The Obama administration wants the U.S. Supreme Court to help it recover $280 billion from the major tobacco companies, money described as "ill-gotten gains" from past racketeering violations.
"It's one of the most wrongheaded decisions in court history," said Sen. Chuck Shumer of New York, referring the Supreme Court's decision to allow corporations to spend unlimited amounts of cash supporting or opposing candidates.
Nobody would claim there needs to be more money in electoral theater, and yet removing any impedance to corporate political spending has some heralding the highest Court's recent ruling as a victory for free speech and others proclaiming the end of democracy that the "floodgates of corruption, now burst open."
...For the third time in recent years, this court is called upon to address a question under California law relating to marriage and same-sex couples...
...Accordingly, we conclude that each of the state constitutional challenges to Proposition 8 advanced by petitioners and the Attorney General lacks merit. Having been approved by a majority of the voters at the November 4, 2008 election, the initiative measure lawfully amends the California Constitution to include the new provision as article I, section 7.5...
...Finally, we consider whether Proposition 8 affects the validity of the marriages of same-sex couples that were performed prior to the adoption of Proposition 8. Applying well-established legal principles pertinent to the question whether a constitutional provision should be interpreted to apply prospectively or retroactively, we conclude that the new section cannot properly be interpreted to apply retroactively. Accordingly, the marriages of same-sex couples performed prior to the effective date of Proposition 8 remain valid and must continue to be recognized in this state...
The right wingnut Mighty Wurlitzer has been going after Sonia Sotomayor for the simple reason that she was on President Obama's short list for the U.S. Supreme Court vacancy.
With last week's news that President Obama will soon get to choose a Supreme Court nominee, media immediately began speculating about who he would choose. And, just as quickly, some media started trying to undermine potential selections. (Back when Democrats were expressing skepticism about President Bush's nomination of Samuel Alito to the high court, the media chastised them for "pre-judging" the nomination. Now the media itself is rushing to judge nominees before they are even nominees. What a difference a few years make.)
Second Circuit Court of Appeals judge Sonia Sotomayor has been the subject of the harshest criticism, led by New Republic writer Jeffrey Rosen. Rosen took a brief glance at Sotomayor's rulings, talked to a few people who don't like her, and typed up their anonymous complaints. Sound like an overly harsh assessment of Rosen's research? It isn't. In fact, that's pretty much how Rosen himself describes his research...
Associate Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia on March 4, 2008 in Warrensburg, Missouri:
[Do you believe that there is a right to privacy under the United States Constitution?]
Oh, there certainly is and it us, uh, contained in the Fourth Amendment. And it says "that the people shall be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures." Period. There is not a generalized right of privacy, whatever that means. What is a generalized right of privacy [garbled]? One of our, one of our, one of our opinions says it means "the right to be left alone". [laughter] Right. This is anarchy...
...[wire tapping] So, there is no, what should I say, exclusion from democratic debate of - conversations. It's something for the people to decide whether you should have wiretapping or not....[as practice now]...This generalized right of privacy which comes from, what is it, penumbras and emanations from the Fourth and a lot of other ridiculous stuff. Uh, you know the consequences of that? Surely one of the major policy issues around these days is whether, uh, the Federal government can listen in on these international phone calls to find what the bad guys are doing. It used to be up to the Congress to decide whether the danger was high enough and the risk of invading people's privacy high enough to permit that. No longer. It's a question for me now. It's a question for me. That's what happens when you, when you read more and more stuff into the Constitution - you reduce democracy.
Last year, when law professor Joel Reidenberg wanted to show his Fordham University class how readily private information is available on the Internet, he assigned a group project. It was collecting personal information from the Web about himself.
This year, after U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia made public comments that seemingly may have questioned the need for more protection of private information, Reidenberg assigned the same project. Except this time Scalia was the subject, the prof explains to the ABA Journal in a telephone interview...
...And, as Scalia himself made clear in a statement to Above the Law, he isn't happy about the invasion of his privacy:
"Professor Reidenberg's exercise is an example of perfectly legal, abominably poor judgment. Since he was not teaching a course in judgment, I presume he felt no responsibility to display any," the justice says, among other comments...
...The second highest ranking Republican in the Senate, just a few days after the election, is already talking about blocking Supreme Court nominations that haven't been named, in response to Supreme Court vacancies that don't exist...
Jon Kyl, the second-ranking Republican in the U.S. Senate, warned president-elect Barack Obama that he would filibuster U.S. Supreme Court appointments if those nominees were too liberal.
Kyl, Arizona's junior senator, expects Obama to appoint judges in the mold of U.S Supreme Court Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, David Souter and Stephen Breyer. Those justices take a liberal view on cases related to social, law and order and business issues, Kyl said.
"He believes in justices that have empathy," said Kyl, speaking at a Federalist Society meeting in Phoenix. The attorneys group promotes conservative legal principles.
Kyl said if Obama goes with empathetic judges who do not base their decisions on the rule of law and legal precedents but instead the factors in each case, he would try to block those picks via filibuster...
Steve Benen points out that John Kyl (r - Arizona) was against judicial appointment filibusters before he was for them:
SEN. JOHN KYL: ...This is strictly about whether or not a minority of senators is going to prevent the president from being able to name and get confirmed judges that he chooses after he's been elected by the American people. And it's never been the case until the last two years that a minority could dictate to the majority what they could do...
...No freeman is to be taken or imprisoned or disseised of his free tenement or of his liberties or free customs, or outlawed or exiled or in any way ruined, nor will we go against such a man or send against him save by lawful judgement of his peers or by the law of the land. To no-one will we sell or deny of delay right or justice...
Today the United States Supreme Court restored habeas corpus in a 5-4 opinion.
ACLU...In a stunning blow to the Bush administration's failed national security policies, the Supreme Court ruled today 5-4 that the U.S. Constitution applies to the government's detention policies at Guantánamo. The Court concluded that detainees held at Guantánamo have a right to challenge their detention through habeas corpus....
Associate Justice Antonin Scalia issued a dyspeptic dissent.
...Scalia said the nation is "at war with radical Islamists" and that the court's decision "will make the war harder on us. It will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed..."
The Raw Story
...Democratic presidential contender Sen. Barack Obama is again facing questions about his patriotism from some conservative blogs -- this time for apparently failing to put his hand over his heart during a rendition of the national anthem at an Iowa campaign event....
In 1943, at a time when we were at war, the United States Supreme Court had a thing or two to say about "required" displays of patriotism.
