I agree. Not with the overall analysis of the commerce clause that the Supreme Court uses. I think they should strike down far more laws. Just look at a case like Raich six years ago. If the government can say that home grown marijuana which is used by the grower and never sold is somehow “interstate commerce” then pretty much anything is. And Scalia even sided with the majority on that one.
I also don’t get the statement that “the government can’t force you to buy something.” Where does this come from? It seems as long as Congress makes a nexus with interstate commerce, then they could certainly do that.
The distinction also escapes me. If the government can keep you from buying things, within reason, it’s very difficult to see any particular reason why it can’t force you to buy things, within reason.
Yep. Also wouldn’t be stunned to see Alito or even Scalia allow it.
I’m not going to pretend I’m some savvy court-watcher, but I looked into it a bit last week, and while I personally think the courts over the last 70 years have gone way, way wrong here, I doubt the SCOTUS is going to try to fix that. Hope I’m wrong.
Yes, the reason she has the jobs with the Heritage Foundation (where she was collecting resumes for Bush Admin jobs while Bush v. Gore was before her husband’s court, and was later the group’s WH liaison). Do you *really * think it’s just a coincidence? :dubious:
She’s now the head of a well-funded TP group aimed at opposing the “tyranny” of the Obama admnistration, of which health care is the most prominent example. She also runs Liberty Consulting, whose website says “clients can use [Ginny] Thomas’s ‘experience and connections’ to help “with ‘governmental affairs efforts’ and political donation strategies”.
Does it start to dawn on you yet? If not, this should be illuminating.
Nobody’s actually going to recuse. That never happens. But the suggestion that Kagan should is just another example of what the GOP has found to be a very effective tactic - the preemptive tu quoque. If you’re vulnerable on a point, just accuse the other guys of it first. The accusation will stick among the credulous, and any attempt by the other guys at pointing out the log in your own eye will just look like whining.
Kagan recused herself out of something like half the cases during her first SCOTUS term, because she had worked on the cases as Solicitor General (I think she actually has the record for most recusals in a term). Roberts also recused himself from several cases when he was first appointed, as they were appeals of cases he had decided as a Circut Court judge.
And Reinhardt actually has recused himself in cases his wife was more directly involved in the the one he was talking about in the OP’s quote (I’m not certain, but I’d suspect he recuses himself when his wife works directly on an amicus brief for the case, instead of just being head of the organization that produces the brief.)
So “that never happens” certainly isn’t true. I doubt it will happen in the case of the ACA, but thats because there isn’t really any good reason for Thomas or Kagan to recuse themselves, not because judges never recuse themselves.
I’d forgotten about Kagan’s possible recusal. What would be the result of a 4-4 decision If either Kagan or Thomas, but not both, recuse themsleves? Would health care reform be constitutional in some states but not in others?
Happens quite a lot, actually. It’s called a circuit split. For example, there are two distinct groupings of federal circuits on the issue of whether admission of pre-Miranda silence as substantive evidence of guilt is constitutionally permissible (plus the 9th, which splits the baby).
It seems like you are thinking in the wrong direction. She benefits from his position on the court regardless of her opinion. That’s just life. Now, if the opposite were true then you would have a point. The same is, or would be, true for the spouse of every politician. Spouses benefit from being married to their politician spouses.
It is sad that we all can agree that the SCOtUS is a political operation now. We used to be able to convince ourselves that is was a branch that was about a neutral application of the law. I don’t know if it is due to the public questioning of the candidates by congress or the admitted intent by the right wing to select judges that agree with their principals. The ability to think the court is above politics has been smashed beyond repair.
Thomas weaseling about his wifes salary and involvement in right wing politics is reprehensible. Has he no honor? He is a Supreme Court justice. He is not a local judge. If we can’t depend on the top judges to make an attempt to stay above politics, we have no refuge. The Supreme Cort has been diminished in respect and served badly by Thomas.
He would not have been booted off the court because his wife was a right wing organizer and was making tons of money. He had no penalty involved. It was just weaseling to hide the connection.
“POLITICO has learned, for instance, that the initial $500,000 contribution came from Dallas real estate investor Harlan Crow, a major GOP donor who held an event for Liberty Central at his home a few months after the group launched. He also once gave Justice Thomas a $19,000 “Frederick Douglass Bible” as a gift and donated $150,000 to build a new wing named for Thomas on a Savannah, Ga., library that Clarence Thomas visited frequently in his youth.”
Now if the above is true about Virginia Thomas’ new consultancy funding, it’s not an unreasonable stretch to call this at a minimum the appearance of a conflict of interest.
Are you not getting the problem, or just evading it? HE benefits from HER using her marriage to him for financial gain, because of her (presumed) ability both to sway his thinking and to point out the substantial material benefit they both gain from her sponsors.
Justice Thomas is not disinterested in this case. Mrs. Thomas’ financial affairs are irrelevant. The financial affairs of the guy with the power to deliver results to her sponsors are terribly relevant. Clear now? gonzo, the broad public recognition of this Court’s more senior members as partisan hacks is purely of their own doing, stemming from a 2000 ruling you probably remember.
Not really. You are assuming that her sponsors are paying for a particular vote from Thomas, or that she is suggesting that she can sway her husband’s vote. I think that it is the work she does, as well as the people she can influence on the hill (and, by this, I mean legislators) that accounts for her compensation. If Thomas were to vote against Mrs. Thomas’ agenda I don’t see how that affects her compensation. If people see her as a champion of their agenda then they will still donate to the cause.
At any rate I do see your point about the possibility that a justice may not be disinterested in a case. But, that being said, I don’t really see the difference between this and Kagan’s interest. Although it may not be financial it may certainly be ideological. She may have been involved in meetings to give advice on litigation. We will never know for sure. If you think Thomas should recuse himself then I don’t see how you think Kagan should not. According to your criteria even a whiff of impropriety should be cause enough for recusal.
“If you dont vote right, then you don’t get any sex until you get another chance to vote right, and you know how long THAT could be!” is a powerful argument, indeed, that only Thomas’ wife can make, and of course, how would the rest of us know it was being made? So, no, not persuasive, not persuasive at all.
Why do you think so? Remember that you didn’t even know she had the position until a day or so ago.
You’ve already been told where that income comes from, and why. As Ann Landers used to say, “Wake up and smell the coffee, Buttercup.”
If you have any basis whatsoever outside partisanship to think so, then tell us. If you think political views have no role in a lawmaking organization like the Supreme Court, then that’s just silly.
You now know that she did not. What is your problem?
Clear, direct financial interest is a “whiff of impropriety”, and hypothetical political leanings are comparable? Take off the partisan blinders - you’re fooling no one.
