell people the SCOTUS theocrats are on a personal level.
If they’re willing to use their position to strip rights away from Americans for political reasons, they’re not good people. And I don’t give AF if they’re a pleasant co-worker.
Miss Bianca
@eversor: Yawn. Must you stay? Can’t you go?
ian
@eversor: your back! I wondered what that smell was.
prostratedragon
Note on site to WaterGirl, if you see it: On this page, and this page only it seems, the NoScript add-on that I use will not allow scripts to execute, even though I’ve permitted them for balloon-juice.com and the various other contributing sites that make the pages work. Repeat, it’s only this article so far; the next post and previous posts all seem to work as they should, as does the top page. Next time there’s a site-related post I’ll try to mention it.
raven
@sab: We’ve been amazed at how she tumps!
prostratedragon
@prostratedragon: Now, strangely enough, I just got all the scripts running by clicking “here to refresh.”
Strange, because refreshing from the browser control was not working, and because as noted I was having no trouble with any other page before or after this one.
Elizabelle
This Supreme Court stinks of illegitimacy. You cannot not see it.
I wonder how these fine minds, the USSC conservatives and GOP politicians, never got the concept of “consent of the governed.”
Soprano2
@Dangerman: That play completely changed the momentum of the game. You can’t quantify that. Fucking Denkinger.
Steeplejack
Relevant meme.
Citizen Alan
@schrodingers_cat:
To be fair, we have Osama bin Laden to thank for alito and Robertd. Bush had no Supreme Court vacancies during his 1st term. And I’m convinced that he would have never been re elected had it not been for 911.
livewyre
@Elizabelle: In short, they get it – they just affirmatively oppose it. Conservatism means you take the place you’re given or else. Consent is an obscenity. Just ask Limbaugh’s ghost.
WaterGirl
PSA: raffle ticket sales end at midnight tonight. See the posts in the sidebar for more information.
Also copied here for convenience for mobile peeps:
Ukraine Quilt Raffle
Tickets for “Sale” thru Tuesday
Raffle Tickets Available!
Individual Blocks are Available
Uncle Cosmo
@HinTN: Shoulda said
And if he clams up, start naming pricey whitey neighborhoods & adding after each, “Wouldn’t be much of a loss there, would it?” til the fucker ‘splodes.