Barrett spurns Supreme Court bias claims after string of Trump shadow docket wins
“I want people to understand, agree or disagree with the decisions that the court reaches, that we are engaged in a legal enterprise."
@courthousenews.bsky.social
www.courthousenews.com/barrett-spur…— Kelsey Reichmann (@kelseyreichmann.bsky.social) September 25, 2025 at 5:54 PM
===
Thomas also gave public remarks on Thursday, suggesting that the precedent purge isn’t ending anytime soon www.courthousenews.com/thomas-signa…
— Kelsey Reichmann (@kelseyreichmann.bsky.social) September 25, 2025 at 10:05 PM
Josh Marshall has some proposals:
For 26 but especially 2028 it's time for Democrats to make clear that the current Supreme Court will have to be reformed (expanded in number, reformed in structure) to allow popular govt to continue in the United States. Not so much a litmus test as precondition for any other promise to be credible.
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm.bsky.social) September 27, 2025 at 11:38 AM
2/ My own preference is for the number of Justices to be expanded by at least six for terms of ten years (re-appointable) and the Court restructured to operate more like one of the federal appellate circuits. But that’s just one idea, not necessarily the best. This can all be done by simple…
3/ majority votes. There remains a lot of resistance to these necessary reforms. But the last eight months have helpfully clarified the extreme corruption of the current court. No new legislation can have real impact as long as the Court willfully misinterprets the plain meaning of statutes or …
4/ makes de facto rulings without opinions that provide explanation or precedent. The responsibility for this dangerous set of circumstances rests entirely with the corruption of the current members.
5/ It’s a very secondary matter. But this is also something all law professors and people in legal academia generally need to reckon with. Over the last three or four years there’s been a growing number of law profs who’ve been forced to reckon with the current majority’s extreme corruption …
6/ and realize, admit that reform is necessary. But quite a few still persist making excuses for the current corruption as though it were a matter of differing judicial philosophies etc. In a way it’s professional self-preservation because if the work of the legal judicial/academic system isn’t …
7/ an intellectual pursuit, a matter of scholarship and thought but rather a system of mystification and pure power than what are you doing exactly? Then it’s just PR work for people who got great grades as undergrads and nailed the LSATs. I’m not saying that’s the entirety of it.
8/ But that’s the reality for those who haven’t been able to reckon with the Court’s corruption.
Another ‘engaged in a legal enterprise’ proponent heard from:
Justice Anthony Kennedy tells @npr.org's @ninatotenberg.bsky.social "very worried" about our country, and that "Democracy is not guaranteed to survive."
Kennedy wrote Citizens United and was the fifth vote in the rest of the Roberts Court's anti-democratic decisions.
www.npr.org/2025/09/27/n…— Mike Sacks (@mikesacks.bsky.social) September 27, 2025 at 7:34 PM
Baud
I agree with Josh and would love to see this work. That said, liberals have a history of grand ideas and anemic implementation.
M31
Justice Kennedy being fitted for his banana costume as we speak.
What a piece of shit.
PsiFighter37
Anthony Kennedy can kick rocks.
Baud
Maybe Trump will indict Kennedy next.
NeenerNeener
@Baud: It’s not outside the realm of possibilities. Having helped Trump in the past is no guarantee that he won’t turn on you in the future. The people he “owes” one way or another become bigger targets sometimes.
Ishiyama
Indict Thomas and Alito on corruption and bribery charges. Indict Kavanaugh and Coney Barrett on perjury charges during their confirmation hearings. Have the Secret Service drag them into the White House and let the President jawbone them into resigning, or else expand the Court.
There is more than one way to skin a cat. All that is required is the will.
Baud
@Ishiyama:
LOL
The triumph of the will, even.
bobbo1
Kennedy: Partisanship is mean and a threat to our democracy, not because the rightwing of the Court is utterly corrupt and keeps giving Trump the power of a king, but because the liberals on the Court have pointed this out.
lowtechcyclist
As a stopgap pending (hopefully) more serious reform in 2029:
In the (unlikely but not impossible) event that the Dems retake the Senate next November, they should refuse to consider any Trump nominees to the Supreme Court in the event that Thomas or Alito step down while Trump can nominate their successors.
Mitch McConnell had publicly said that he was going to do this to prevent Hillary Clinton from elevating anyone to SCOTUS, if (as everyone then expected) she were to be elected in 2016. And of course he’d already blocked Garland from Senate consideration. Might as well recycle Mitch’s justification re Garland that the people of the United States should get to vote on who would do the nominating.
sab
@Ishiyama: Indictments won’t work if the conviction can (and will) be reversed by the cirrent court.
lowtechcyclist
If Anthony Kennedy is concerned about “antagonistic, confrontational” political conversation, he might should consider which side of the political divide has been talking about “Second Amendment solutions” for many years now.
NobodySpecial
Barrett misspoke. The Sinister Six are involved in a criminal, not a legal, enterprise. Gods, do I hate these people.
Suzanne
Anthony Kennedy is another one of these people whose biggest concern seems to be that Americans are increasingly impolite. This kind of clown can be found on our side, too, but I generally think the Politeness Fetishists on the blue side are just overly earnest children, whereas the ones on the red side are essentially Anton Chigurh.
I basically welcome any Democrat at this point, regardless of ideology, who recognizes that we are dealing with a party full of Anton Chigurhs and strategize accordingly.
Ishiyama
@sab: Indictments don’t work if you don’t try them. You bring the charges for leverage, right? And you can up the ante by sending them to GITMO pending trial, holding them incommunicado, depriving the Court of a quorum. After Bush v. Gore there was no concealing the problem, but nobody had the guts to address it. I will repeat myself: If it must be done, it can be done. Lincoln had to defy Roger Taney.
prostratedragon
@lowtechcyclist:
Oh my, yes. And expansion to the number of Circuits,which further more one sometimes hears should be increased also. And maybe we all meditate VERY loudly on the Good Behavior Clause.
artem1s
legal alchemy? or more likely snakeoil salesmen. you cannot claim intellectual superiority if you can’t justify your reasoning. if your work can’t withstand peer review, it does not meet the Constitutional definition of justice for all.
artem1s
there is a damn good reason this court and GOP and CEO criminals stacked the deck to keep Kamala out of the WH.
tokyocali (formerly tokyo ex-pat)
Thank you, AL for all your hard work on these posts each and every day. I think reform of the Supreme Court should be a priority if not the first priority if Democrats take back power. If they do not reform the Supreme Court, they risk that any changes they make will be thrown out by the 6.
New Deal democrat
First things first: judicial reform is even more important than political reform. As awful as T—-p is, a Supreme Court that enforced statutory law would only have allowed him to put into effect about 10% of what this Court has.
Second, the very brevity and lack of specificity in this Court’s shadow docket rulings mean that they can turn on a dime and issue summary, unreasoned rulings preventing a Democratic President from exercising similar power.
Third, no matter how anyone tries to spin it, any sort of term limits would require a Constitutional Amendment. About the closest we could come is specifying that the Court be split up into panels, only one of which could hear any given case. Even that might require a direct confrontation between the other two branches and the Court.
Another good idea I’ve read recently is that the Congress could establish a national Appelate Court to hear all appeals from the Circuits except for those specifically allocated by the Constitution to the Supreme Court. That might also require a direct confrontation between the Court and the other Branches.
The easiest thing to do without any need for a Constitutional change is to expand the size of the Court. I would actually go well beyond 13 or 15 to something like 27, making each Justice’s individual vote less definitive.
Should prosecutions for corruption be launched? Should Justices be required to an ppear before Congress and explain why their subsequent behavior contradicts their confirmation testimony? Should Congress grill them on blatantly hypocritical rulings? All absolutely, understanding that the Sargent at Arms may have to forcibly bring them to appear. Please note, this kind of resolute behavior is how the UK Parliament gradually asserted their paramount authority.
Finally, by all means we need to examine how other countries have delimited the power of their Supreme Courts. Because the US Court is by far the most powerful.
Geo Wilcox
Fuck him, he helped create the current time line we all have to suffer through.
Professor Bigfoot
@Baud: The Green Lantern theory of governance. 🙄
satby
Yeah, the solution for lawlessness is breaking more laws.
Professor Bigfoot
@satby: Yep, the way to restore the Constitution is by shredding it, just like conservatives.
Of course, they’re doing it for the cause of white supremacy— they’ve had one Black president and they’re going to make good and damned sure that ONLY STRAIGHT WHITE CHRISTIAN MEN can be put into that office.
Even if they have to burn the Constitution they claim to revere to make it happen.
Why would we do that? Because we’re stupid?
satby
Amy Coathanger seems to have aged quite a bit more than the number of years that have passed since we were all forced to learn about her. Another example of how the evil you do will show on your face.
Ishiyama
@satby: As Frederick Douglass said: Chickensh_t tactics won’t get you anywhere against the Man.
brendancalling
@M31: I have nothing but hatred for Kennedy. I hope his death is slow and painful, that he dies alone, and that his every waking second til then is pain and humiliation.
satby
Seems like a good time to share this post about how trolls operate online. Because we’ve all been subjected to it on this blog and it’s not just bots or Russian troll farms.
tobie
@satby: Barrett’s comment shows she’s incapable of looking in the mirror. In her opinion, all criticisms of the court represent the bad faith and ideological bias of the criticizers. Never once does she consider whether the criticisms have merit. The 6 conservatives on the court are thin-skinned and maybe that shows in their skin.
Regarding court reform: if Dems can make DC a state, that would help getting reform passed in the Senate.
artem1s
as attractive as term limits are for purging the court of the GOP’s political hacks, it ultimately will lead to the GOP using it to purge Dem picks. This would lead to a completely toothless court and their ruling (especially the ones that benefit the people and not just the oligarchs) will have no permanence.
I like the idea of a expanding both the circuit courts and establishing a mix of permanent appointments and rotating membership for SCOTUS. That could allow the circuit judges limited terms on SCOTUS and they would get experience and a have some of their rulings on the record. That way they’d be less likely to perjure themselves the way Barret did if they were nominated for permanent appointment. Maybe 9 permanent and 18 rotating senior members from circuit courts. Ultimately this would be very attractive to the judicial branch as it would mean more of them would make the playoffs for getting a chance at a SCOTUS rotation or seat.
This would take a serious rewriting of the Constitution, but if you are going that route you may as well swing for the fences. Oh yea, and while we’re at it – make those fucking shadow dockets illegal.
jimmiraybob
“… we are engaged in a legal enterprise.”
And here’s our most current price list.
Josie
I am so disgusted by these high minded conservatives who designed and built the structure of the current mess and who are now upset by what they see, How did they expect that things would work out? I am not impressed with their johnny come lately furrowed brows.
ETA: Judicial reform should be front and center.
artem1s
IMO he’s right up there with O’Connor on my despised list but still way back of Scalia, Taney and the worst SCOTUS ever John Roberts.
Deputinize America
@New Deal democrat:
I like the idea of 27 – it would guarantee a more appropriate role for the court and make it far less looming in American life.
Remember – it was Dred Scott that actually ticked off the predicate for the Civil War when that pack of morons gratuitously ruled the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional and thereby extended slavery throughout the country (you could move anywhere with your slaves, and their children – even born in free states – would remain slaves).
Taney was genuinely confused at the anger. He thought that once they ruled, they settled slavery forever because of legality.
BellyCat
Chances of attorneys (and judges) admitting the foundations of the legal system, as taught and practiced, are flawed? NEAR ZERO
The legal system in the U.S. is and always was largely a system of network genuflection. What we’re seeing today, judicially, is little different than Late Stage Capitalism.
While attorneys may disagree, reflexively, there is little evidence to the contrary. Whereas, pro se litigants have long seen a side of The Law to which attorneys are blind: the published recipe ain’t how the sausage is often made.
Plainly, the guards can not guard the guards.
Chief Oshkosh
@Professor Bigfoot: Smirk if you will, but until he’s tossed on dung heap of history, it’s worked for Trump. Not saying it should be emulated by our side, but there’s no denying that the Green Lantern approach has worked for the MAGAts
ETA: Hell, to a point, it worked for Shrub.
Baud
@tobie:
That’s standard on the right. They learn that in right wing kindergarten.
Professor Bigfoot
@Chief Oshkosh: I think it far more that the vast majority of the white electorate AGREE with Trumpism and THAT’S why it has worked for them.
Trumpism is white America making good and damned sure that no other Negro (or woman, or non-Christian) ever ascends to the White House ever again
ETA: It should be perfectly clear that since 2008 conservatives have been ready and willing to burn the Constitution they claim to revere because it let a Kenyan Muslim usurper become President “over them.”
lowtechcyclist
@tobie:
YES. DC Statehood would make everything else we want to get done just a little bit easier.
Baud
@Chief Oshkosh:
Keep reading to comment 23 and you’ll see why it worked. We don’t have anything comparable on our side.
Also, too, they’ve been persistent for a half century. We can barely stick to the script for two years.
Professor Bigfoot
@Baud: We actually try to follow the law and the Constitution.
To conservatives the Constitution is no longer valid because it permitted a Negro to become President over them.
Thus they are perfectly willing to *burn it all to the ground* to make damned sure it never happens again.
From John Taney Roberts gutting the Voting Rights Act to the entire 2025 agenda; it’s ALL about keeping ALL power in the hands of straight white Christian men.
Princess
The court needs to be expanded to be large enough that no one can name any of the justices except maybe the chief. In other countries, justices of the Supreme Court are not celebrities. That’s toxic by itself.
In other news, Trump is pushing fake healing medbeds that claim to solve all your ills. The video of him is so but he (or someone…) posted it on his page. Right now, a few lucky people get the privilege of buying a metal card with the hint that they’ll get the first medbeds. I bet some of you have never even heard of a medbed. Apparently it’s the new QAnon wonder treatment. As someone said, I’m shocked I can still be shocked.
bsky.app/profile/alkapdc.bsky.social/post/3lzujov6tg22d
Kristine
@satby: thanks for the link
Professor Bigfoot
@Princess: There are MANY reasons to expand the court; the most obvious to bring it in line with the number of Circuits.
But conservatives will fight this tooth and nail because the only way for them to defend white male supremacy is to keep all power, as much as is possible, in the hands of straight white Christians; the fewer the better.
suzanne
@Professor Bigfoot:
Not only this. They will burn the Constitution to dust before they ever have a boss who’s a Black man, or their wife makes more money than they do, or an immigrant gets more respect. IOW, sparrows and curtain rods.
It’s the dynamic of all these small humiliations adding up, and they’re willing to destroy the country over it.
Baud
@Professor Bigfoot:
Not just conservatives.
We all remember what happened when we had an opportunity for a Dem majority court in 2016. It was a full court press from everywhere.
Deputinize America
Try this on for size – maybe the problem is that the 1789 Constitution was a piece of shit to start with, and relied too much on better natured people to take office.
I hold that it is no better than the Weimar Constitution, which was the source of authority in Germany until May 1945.
schrodingers_cat
@Deputinize America: Any Constitution is only as good as the people who are supposed to follow it. Its not magic.
lowtechcyclist
@artem1s:
I’m confused by this. The point of term limits isn’t to purge Justices from SCOTUS, it’s to (a) limit in advance how long they can stay there and (b) ensure that there are the same number of nominations to the Court in each Presidential term.
I’m sure there are ways to game that, but there are ways to game anything; all one can do is increase the level of difficulty.
Professor Bigfoot
@Baud: To admit that, though, is to say it’s white people.
Which then forces the obligatory #NotAllWhitePeople.
But somehow, it’s always white people.
”There is no horseshoe. There is only white people who are at best uncomfortable with any power being held in Black hands. Those white people are at all points of the ‘left-right’ spectrum.”
prostratedragon
@Deputinize America:
It must in fact be much worse, since it has lasted 5 or 6 times longer than Weimar.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: I remember how the HSL pooh-poohed it. And not just some random person on Twitter but people actually associated with BS campaign.
prostratedragon
Radley Balko might be onto something:
Chief Oshkosh
@Professor Bigfoot: I completely agree that Trump and other Republican presidents have the deck stacked in favor of the Green Lantern approach. They’ve been moulding institutions since the 70s to support it, and those activities themselves are always based on the bedrock of white nationalism/good old fashioned (violent) racism and bigotry. But other white presidents arguably had much of this going for them and didn’t get anywhere near as much done as Trump has (all of it bad, but he’s done a lot).
Trump operates on the level of not recognizing any strictures from the outset. He does what he wants until someone stops him. Hell, if he was just one gram less fucked-in-the-head, just a tiny bit less self-destructive, he’d have gone even further faster.
Now, turn that around and imagine taking that approach with liberal goals. Again, I am not advocating this, but you could get pretty far if you were willing (there’s that word again). It’s just that, unlike Trump (and apparently all of the elected Republicans and most of their voters), we’re not willing to go down that path because, maybe, we’re better at understanding that there is a tomorrow and we don’t want it to be a bloody hellscape
ETA: In his own grandfatherly manner, and in a limited way, Biden was our Green Lantern, and some of that was expanding on Obama’s second term Green Lanternly shift. They were forced to use the power of the Presidency, often going it alone, to get things done, and often without support of many in their own party.
schrodingers_cat
@prostratedragon: I have much simpler explanation. The media is in bed with the Republicans.
artem1s
@Princess:
sounds like they are desperate to rebrand the very unpopular ACA cuts in their BBB. Won’t need healthcare after I get my MAGA MedBed!
Professor Bigfoot
… “to destroy the Government, unless you be allowed to construe and enforce the Constitution as you please, on all points in dispute between you and us. You will rule or ruin in all events.”
We actually believe in the founding rhetoric. We actually believe in the Constitution. We actually follow the law.
“They not like us.”
Whomever
In other news Trump posted an AI generated video of him announce Medbeds. For those lucky enough to be unfamiliar with Medbeds, they are a conspiracy theory of the Qanon crowd that there are special beds that will cure people of anything. This is a dangerous conspiracy theory because if people think they are coming they will refuse real treatment.
We are so screwed.
Frank Wilhoit
It is no good reforming any institutions without reforming the people. The people will not be reformed, therefore the institutions do not matter.
oldster
Amy OfTrump Barrett:
My “engaged in a legal enterprise” t-shirt has people asking a lot of questions already answered by my shirt.
narya
@Chief Oshkosh: And the corrupt court stifled Biden every single chance they could manufacture. And now they are absolutely dismantling the administrative infrastructure, from every possible direction–almost as if they won’t allow another Democrat to be president.
I’m so tired . . . .
Baud
@Whomever:
I feel sorry for the children, but we’re not screwed because of the adults who fall for this.
TXG1112
One of the major issues of our current era is elite impunity, which is bad in and of itself, but is also corrosive and encourages everyone to break down the societal bonds that make everything work. The Supreme Court is one of the more visible and extreme examples of this and they are actively aiding and abetting the the destruction of the rule of law and promoting the accumulation of power for its own sake. I am going to take JMM’s basic argument one step further and claim that anyone who thinks that “packing the SC” is sufficient to restore the supremacy of “law and order” is deluding themselves. I realize that there are swathes of Democratic Elites that still need to be convinced that even reform is necessary, but we do not have to take their arguments seriously. They still believe in the pre-Trump status quo and are part f the problem, not part of the solution.
Elite impunity is a bi-partisan winning issue that also animates the drive to release the Epstein files. It’s obvious why Elites (of any stripe) do not want to make this a central plank of any reform movements but we do not need to entertain their self serving framework. The point I’m making with all this Jibber-jabber is that there must be actual punishment meted out to these thoroughly corrupted SC justices. Working around them is insufficient. Prosecution of their flagrant crimes and capital punishment for their treason is an absolute must. Any other course of action is just papering over the very deep issues and asking for it to happen again.
Princess
@artem1s: I always thought O’Connors quiting to take care of her demented husband who then fell in love with another woman was a small down payment on her crimes, but I’m a bad person.
Princess
@Professor Bigfoot: maybe I’ve mentioned this before but whenever they break out approval rankings for Trump, there’s never a segment on his protection of white patriarchy. Without that, pollsters will never be able to explain or understand his continued relative popularity.
Baud
@TXG1112:
You can focus on the elites, but last I saw, court expansion was deeply unpopular with the public.
suzanne
@prostratedragon: I’ve said something similar, which is that I don’t know if he has dementia because he’s been saying absolutely stupid shit for years. Some of the things he said in his first term were so mindblowingly dumb that they created residual embarrassment in me.
Another Scott
Fight for 15!!
Requiring fixed terms (maybe 18 years, maybe less), a binding code of ethics, etc., as Biden proposed, makes sense. Lots of things make sense.
The main thing is, the Courts (and not just the SCOTUS, but also like abominations like those judge-shopping single judge circuits in Texas) must be reformed. They are not infallible god-like super legislators. They cannot and must not be able to throw out democratically passed and signed legislation just because it upsets their precious fee-fees. They need to stay in their lane. They probably should have something like periodic reviews of their work so that cranks aren’t allowed to spend decades trying to break the system without consequences.
Harvard.edu (from August 2024):
While much of this reads an awful lot like Murc’s Law to me, there are several very good ideas there.
It may even be the case that federal legislation should only be overturned via a substantial majority (like N-2) so that it can be done, but the barrier is high (but not impossibly high so that a single crank could foil sensible results). The other branches need to have appropriate deference, and 5-6 unelected idealogues should not be able to throw out their work on a whim.
I do agree that it’s a political problem. The courts are a human construct, so humans have to figure out a way to fix it. Electing more Democrats is an essential part of the solution.
Grr…
Thanks.
Best wishes,
Scott.
Chief Oshkosh
@Professor Bigfoot: And they’d say, and have run and won on it, that FDR and his party ignored the law when they created each component of The New Deal and that Johnson was similar with The Great Society.
As to the foundation rhetoric, it is, if nothing else, based on the concept of balance of powers. From one perspective, that should encourage a president to push as far as they can; it’s up to someone else to stop them (the someone else being Congress or the courts). If it’s not a workable perspective or approach longterm, then we need to make changes to the foundation. But from the perspective of the Republicans and MAGAts, it’s working out just fine. So far.
UncleEbeneezer
@Baud: Court Reform is generally popular until you get to the part where everyone has to vote for Democrats to elect enough to get the majority needed to enact it. “Blue, No Matter Who” is kind of a crucial component and as we have seen there are too many people in our coalition who would do anything for
loveDemocracy, but get offended by that. So much of our electorate doesn’t want large Dem majorities (unless each Dem meets their personal standards on every issue) that it’s hard to see how this ever happens.Baud
@Chief Oshkosh:
Like you said, Biden was our experiment. Our test run. The public and the party failed.
I doubt President Beshear will take the same risks.
EarthWindFire
It’s like racism, then?
Thor Heyerdahl
Germany took an interesting approach by creating a constitutional court. It only looks at the constitution, and is not based in Berlin (or any of the major metropoli) – it’s based in Karlsruhe.
Perhaps the US could split the constitutional from appellate duties, and since the constitution was signed in Philadelphia, base the US constitution court there.
Eyeroller
@artem1s: A toothless Supreme Court would be a net benefit to the country. Historically they have been a major negative force. We of a certain age just remember the brief interval of a few decades when they tended to rule more liberally than was typical.
I also don’t think term limits are unconstitutional (and who cares about the Constitution anyway, since apparently this SC doesn’t). The Constitution says that federal judges must have a lifetime appointment and that there must be a Supreme Court. So rotate them in and out. Expansion would be good for several reasons but even if we succeeded at that, it would quckly clog up again with people appointed as young as possible who would block all the slots for decades. And Rs are much more ruthless about appointing young and unqualified people than are Ds.
Apologies to BJ lawyers, but there is not and has never been any “intellectual” basis to law. It’s entirely made up by humans, and it depends on enforcement. The “intellectual” aspects for law professors would be to teach and promote sound and consistent reasoning, which would be worthwhile, but we don’t seem to see much of that in practice.
Baud
@UncleEbeneezer:
This is a year old, but I didn’t find anything more recent.
kindness
Supreme Court Justices will lie to promote their side. The law should not have ‘sides’, but with this court it does.
prostratedragon
@suzanne: Oh I just hate when that happens! Why ought I feel embarrassed by that jackass*, as if I were the one?
____
*No insult to the world’s fine burros and mules intended.
WaterGirl
I haven’t read the comments yet, so maybe this has already been said.
But when a justice of the highest court in the land has to volunteer that what they are doing is legal, that’ not a good sign.
“Make the sonofabitch deny it!”
Eyeroller
@Professor Bigfoot: I’ll just note that John Roberts’ ambition to destroy voting rights for nonwhites apparently goes back to his law-school days, so well predates the fulfillment of what seems to have been his greatest fear. Similar to Rehnquist in that regard.
suzanne
@prostratedragon: It’s because you are a normal human with theory of mind, and who feels empathy. Even for awful people.
lowtechcyclist
@Whomever:
But only if you use them with a MyPillow, right? ;-)
That’s such an absurd idea that I think even most MAGAts would go AYFKM when they hear of this. I mean, even ivermectin made way more sense than this, and ivermectin made no sense at all.
lowtechcyclist
@Frank Wilhoit:
But how do you reform the citizenry without reforming institutions?
Baud
@lowtechcyclist:
That’s was advocacy and coalition building is all about. An institutions-first approach will fail. YMMV.
suzanne
@lowtechcyclist: The other question this presents to me….. are Americans just worse than other people? I don’t know that I believe that.
suzanne
@lowtechcyclist:
At least among white people, we see a huge gulf in the voting behavior between college grads and non-college grads. Which prompts the question…. does higher education improve white people? Or do liberals just select to go to college in greater number?
Eyeroller
@suzanne: I don’t believe we are worse than other people inherently. Our history and institutions and cultural biases just give us more opportunities to be bad.
Ramona
@M31: Piece of shit indeed! Was Kennedy not one of the corrupt 5 who handed the presidency to GWB in 2000? IIRC he also convinced O’Connor to agree in that ignominious decision!
M31
HOT DOG costume, not banana costume.
[submitting a shadow docket ruling that bananas and hotdogs are the same, because of penumbras and emanations thereof (6-3, Justice Jackson issues a scathing dissent)]
lowtechcyclist
@TXG1112:
It may not be a sufficient condition, but ISTM that it’s a necessary condition.
[Baud @65]
I remember how Dubya dropped just enough mentions of Social Security reform into his speeches while running for re*-election in 2004 to claim in 2005 that he’d run on that issue, but nobody took much notice at the time.
Seriously, we may have to do something like that with respect to Court reform in 2028 because I only see two paths that potentially work for our democracy: one has SCOTUS reform as a component, and the other involves basically saying “how many divisions does SCOTUS have?”
And I really don’t see that second alternative working out well either, just that it might be better for the next Democratic President than being hamstrung by the Court we’ve got. After that….
*Depending on your view of whether he was elected in 2000. (Sure he was, by a 5-4 vote.)
TXG1112
@Baud: I will note that I’m not advocating for SC expansion ad don’t believe it would solve our problems. I’m proposing removing several existing justices, putting them on trial, publicly executing them and replacing them with ones who believe in a constitutional order. The thing about open corruption, is that it doesn’t take a lot of work to collect evidence. Watching your peers dangle from a gallows should greatly focus the mind of those opposed to a functioning society for all. Studies show that harsh punishment doesn’t deter crime, it is the belief in likelihood of punishment that does.
Ramona
@NobodySpecial: I dream of a successful conviction in the Senate of Trump being the first domino in a series of successful impeachments: next Thomas, next Alito, next Roberts… A girl can dream…
Chief Oshkosh
@Baud: I’m less pessimistic. I’m pretty sure President Crockett will prove me right.
Another Scott
@Baud: OTOH, beware modern polling…
Niskanencenter.org (from June 2022):
(Emphasis added.)
Good polling is hard, especially these days. Too many vested interests want to believe the results of their polls and use them to push their preferred agenda.
Ultimately, representative democracy means that elected representatives have to decide and vote. We don’t have direct democracy – for very good reasons – and treating polling (especially these days) as being as or more important than considered judgement of representatives (and I’m not accusing you of doing that, just trying to make a general point) is a mistake.
tl;dr – The public doesn’t decide how many justices should be on the SCOTUS, and they shouldn’t. Their elected representatives, who have the responsibility to carefully consider the plusses and minuses and all the legislative details, rightfully have that power (along with the power to consider all the other legislation that crosses their desks). Division of labor, and all that.
FWIW.
Thanks.
Best wishes,
Scott.
M31
@Ramona:
Yeah Kennedy voted for Bush v Gore.
Kennedy got some [legit] praise when he wrote the opinion for Obergfell, the ruling that legalized gay marriage, but even so he’s still a piece of shit
Deputinize America
@schrodingers_cat:
The original error was in deifying the Founding Fuckheads, a pack of mercantilists who took advantage of distance and a favorable demographic lump as compared to Mother England in terms of the percentage of overall population.
They could have always gone for appropriate representation in Parliament, but they wanted their own controllable king.
lowtechcyclist
@TXG1112:
If we do that, they’ll do that x100. I wouldn’t want to go down that path even if that weren’t true, but sheer pragmatism should be enough to nope this notion.
Then why are you advocating harsh punishment, when you say what’s needed is just the likelihood of punishment?
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
Just spitballing here but suppose Congress passed, and some future POTUS signed, a statute that says “Any federal judge appointed by a convicted felon, whose crimes were committed before said appointment was made, shall immediately be removed from the federal judiciary, unless the current president, provided that person isn’t a felon, confirms that the judge can continue in office.”
The argument here is pretty straightforward politically- we shouldn’t have criminals picking judges. How are we supposed to be tough on crime if we let felons pick judges? So no, if a felon appointed you you’re going to have to convince a non-felon you’re qualified for the job to keep it.
schrodingers_cat
@Deputinize America: Agreed with deifying stuff. I never got that. Isn’t the problem from the inception the need to protect white supremacy. Everything else flows from that. Even the current pickle we are in
NotMax
Bring back riding the circuits.
Professor Bigfoot
@Chief Oshkosh: “Probe with bayonets. If you encounter mush, keep going. If you encounter steel, stop.”
oldster
@M31:
In Banana v. Hotdog, the justices reached a split decision.
Where is Justice Frankfurter when you need him?
AM in NC
@Princess: Wow. I did not know this about the O’Connors. Karma is a righteous bitch.
Professor Bigfoot
@Eyeroller: But it took that event happening to get the ball rolling to actually return Jim Crow… but here we are, now.
prostratedragon
I think they mean us:
UncleEbeneezer
@Baud: We reject the very concept of a script as being: Hive Mind, Blindly Loyal, Blue MAGA, Sheeple!!1! etc. Too many on our side think relentless partisan cheerleading (like Republican/Independent voters do) and constantly leaning into the actual great achievements of Dems would somehow be selling out their brave, independent spirits. Fascism is bad, but being viewed as too knee-jerk loyal to the Dem Party is still the far greater evil. So we endlessly bash Biden, Harris, Hillary, etc., downplay their greatness then blame them (and the DNC) when voters show that they absorbed all the bashing we did by choosing not to bother voting.
TONYG
@Suzanne: Of course, Anton Chigurh was always honest about what he is. The contemporary GOP are all liars.
Professor Bigfoot
@lowtechcyclist: we’re talking about people who genuinely believe that prayer cures.
Magical thinking has overtaken a significant fraction of the American public; to the point where their very religion is magical.
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone😊😊😊
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
Also ethics reforms with real teeth seem like they’d be reasonably popular and could force out Thomas and maybe Alito. Possibly some of the other conservatives too – could be we just haven’t heard enough about their corruption yet but they may be just as guilty.
rikyrah
Reform?
1. A phucking explicit CODE OF CONDUCT, WHICH MAKES CLEAR THAT THE BRIBERY CURRENTLY HAPPENING IS GROUNDS FOR CHARGING.
2. EXPAND TO 13 CIRCUITS
3. 13 SEATS ON THE COURT TO MATCH THE 13 CIRCUITS
Interesting Name Goes Here
@Whomever: This idea didn’t work all that great when Neill Blomkamp tried it.
Professor Bigfoot
@suzanne: Americans aren’t inherently worse, as humans go— but American culture was born of Genocide and Enslavement and Americans have swept so much of that under the rug that they think it only natural that white Christians should be at the top of all hierarchies and everyone should know their place.
That Americans are lauding the memory of a man who said that empathy was a bad thing… comes from that same sense of entitlement and superiority.
ETA— OR, what Eyeroller said at 85. ;^)
Chip Daniels
Its not enough any more to simply expand the Court.
There need to be investigations and prosecution of corruption, with impeachment and removal of at least Thomas and possibly the others who have openly ignored their sworn duty to uphold the Constitution.
M31
@oldster: HAHAHAHAHA
lowtechcyclist
@Baud:
If it takes too long to build a coalition that supports SCOTUS reform, and we wait around until we succeed in that, then we fail anyway.
I think the degree of danger to our democracy speaks in favor of using the legitimate, Constitutionally-granted powers of our government to enact reform, and then let the voters respond as they will. If they care enough about that to vote against us in 2030 or 2032, then such is life. But the longer we keep going down the road we’re on, the worse the damage will be, and the longer it will take to restore both a healthy democracy and a healthy economy.
Gvg
@lowtechcyclist: which is why it isn’t going to happen easily instantly. I would say it needs to start, but we can’t wait, or need it for anything else.
It has its own basic right versus wrong, and fairness. Separate from all the other issues we face. No taxation without representation AND all Americans should have votes and a voice. They exist, and are always going to. They need to be a state. They get pushed around too much. As for them being mostly minorities, tell the republicans, maybe white voters found they couldn’t put up with being treated like that, and that’s why they left the area.
Solving the corrupt court has to be done without factoring in a DC state vote. Statehood takes years because of all the levels of votes that have to happen. Since Dc would almost certainly be democratic, the Republican states probably would oppose just because, unfair as that might be. I think Puerto Rico should also be a state. I recognize they are mixed about wanting it, but fairly I think the halfway state is wrong. I don’t see them as safe as independent and it would force many families to split and make choices they don’t want for economic reasons etc. This would also have some trouble getting ratified due to the rising racism. We need to put these off and start propagandizing the whole us population to be in favor. Campaign for years and not specifically from the Democratic Party. Which as I understand it PR is not really a democrat/Republican state and won’t be an automatic D vote.
prostratedragon
After the public executions by guillotine in 1793 of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, it took France a mere 77 years to stop having kings.
lowtechcyclist
@M31:
I know the hot dog reference, of course, but I’d say banana costume for banana republic.
Baud
@lowtechcyclist:
I don’t see how short lived, failed reforms are helpful to democracy.
The reason we vote to prevent harms is because harms can’t be easily fixed. Too many people think it’s ok to let bad things happen because everything can be cured once we elect a hypothetical Dem with sufficient gumption.
There will be no shortage of issues that a future Dem government can stake reelection on. Unless public support is there, I am doubtful that court reform will be one of them.
Of course, I expect Trump to appoint replacements for Alito and Thomas. Maybe that will be enough to change the public’s mind.
Ruckus
@Josie:
When one relies on bullshit and bravado (at best) as their intellectual/political concepts, what one gets is BS and ignorance, neither of which work to make a rational government.
Lobo
@What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?: Annul everything that Trump has done and start over from that.
NotMax
@Professor Bigfoot
The myth of American exceptionalism is the foundation of American deceptionalism.
Princess
@WaterGirl: that’s a good point. When Redford died a few days after Kirk no one had to insist he was a good person because everyone who encountered him knew he was. If the court faithfully upholds the law, we may kvetch but we can see it. May them defend themselves indeed.
Chief Oshkosh
@Professor Bigfoot: That is the an outcome of the foundational rhetoric. In theory, the president goes as far as possible, restricted only by the courts and Congress. Congress goes as far as possible, restricted only by the courts and the Executive. The courts go as far as they can go, restricted only by the Executive and Congress.
And all of that mess is ultimately ruled by the vote. In theory.
Hey, I didn’t write the rules.
Professor Bigfoot
@schrodingers_cat: EXACTLY this; but this is something that is very, very difficult for white Americans to see.
Most of white America are either unaware— or consider this timeline mere coincidence.
NotMax
@lowtechcyclist
“There’s always money in the banana stand.”
:)
AnonPhenom
pajaro
Expanding the size of the Court to one Justice per circuit is consistent with the Congressional enactments that expanded the size in the past. It’s not unprecedented, period, as we can explain to the public. It takes a bill passed by Congress and signed by the President, but there’s no question it’s constitutional. It’s simple enough that it could be done in the first week of a new term of Congress. If we were somehow able to win Congress and the Presidency in three years, it’s the first thing that should be done.
Chief Oshkosh
@Professor Bigfoot: That is a narrative, but it doesn’t acknowledge the New Englander perspective that it was mainly the northern Yankees who pushed most vigorously for revolution. Most of the southern colonies had to be cajoled into to. Jefferson was an early proponent, but from a much more wonky beginning point, and he was reviled by many of his fellow slave addicts. Of course, neither group sought independence via revolution for any cause other than established white male order.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: We also need to stop taking polls as the word of God. Not on this issue, or any any issue.
Gvg
@TXG1112: yes. And prosecution will happen when the Congress takes up its designated responsibility and removes the corrupt justices after a fair trial (or maybe it’s called hearings before Congress). No one Congress person or party can do this, it’s a collective body. We have to elect enough in fact an excess of the required minimum votes, who will ACT and live up to their responsibilities.
Congress comes from the people, the voters. Enough people have to pick their representatives in both houses, enough elections in a row, to make this happen. I say in a row, because of the Senate.
Part of the problem is I think that some of Congress are also corrupt as in taking money from the same sources as the court and I think they are protecting each other, hence the ruling on bribing politicians. But if we could just change the balance of the senate, maybe we could put the bribery laws off limits for Supreme Court and reinstate? I am not sure how that works, but it seemed like a confession of awareness of guilt by the court to me.
There have to be consequences for the powerful not just the common or weak.
Congress has to quit running away from hard decisions and grow up. Some of it is stupid and weak. Some of it is grid lock because the country itself is stuck 50/50 and has been for a long time.
Professor Bigfoot
@Chief Oshkosh: Hey, it was theoretically a good idea to structure a government such that no one person could have too much power.
That whole “checks and balances” thing would still work except for we have one party that’s gone completely RICO and it now has all three of those branches.
They were Enslavers, but they really weren’t idiots; they were truly doing “And Now Something Completely Different.”
I give ‘em points for the structure they created… even though they built a structure that would let them keep their fellow humans Enslaved.
schrodingers_cat
@Professor Bigfoot: Not just the US, a lot of Europe has the same problem. Because in the last 500 years or so they have dominated the world at large through their wars of conquest and colonization.
schrodingers_cat
@Chief Oshkosh: New England was a bit of an outlier then and it is a bit of an outlier now.
I agree what you said about New England. But I was speaking of the Constitution and the 3/5 person compromise meant to keep southern slave owners happy.
Socolofi
SCOTUS has clearly been political for some time. A lot of reform is necessary to make it less political. That said, I would hope the next few Democratic candidates start just talking about the Bad Behavior of certain justices, and then use that to codify what Bad Behavior is and promptly remove some. Then ideally with Dems in a degree of power they can invalidate all rulings where someone thrown out due to Bad Behavior was in the majority. Doesn’t mean they are all reversed but does mean we can have do-overs.
The more interesting question is whether Democrats and Republicans can find a set of rules they can play by. If not then we look like most South American or Middle Eastern countries where one side is in power for a while until they piss off enough people, and are promptly jailed and killed in the revolution, and the cycle renews.
Professor Bigfoot
@schrodingers_cat: True, but who else bellows about “Freedom” and “Liberty” and the biggest lie of them all, that they believed “All men are created equal.”
schrodingers_cat
@Professor Bigfoot: I am from India, The British are not my heroes. Sorry.
They replaced their plantation slaves with indentured labor mainly from India.
schrodingers_cat
@Professor Bigfoot: The French. And look what they did in Haiti. And the Brits were just as hypocritical when it came to India, for example.
Jackie
@schrodingers_cat:
Agreed. We’ve learned people LIE on polls – especially polls involving FFOTUS.
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@schrodingers_cat: Another example: Leopold II of Belgium, and the Congo Free State.
Gvg
@Chief Oshkosh: Yes, the New England northern half of the colonies were more motivated by free trade. Yankee traders. They went everywhere. Which did include slave trading because of the time and their near neighbors. Yankees became rivals of England and the East India company. The marines were formed to fight Pirates. Our next few little wars with England were over freedom of the seas to trade and impressment. The yankee NE became manufacturers as a result which ended up making them more successful and wealthier than the slave states overall and had a lot to do with them both winning that war and wanting to end slavery. For the ordinary yankee worker, slaves were cheap labor that kept his own wages low. They were involuntary scabs (union strike breakers term from latter time), and in a sense rivals. It wasn’t all an obligation to free their fellow man that motivated the North, there were selfish economic reasons too, which is why the prejudices remained.
Most of the original colonists immigrated over escaping religious persecution in Europe. Continual turmoil over official religion in a region changing due to some kings whim or marriage or conquest, were the foundations of almost all of the 13. Once here they had to make livings and found different ways.
Anyway
Are there any left-aligned think-tanks doing strategic thinking about how to advance D priorities so they are not struck down the first week of a D loss/R win? Ds are sposed to be process-oriented dotting all the is and it still doesn’t seem to stick. I know, I know – the sinister six play a big role in thwarting D goals but we need a deeper dive into how to make it work. Just voting is not enough- it seems that better education on white supremacy is needed but messaging is pooh-pooled by jackals —- tl;dr we need more than “vote harder”
narya
@Professor Bigfoot: Another piece to it, in our timeline, is that the House is too small, which favors Rs, and the Court is too small. The US population has grown immensely since the Court or House was expanded. People who would support reform of various sorts are likely underrepresented in all of our institutions.
Anyway
@narya: yes, the House needs to be expanded in keeping with the population. That’s an example of long-term policy goals that should be advanced by left-aligned groups.
schrodingers_cat
@Anyway: Voting is the zeroth step. I for one have never seen any rightwinger disparage it.
Betty
@prostratedragon: Radley is a very good reporter, but to suggest Trump’s behavior has not gotten worse in the past year or two is wrong. His mental condition has deteriorated and will continue to get worse. None of the people with power are ready to deal with that.
And yes, court reform must be a priority. At a minimum real ethics rules with an enforcement mechanism and at least 4 more Justices on the Supreme Court.
Ruckus
@Deputinize America:
I agree that more members/votes on the court might give a better concept for outcomes. But what is also obvious to me is that we need a better court and that may mean more members but would 27 members actually ever be able to make rational decisions? Sure 9 members now isn’t actually working all that well but is 3 times more the logical answer?
We are at a time when control and freedom are at odds. As the number of citizens grows politics will have less control over the issues, because groups will splinter, often over issues that do not meet specific concepts of governance. Groups will harden because they more often do not get the control they want.
How to fix any of this? I’m not sure it’s possible. We have, as a country, a concept of freedom from governmental involvement in our lives. But as groups build size and desire more control to get the concepts of government they want, this becomes a harder to control form of government. With more communication means and availability, there likely will be groups that want more control over others so that “their” government aligns with their concepts of governing. We are at a time when much more of life is visible to all that look. Or even just have it shown to them. The good, the bad and the in between. Freedom is never free, there is always a cost when humanity is concerned. It may be a simple inexpensive monetary cost. It may not be simple or inexpensive or easy or rational. We have a government that does not allow 100% strict control, a good thing. We have humanity that sometimes needs at least stricter control, at least in some ways. We have a monetary system that allows multi billionaires, and at the same time allows others to have nothing, with little to even survive. I have no real ideas how to fix this but I believe it will have to happen or this will not last. I’m not saying it will be next week but it does seem to continue to build, with more poor and more uber wealthy. Maybe that’s how humanity works, no matter what is done. In my lifetime this country has grown significantly. In just over 200 years this countries population has grown from about 4 million to about 340 million. Daily life has changed a tad. From no electricity to electric cars. From communication mostly in person or very slowly to what we are doing here, now. Travel by horse or foot, to being able to fly around the world. Look at cars 100 years ago and compare to today. When I started machining metals 60-65 yrs ago compared to today, there really is almost no comparison as to what, how and how well. And much of living has little comparison. Sure we had cars, but the ability to build them reasonably and within the budget of most people is entirely different. Travel is far, far different. Sure we had vehicles with 4 wheels, but the quality is far, far different. As is much of living, like communications or medicine, healthcare, food, housing, transportation…. How many of you have seen a side of beef in a store? Or watched it be cut up and packaged in front of you? More than one or two I’d bet but how long has it been since?
My point is that this is still life. But life is lived differently in much (most?) of the world, than it was over 75-100 years ago. Humans have been around for a very long time but change comes faster now. You carry a phone that can reach most of the world in your pocket or purse. When I was young many people didn’t have a phone of any kind. And none had one in their pocket that actually can do a lot more than just make calls. Or have a car that has to be overhauled every 30-50 thousand miles. Or, the list goes on. And yet we are still human, with all the good and all the faults the word covers.
narya
Here’s another reform for the Court: eligibility criteria include actually having been a trial judge. No idea how to make that happen, but I think it would be very helpful.
Suzanne
@narya:
Very much agree with you here. I am on the younger side of the jackaltariat, and the U.S. population has grown by over 50% in my lifetime. And the nature of that population is changing, too. The Baby Boomers are 75% white, whereas the Millennials are only about 50% white. We’re much more urban, as well. A system of government designed to favor rural white landowners is inherently unstable in a world where most of us are not.
Ann Sears
Test
sab
@Professor Bigfoot: Thank you for pointing this out again. I was a college history major , focus on English and American colonial history, and I never made this connection until you pointed it out.
piratedan
@rikyrah: pretty much nailed it. You don’t want corrupt judges, then you set up a code of ethics (and fucking enforce it). Expansion of circuits courts and matching the number of justices that match that makes sense.
One other thing, public votes and SHOW YOUR WORK. If you’re going to overturn precedent, show the legal/moral/ethical justification for doing so. No more of this shadow docket/star chamber bullshit.
one other thing, National referendums, if a majority of states hold a referendum in opposition to a SC decision to overturn said, ruling, it goes to a national ballot item (every two years like we do for Congress). This way, if the public feels like these mendacious fucks have lost the plot, the public gets to tell them fuck you.
Baud
We should abolish the Supreme Court and create a new reality show called America’s Got Law where cases are decided by celebrity judges and audience voting.
Percysowner
@Ishiyama:
That will be hard or impossible since any money received by a Justice for giving a helpful ruling is defined as a “gratuity” not a bribe as per Thomas, Alito and 3-4 others. I’m too lazy to look up the case to check the vote count.
They didn’t lie, the arguments presented for overturning the precedents they agreed to uphold were so strong that they totally outweighed established law. Plus they got a gratuity after, so no harm no foul.
Percysowner
@lowtechcyclist:
If that happens Thomas and Alito will immediately resign the day after the election and Trump will ram through 2 very young, ultra conservative judges. Actually, if the polls look really bad they may both decide to retire in the summer, so that Trump can get a head start, just in case.
WaterGirl
@Ann Sears: Hi Annie!
I just approved your first comment, so you’ll be ready to go for your Artists post. After the first one, all comments show up right away.
TXG1112
@Gvg: The notion that we can use the existing political order to solve our current problems is sheer fantasy for reasons you have articulated throughout these comments. The existing order is thoroughly broken and a major shake up will be required to move forwards from here. I am not advocating for a civil war or believe that there will be a fracture, but the forces that believe that we are all in this together for the greater good need to band together and stamp out those that believe that society is only for some special subset of people once and for all.
piratedan
@Percysowner: well, those bribe/gratuity taking fuckers can call it legal, even as lawyers with a straight face, just like someone saying that shooting them dead in the driveway was an environmental act to balance out oxygen levels.
There is a reason that mob rule has taken place from time to time in the history of the world, it’s when the people making the rules that apply to us say that those same rules do not apply to them. Enough of that shit ends up with people being dead and all the pieces wiped off the board until enough sanity is restored to try again.
In this day and age when guns are everywhere and the technology is present to fly a drone full of explosives into a house and blow it up, that if you can’t even put up a decent facade, people will take action and the conservatives, for reasons only known to themselves, don’t appear to be aware that they are currently just as likely to be the targets.
The fact that these sanctimonious fucks haven’t even blinked in this environment still makes me think that they believe themselves to be untouchable.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Josie:
Should be in “air quotes”. Ain’t no such thing.
Soprano2
@Suzanne: He doesn’t seem concerned about what they’re doing, just how they’re doing it. What a tool.
It occurred to me this morning that the SCOTUS is completely blowing up the relatively stable government we built over the last 125 years (since the civil service was established) and taking us back to an unstable government that completely changes every time the president changes. Do they think there will never be another Democratic president again?
schrodingers_cat
People who find it onerous to vote and speak on the phone are going to bring about a revolution. Believable.
rikyrah
This video by Bryan Stevenson punched in the gut What he says just angered me. The eternal Black Tax https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8S3qTEd/
Kathleen
@UncleEbeneezer: TRUTH!!!!
Deputinize America
@UncleEbeneezer:
“Don’t you dare blackmail me over the Supreme Court. My vote is MINE, and must be earned by supporting 100% of what I want!”
– candyass white boy Bernie Bot, circa 2016
WaterGirl
The sidebar image from Ozark today is another one where you have to click on it to really see the light.
Soprano2
@schrodingers_cat: I agree with you. I’ve thought many, many times since January that if Biden had talked and behaved the way FFOTUS does, it would have been a non-stop topic of conversion in the press, but when FFOTUS does it that’s just “him being who he is”. They actively ignore how he is now.
Ann Sears
@WaterGirl: Thanks!
Kathleen
@Baud: The head of the court would be “The Supreme Smiter”.
suzanne
@Soprano2:
Some nice and otherwise intelligent people are too credulous.
Soprano2
@lowtechcyclist: Is this like the idea that sleeping on a mattress laced with copper can cure all your ills? It’s dumb, but not a new concept. Conspiracy minded thinkers always believe there’s something out there that could cure everything that’s wrong with the world, but “they” are keeping it from you.
Baud
Whiskey Pete cock blocked
Another Scott
@Baud: He’ll probably make them stand up and give him a standing ovation, with tears in their eyes, etc., etc.
Grr…
Best wishes,
Scott.
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2:
I think Alito and Thomas definitely believe that, that they’ve achieved their ultimate goal of converting the United States into an absolute monarchy and that this is how it’s always going to be.
It’s harder for me to get a bead on the others, despite the fact that Amy Coney Barrett seems to be trying to explain herself.
Baud
@Another Scott:
I’m sure the Pentagon will distribute eye drops.
schrodingers_cat
@Matt McIrvin: Well the British thought they were going to be in India for centuries when they built New Delhi in the early 20th century (teens to early thirties)
cmorenc
The most important reason the RW6 are using the “shadow docket” to allow so many of the Trump Admin’s dodgey actions is to avoid making any precedent-setting opinions that could handicap their ability to restrain or handicap future Democatic Administrations.
Anyway
Agreed. Question was about organizations working on steps 2, 3, 4 … not deriding voting in any way just not in on the chest-thumping.
Baud
@cmorenc:
100%
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@Jackie: One of the dynamics Democrats constantly struggle against is…we start out with an issue that polls well – say universal health care. But then as we start working on getting that done Republicans find some angle to make the fix unpalatable to a large chunk of voters. So yeah our policy polls well in general but there’s always some component that Republicans use to turn the public against it. Lesson is that polls aren’t set in stone. Good marketing can change them.
The other related thing we struggle with is that as Josh Marshall at TPM constantly says Washington – by which he means the DC and national mainstream news outlets- is wired for Republicans. That means that our messaging gets filtered through a skeptical lens at best and a hostile one at worst. These two problems have existed since the Regan era and it would be nice if we could figure out a way through or around them but so far we don’t seem able to do that.
gene108
There are huge number of unprecedented reforms that need to happen, if Democrats retake government, because Trump and Republicans have been doing so many unprecedented things for years and years.
I doubt enough will change to prevent the next Republican president to be as bad or worse than Trump. I think too many people believe Trump is a singular phenomenon divorced from how Republicans have been trending for years.
I don’t think a lot of people are not willing to accept Trump is where the typical Republican politician and voter are, in terms of their view on issues and ethics.
Matt McIrvin
@What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?: The angle that makes it unpalatable is usually the SAME angle, which Professor Bigfoot has explained in detail.
(“Universal” means “Black people get it too”)
Baud
David Collier-Brown
@New Deal democrat: In Canada, supreme court justices
Kelly
@artem1s: I like the idea of rotating Supreme Court justices. I prefer all rotating seats, drawn by lot 1 from each Circuit annually. Also double the number of Circuits. While we’re at it consolidate district courts to reduce judge shopping.
Kayla Rudbek
@Ruckus: The Federal Circuit is 12 judges total, and I know that they will decide things either by smaller panel or en banc (meaning that the entire roster of judges on that court are deciding the case). The Ninth Circuit has 29 judges so I think they do a similar thing of smaller panel or en banc. The main problem with that system is the panels may not agree with each other, then you get conflicting opinions coming out of the same circuit, then the en banc court tries to fix it, then it gets appealed up a level to a thoroughly untrustworthy court.
@AnonPhenom: I like this idea, although I think we will run into the problem of different panels issuing conflicting opinions.
@Chip Daniels: co-signed, I think all of the Supine Six should be investigated (criminal and counter-intelligence)
David Collier-Brown
@Frank Wilhoit: The framers seem to have expected the electorate would be engaged and to some degree aware. Now a significant part of it (about 1/3 in the US and Canada) is unengaged and unaware.
cmorenc
@Matt McIrvin:
I think you’re wrong there – they do anticipate there will eventually be future D Presidents + D control of Congress, possibly as soon as 2028. Their main goal instead is to shift the fundamental terrain of US constitutional law to severely handicap the Ds eventual ability to restore a progressive vision of the federal government if and when the Ds do regain control of the Presidency and Congress. With the possible exception of Thomas and Alito, the other four know they cannot credibly get away with holding Social Security to be an unconstitutional extension of the federal government, but they can craft a web of decisions that will severely handicap the Ds ability to successfully create any future similarly ambitious social welfare program.
In short, the true agenda of the RW6 is not loyalty to Trump or keeping Trump in office post-2028, but to constitutionally lock in the goals of the Federalist society and Project 2025, and Trump is a useful idiot (albeit at the moment a very useful one) toward achieving their main Federalist Society goals.
Kayla Rudbek
@Kelly: I’m still trying to decide if it’s a good idea to have separate intellectual property trial courts or not; we almost have it de facto because so many plaintiffs go forum shopping as it is. However, I think that it would be a good idea to spread out these cases so that IP law doesn’t get too cut off from the rest of the legal profession (and vice versa; USPTO goes with “false in one thing, false in all things” and so invalidates a lot of patents and trademarks for fraud upon the Office, which is an approach that I think more civil and criminal law SHOULD take; if you lie to the court about one thing, how does the judge know when you’ve stopped lying?)
Glidwrith
@piratedan: One other thing, include a rider in every law: if a court knocks down a law claiming it needs Congressional action to be valid (aka Citizens United), the rider says the law remains in effect until Congress takes the action the Court says is required.
Kayla Rudbek
@cmorenc: as I have frequently said, every single member of the Federalist Society should be permanently disbarred.
Shakti
We may be past some common sense measures. Or rather, they aren’t enough when they would’ve been 5 years ago — I fear.
The Supreme Court shouldn’t have been able to exempt themselves from the ethics rules that every other legal professional has to follow.
The Supreme Court should’ve been expanded five years ago, just based on case hearings. 13 SCOTUS judges for 13 districts.
It should’ve been an actual law forcing presidential nominees to publish their tax returns. The excuse of being under audit is not a defense or a reason for delay.
If a genie waved a wand, and put me in charge as Queen Dictator of the World, drunk with power :
Necessity:
The court has failed its self appointed ambit from Marbury v. Madison as an interpreter of the laws and a check on the other two branches of government. Most current members have lifetime appointments to the office by a President who has not won the popular vote; and therefore lack any accountability to the Republic, beyond the ordinary structure of such appointments. The present Court has only served to enable the Executive and weaken Congress, which is more directly accountable (in theory) to the people, because elections exist, and the Congress is a larger body of people, and not a small body of nine like the Supreme Court, or concentrated in one person like the Presidency.
The present Court gave away chunks of Congress’ power to the President without justification, without citation to the precedent from which it derives its authority. To the extent it relies on shadow docket rulings, or unsigned opinions, or orders without legal reasoning — it voids its orders and opinions and the force of law behind them.
This is not balancing. Either we implement these slate clearings to save the institution, or completely end it from the ground and implement an entirely new judiciary.
In addition:
Percysowner
@cmorenc:
I think this is part of the reason they are using the Shadow Docket so frequently. All they have to say is “The President is right in this case” but not say why or how he is right. When we get a Democratic President, they say “The President is wrong in this case” and again no reasons as to why. That way they can switch their decisions whenever it suits THEIR needs.
Matt McIrvin
@suzanne: We’re not worse than other people. There are historical specifics we’re struggling with.
Countries that have a strong sense of public goods, a strong social safety net, etc., are often more ethnically monocultural than the US and can sometimes be frustratingly xenophobic.
That’s not always the case and it varies from place to place. Canada seems to have threaded the needle better than we have, at the present moment. But there is no country where people are angels, there are huge internal stresses there too and there are Canadians who are as racist as any white American.
Right now, many European countries that have really built a lot of good stuff are dealing with whether the public will still support extending those boons to people Not Like Them. So, the same forces that led to the New Deal/Great Society getting eroded so badly.
They’re more likely to have an ancestry-based concept of citizenship, like what Republicans want to bring to the US, and it means they have this multi-generational population of workers who are “immigrants” even though they were born there, and don’t get the full benefits of the welfare state that they help support.
I don’t personally want to make a devil’s bargain like that. It’s blatantly unconstitutional by any plain reading of the 14th Amendment, and contrary to common concepts of citizenship not just in the US but in nearly every country in the Americas. But there are many people worldwide for whom that kind of thing seems like a good deal.
Matt McIrvin
@David Collier-Brown: The framers didn’t expect most people to be IN the electorate–it was a democracy of comfortable landowners. The move even toward universal white male suffrage came a couple decades later, though it was pretty early in the historical grand scheme of things. And at that point you got the phenomenon of Jackson, who was in some ways a proto-Trumpian demagogue.
Of course, the funny thing is that it’s most often conservatives who will tell you that those kinds of limits on the franchise were a good thing that we should go back to.
BellyCat
Quite possibly true. Two big issues: (1) not only was it rushed and full of compromises, (2) it relied overly much on trusted norms; thus, inattention to detailed roles/expectations and bad faith behaviors individually and collectively.
Good luck changing the Constitution now…
BellyCat
@Professor Bigfoot: So, what’s your explanation for Clarence Thomas’ judicial ideology? Genuinely curious.
Matt
Put the six wingnuts on a one-way flight to Gitmo
Waterboard them until they’ve adequately explained all the corruption they’re involved in
Lock their cells and throw away the key
When they whine about any of this, remind them that they decided all of this was legal
Matt McIrvin
@Deputinize America: There’s a well-known problem in technology that early adopters of some piece of tech often get locked into an early, kludgey version of the system lacking many of the refinements of later iterations, or requiring awkward patches to bring new features in.
I think this is the US’s problem with modern constitutional democracy. We’re running a badly patched prototype version, which was made deliberately difficult to repair and is operating with a lot of awful workarounds. We rightly revere the principle of having one. And that was relatively novel in 1787. But that’s not the same thing as our version being the best of all possible systems.
But any top-to-bottom refactoring is going to be subject to interference by the worst people in the world, abetted by the current system’s faults, so it’s not clear that this is even feasible.
Professor Bigfoot
@schrodingers_cat: omg no, that doesn’t make them heroes.
But its the fear of losing their slaves that drove the southerners to revolution.
It scared them almost as much as the Haitian Revolution did.
Professor Bigfoot
@schrodingers_cat: Point well taken.
BellyCat
@Eyeroller: ALL judges, at EVERY level should be term limited in their position. Same for all county, state and federal representatives. The extended duration in any role is ultimately what keeps the grift grifting.
The retention thing for judges, where “no” must outweigh “yes” is a feature not a bug. In PA, for instance, one is not even entitled to know how many complaints are filed against a judge. Going further, if a litigant prevails in a complaint against a judge, and a written reprimand is issued, said litigant is not even permitted a copy of the letter to a judge.
How can one decide to retain a judge based on a sealed record? One can’t. The system works exactly as intended.
Ruckus
@TXG1112:
society is only for some special subset of people
I believe this will stay in concept for a very long time. Humanity has the same issue as every other living creature, survival. Sure it is much easier for most to survive than it was even when I was born, a somewhat long time ago. Modern medicine is completely different than in the lifetime of old farts still alive – like me, than it was when those old farts were born. What we can do for health is far different than it was 3/4 of a century ago. Medicines, things that make living with many conditions better/doable, concepts of treatment, education and training of doctors and nurses far more than they used to get, because humanity has learned a hell of a lot in the last 75 years. Being a better human still has a ways to go for some. Individual survival is still a concept and is easier today, for many. Not all mind you but at least many. Most?
Ruckus
@Soprano2:
The press has two sides to FFOTUS. The side they think they can speak about and the one they “know” they can’t. Never forget that survival is a strong point of humanity. And some have way, way, way too much power over others, even when they are far worse than useless 24/7.
Professor Bigfoot
@BellyCat: One does not have to be white to be a white supremacist
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Go watch Django Unchained and know he’s “Stephen.”
catothedog
@TXG1112:
@Frank Wilhoit:
This is the problem. People. White people
All the things going on now – the shredding of the Constitution by this thug Court, the doing of Rethuglicans in House and the Congress,…
In the end, this is but a paper exercise for white people. It leaves them mostly unaffected. For the other peoples, it is survival.
Defang this thug Court. Declare the Federalist Society as a terrorist organization. Declare every member of the Fedsoc an enemy of the State. Those are the minimal steps.. necessary but not sufficient.
Will any of that happen? No. Because of white racism. Both parties are seeped in it. Overwhelming majority of white people and wanna-be-white people live it.
White racism is the uber institution of this country. Every institution of this country sucks on it like mothers milk. Everything exists at the benevolence of white racism. Including the so-called liberal heavens like California… (which to be fair, is utopia considering where this country is heading)
The future of this country is a question for white people. But they are not even acknowledging the question. Unless white people lead on this, no one else can help.
sab
@BellyCat: Ohio put in term limits for legislators and the place has been overrun by corruption ever since. Term limits do not make for cleaner governance. Everyone is hustling for a better landing for the next job.
scav
So, what’s up with the manifest and inevitable greatness of heartland ‘merka being demonstrated at the Ryder Cup?
Another Scott
@Glidwrith: I like it.
There are sensible reasons for the courts to be slow. We cannot, however, let the monsters come in and in 6 months break everything built up over 100+ years and then spend the next 5-10 years (or more) arguing about whether they actually were legally permitted to break everything…
Grr…
Thanks.
Best wishes,
Scott.
BellyCat
@sab: Interesting. (See uneducated populace and right leaning media?)
TXG1112
@catothedog: I get what you’re saying, but will note that it was an unusual influx of brown people into the GOP column that put Trump over the top. I’m not absolving white racists of their sins here, but the idea should be to show the mushy moderates that there are better alternatives to crab bucket capitalism.
BellyCat
@Professor Bigfoot: Ahhhh…. That makes (some) sense.
Maybe in a “not dead thread” sometime you could address this topic in greater detail for those of who are melanin deficient?
Is it really just IGMFY? Or is the incentive structure to succeed and rewards so high for some that selling out one’s own race is a well-known trope? Or?….
Deputinize America
@Matt McIrvin:
It’ll take a massive disaster to red states on the level of something like a Yellowstone eruption, New Madrid popping, or some form of nuclear war to get those changes without a bloody revolt.
mskitty
You will NOT manage to amend the Constitution, fugeddaboudit. However, given a big enough blue wave, adding another six justices is possible.