Boardman writes: "The Hateful Four reached critical mass in 2006 when Alito assumed the bench, following Roberts in 2005, Thomas in 1991, and Scalia in 1986. One third of our Supreme Court was appointed by one family named Bush."
Scalia, Thomas, Roberts and Alito. (photo: Getty Images)
The Bushes' Court
28 June 13
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Author's Note: My piece "Is Scalia a Troll" here on March 13 discussed the oral argument for the Voting Rights Act case, including the delicious irony that to find recent violators of the act, the court had to look no further than the plaintiff in the case, Shelby County, Alabama.
onsters Exist Everywhere, They're Just Not in Charge Everywhere
Four members of the United States Supreme Court have shown again, in the court's decisions of recent days, that they represent the very worst of America when it comes to race or gender, just as they have shucked the Constitution in support of money and partisanship in the democratic process.
The four are Chief Justice John Roberts together with Associate Justices Antonin Scalia, Samuel Alito, and Clarence Thomas. They are the Hateful Four in so many senses � for the hateful views they express, for the hateful practices they support, for the hateful spirit they bring to a country in need of wisdom and healing.
Or is there some significant part of the national life that their decisions have improved?
The Hateful Four reached critical mass in 2006 when Alito assumed the bench, following Roberts in 2005, Thomas in 1991, and Scalia in 1986. One third of our Supreme Court was appointed by one family named Bush, and it's possible that Vice President Bush had influence on President Reagan's choice of Scalia.
Bush v. Gore Set the Table for the Hateful Four
Only two of the Hateful Four (Scalia and Thomas) participated in Bush v. Gore (2000), which appointed the president who appointed the other two. That decision was issued per curiam, to create the legal fiction that the decision was made unanimously, "by the court." As a result, there is no signed majority opinion, although there is one signed concurrence (by Scalia, Thomas, and then-Chief Justice William Rehnquist). There are also four different dissents signed variously by five other justices.
Only Justice Anthony Kennedy put his name on nothing in this case, thereby staking his claim to a startling absence of courage in the face of a decision that would open the country to mindless wars and recklessly unregulated economic behavior, all of which continues to do us harm. In this light, Bush v. Gore is more aptly characterized as a quia volo decision, which means, translated literally, "Because we want to."
In Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Hateful Four voted as a bloc to shift America's already degraded market politics closer to monopoly politics, using a tortured version of the First Amendment to decide that non-persons had the right to buy as much free speech as they wanted. As Kennedy, the opinion's author, put it: "If the First Amendment has any force, it prohibits Congress from fining or jailing citizens, or associations of citizens, for simply engaging in political speech."
"Supreme Court overrules God" � Tweet by Todd Starnes, Fox News
On June 26, the Hateful Four held together but failed to prevail in their homophobic support for the Defense of Marriage Act in United States v. Windsor. Abandoning the Hateful Four this time, Kennedy wrote the majority opinion that upheld a lower court's ruling that federal tax law treated a lesbian couple with blatant unfairness when compared to the way it treated mixed-gender couples.
"The federal statute is invalid," Kennedy wrote, "for no legitimate purpose overcomes the purpose and effect to disparage and injure those whom the State, by its marriage laws, sought to protect in personhood and dignity. By seeking to displace this protection and treating those persons as living in marriages less respected than others, the federal statute is in violation of the Fifth Amendment," which provides, among other things, for "the equal liberty of persons" under law.
The Defense of Marriage Act was no less offensive to the Constitution in 1996, when a frightened bi-partisan Congress passed it (342-67 in the House, 85-14 in the Senate) and a querulous President Clinton signed it into law in September of that presidential election year.
Scalia Has No Problem with Intentional Discrimination Here
To express his displeasure with this 5-4 decision, Scalia read his dissent aloud. It was not a surprise, coming from the justice who wrote in an earlier dissent in Lawrence v. Texas (2003), in which the court overturned Texas law criminalizing sodomy:
"Of course it is our moral heritage that one should not hate any human being or class of human beings. But I had thought that one could consider certain conduct reprehensible � murder, for example, or polygamy, or cruelty to animals � and could exhibit even 'animus' toward such conduct. Surely that is the only sort of 'animus' at issue here: moral disapproval of homosexual conduct..."
Scalia's sexual prejudice was not at the heart of U.S. v Windsor, in which the issue was the catch-22 that allowed the government to pick the pocket of the estate of a member of a long-standing relationship simply because the women were not married, which was illegal under other laws. Their behavior was not an issue, nor was it in evidence, since the state's injustice would have prevailed had the ladies lived together as chastely as nuns.
Because People Have a Right to Vote Doesn't Mean We Should Encourage It
On June 25, Roberts led the Hateful Four plus Kennedy to a victory over the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Writing for the majority at the height of his personal hypocrisy, Roberts concludes the decision: "Our country has changed. While any racial discrimination in voting is too much, Congress must ensure that the legislation it passes to remedy that problem speaks to current conditions."
One thing that makes his argument hypocritical is that Roberts, 58, has actively opposed the Voting Rights Act for more than 30 years, at least since 1981 when he was in the Reagan Justice Dept. He wasn't concerned with "current conditions" then � his concern was that violations "should not be too easy to prove" and to achieve that, Roberts helped the Reagan administration push for elimination of voter discrimination only when it could be proved to be intentional. The unspoken immorality of that position is that unintentional discrimination becomes fine and dandy, a position long enjoyed wherever discrimination has been practiced.
The Right of Citizens of the United States to Vote Shall Not Be Denied
The constitutional basis of the Voting Rights Act is the 15th Amendment (1870) to the Constitution (1791). The amendment in its entirety:
Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.[1]
As Roberts knows perfectly well, the intent of the amendment is to eliminate discrimination, without regard to whether that discrimination is intentional, unintentional, or striped like a zebra. But that's not what he wants (quia volo).
At the beginning of his final paragraph, Roberts is not only hypocritical, but exquisitely deceitful and cynical when he writes:
Our decision in no way affects the permanent, nationwide ban on racial discrimination in voting found in [section] 2. We issue no holding on [section] 5 itself, only on the coverage formula. Congress may draft another formula based on current conditions. Such a formula is an initial prerequisite to a determination that exceptional conditions still exist justifying such an "extraordinary departure from the traditional course of relations between the States and the Federal Government."
The first sentence is almost surely a deliberate lie. The decision affects the constitutional ban on voting rights discrimination by making the Voting Rights Act unenforceable until Congress acts.
Hypocrisy Exposed As Too Timid Can Cover Ruthless Cynicism
To say there's "no holding" on section 5 of the Voting Rights Act is baldly disingenuous and hypocritical, since Roberts well knows that section 5 becomes inoperable without Section 2. Thomas says as much in his concurrence, which ends with this mild dissent:
While the Court claims to "issue no holding on [section] 5 itself �" its own opinion compellingly demonstrates that Congress has failed to justify "current burdens" with a record demonstrating "current needs." [�] By leaving the inevitable conclusion unstated, the Court needlessly prolongs the demise of that provision. For the reasons stated in the Court's opinion, I would find [section] 5 unconstitutional." [emphasis added]
Purposefully or not, Thomas's disparagement of the hypocritical cover story gives some cover to the chief justice's deep underlying cynicism. Of course it is constitutionally correct for the court to nod to the ultimate authority of Congress (even as the court eviscerates that authority), but to make that nod to this Congress is less deference than mockery.
The Voting Rights Acts Works, That's Why We Don't Need It
In 2006, that Congress voted overwhelmingly (390-33 in the House, 98-0 in the Senate) to renew the Voting Rights Act for 25 years. An amendment to shorten the renewal to 10 years lost 288-143 in the House. President Bush spoke with solemn pride of the act when he signed it, calling the bill "an example of our continued commitment to a united America where every person is valued and treated with dignity and respect."
Now the Supreme Court has vitiated the act in a craven decision, leaving it to Congress to fix before the next election. Is there anyone who believes the current Congress will act to repair the Voting Rights Act? Will it even bring a bill to a vote?
No wonder Howard Fineman calls Roberts, with more respect than Roberts has earned, "The shrewdest, most manipulative and radical politician in this city�."
The court's Voting Rights Act decision looks for all the world like intentional racial discrimination. So does the court's decision on affirmative action. But intent is hard to prove. Just as Roberts explained in 1981.
William M. Boardman has over 40 years experience in theatre, radio, TV, print journalism, and non-fiction, including 20 years in the Vermont judiciary. He has received honors from Writers Guild of America, Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Vermont Life magazine, and an Emmy Award nomination from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader Supported News.
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In all of the cases I could find of cops being convicted and sent to prison for murder, the victim was white. But none of them were killed in prison.
Nobody will do any research on it, just keep on quoting Anderson Cooper and the grinning -- excuse me, GRIEVING -- parents about "Sandy Hook".
It's just sickening.
http://www.sandyhookjustice.com/
You can't rely on government officials or propaganda organs like CNN to be telling the truth since 9/11 and Saddam Hussein's WMDs. They have an agenda and it is not in the best interests of your liberty, truth, or justice to accept uncritically the version of events they are propagating.
My wife was a pediatric critical care nurse in Oakland, CA for almost 2 decades, and the thought of all those children, shot and bleeding out without any emergency medical professionals being permitted to try to save some is both heartbreaking and shocking.
Finally, more than an hour after police knew the shooter was dead, the Medical Examiner's Staff went in and simply declared each and every one of them dead.
The police knew the shooter was dead within 10 minutes of first arriving on the scene. The school was taken off lockdown and the children allegedly evacuated within a half hour. And yet, medical workers were not granted access.
That is troubling, especially to anyone who has experience in emergency medical care.
The police considered the scene secure enough to let hundreds of children walk down the halls, out of the building, through the parking lot and down the street, and yet refused to let medical staff in.
At the Aurora Theater scene, EMTs were allowed in even while the police were searching for the shooter's accomplice that many witness/survivo rs reported seeing.
For that matter, why are there no photos or videos of these hundreds of children walking to the Fire Station?
We all saw the one famous photo of a dozen or so kids in the parking lot, but that's all.
"Why do Americans always" believe whatever the corporate media tell them to believe?
Thank you!
I have another question. Why do so many of these comments sections have comment rating numbers that don't show how many pluses and minuses, but only the running total?
Totally ignoring the police gang murder of an innocent, unarmed man who was not breaking the law--and the fixed grand jury that refused to indict the killer cops.
And ignoring that raging injustice could set off extreme anger.
When the grand jury refused to act, I knew they were going to get cops hurt or killed. And they did.
Time to face the music. Bad cops have ignited national rage.
And NYPD and Giuliani, don't castigate the public or protestors as the enemy. You are just making the situation worse--and shredding any semblance of respect we once had for you.
fredboy, your posting is a good example of what our problem is in this country.In the 2nd paragraph you say he wasn't breaking te law but he had multiple priors for the same infraction...se lling loosies. And for the grand jury to act, they would had to find them at fault and they didn't.
Then you call it a raging injustice. Well if you start with that extreme anger, and the grand jury didn't, it follows that you would presume injustice and would only see what you wanted to see. And calling it racism stokes the flames even higher. I could ask why there isn't any uproar over Dillon Taylor, an unarmed white boy shot & killed by a black cop in Utah. That cop wasn't indicted either. The real problem isn't race but that we put guns in the hands of cops and depend on them to keep the law using their own judgement. You can mitigate this problem but it will not disappear because of the poor gun control in this country. And cops don't take chances. I remember a plumber being shot & killed by police when he crawled out from under a house where he was working. OOPS wrong guy.
My father fought against fascism in WWII. I'm sure as hell not going to start supporting it now.
Since there weren't, you're just hyping your fantasy.
These are not a "recent spate of killings." I find no evidence that the rate of police killing people (specifically black males) has increased this year. For some reason, the corporate media has made them "news" this year, and that is an interesting phenomena.
The Zimmerman case was not a police killing. Still, though many of us feel that the case was bungled, and justice was not served, there were not the types of protests you berate after the verdict.
I agree with your comments about actual trials but disagree that people would be satisfied with anything other than conviction. I brought up the Zimmerman case because protesters are still calling it no justice (as you just did). I'm not sure what you mean by "hyping my fantasy." All I said was that people are calling for justice but will not be satisfied with anything less than conviction and they should say what they mean.
That is hyping your fantasy.
They are trained to shot and kill. I think it is time to reevaluate that training along with teaching them not to draw their gun unnecessarily. If they are too scared to be in their assigned location without a gun in hand, they should not be cops.
The roots of the problems here go back generations, not months, and tracing those roots would take more time and space than is allowed here. It comes from the divisiveness inherent in the 'us versus them' that is the core of the issues at this time. And the disintegration of the application of the law even handedly to all citizens, regardless of color or economic status.
What most of the people are missing, who line up with the position that the police are justified in shooting blacks - or anyone, for that matter - when they are unarmed, is that they are afraid of the real possibility that if this 'us versus them' mentality continues, it will not neglect them, either. They won't be immune to such sanctioned violence. This is the potential end result of the degradation of our rights under the Constitution and Bill or Rights. These rights of citizens apply to all of us; white, black, anyone - or they can be abrogated at will by anyone who has been given the power to do so. As the police are who swore their oaths to 'defend and protect'; as the NSA, CIA, FBI, SCOTUS, Congress, and the Administration swore the same oaths.
This divisiveness enhanced by 'security' excuses that override the oaths, will destroy our democracy. Is doing so. Remember.
Wow. Ugly. But reality of history often looks that way when brought into the present.
And who was it that first said that those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it?
Any aliens who show up in invisible starships to assess humanity's suitability to be allowed out into the rest of the galaxy would most likely conclude that we should be contained on this one planet to see if we manage to avoid self-destructio n from sheer willful stupidity. That's assuming such aliens don't have a vested interest in helping us along to said self-destructio n. Who knows?
Also must cops are veterans taught to shoot first and think later in Basic Training video games