RIP Scalia

[lance_strongarm]

@Rick_Kitchen

My question. Scalia was at this resort in a company of 40 people. Who were these people? Were there lobbyists? Koch brothers? Investment bankers? Tea Party activists? Were they discussing upcoming Court decisions?

I’m going to guess that judges go to resorts, and dinners, and meetings, and all kinds of social and business events, and we don’t wonder these things. Just because he died at one doesn’t change that.

[Bricker]

@TonySinclair

I’ll tell you after the eighth Congressional investigation into Scalia’s activities at the ranch.

This response dodges the question.

[Frank]

@Bricker

This response dodges the question.

I’m going to come down foursquare and stalwart on your side here, Bricker.

The baseless insinuations that Scalia was accepting gifts when he died are ridiculous.

He liked hunting, he did it frequently, and he could certainly afford a $400 dollar a night resort to do so in. The only reason to believe that he was doing something underhanded is if one believes that all people will do something underhanded given the chance, and I don’t believe that.

The comments in this thread are simply mud-slinging. They’re saying, “I see smoke!” when there’s not even a fire.

[andros]

I’ll chime in as a bleeding heart commie who has spent many, many hours reading and *literally *yelling at Scalia’s opinions, who deeply and ferociously has despised many of his interpretations of the law and the nature of the Constitution, and who regularly disparages the man with the moniker “Fat Tony:”

I see absolutely no reason to believe that Justice Scalia was corrupt, or that his personal activities leading up to his death or at any time in his SCOTUS tenure involved any unethical activities.

I do not celebrate his passing, but I assuredly do not mourn it; I adamantly believe that his presence on the Court did not best serve the United States or her citizens. But I do not believe for a second that he was on the take.
.

[Tamerlane]

@andros

I see absolutely no reason to believe that Justice Scalia was corrupt, or that his personal activities leading up to his death or at any time in his SCOTUS tenure involved any unethical activities.

I do not celebrate his passing, but I assuredly do not mourn it; I adamantly believe that his presence on the Court did not best serve the United States or her citizens. But I do not believe for a second that he was on the take.

What he said.

[kaylasdad99]

@Bricker

Yes, and nope.

Yes, the Fifth Amendment, but nope, not due to a theory that injury is deprivation of property.

The Fifth Amendment forbids compelled self-incrimination: “I take the Fifth,” being the well-known phrase that asserts this protection. Information obtained from the application of a truncheon is compelled self-incrimination.

:smack:

Thanks very much; I shouldn’t have missed the simple one that was staring me in the face (it does, however, make me curious to know what was the specific case in which someone claimed that torture was violating the Eighth).

@Bricker

I think you’ve confused the disease and the remedy.

The “wholesale upsetting of social norms,” did indeed happen. But it was the passage of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments which did so. The social norms that continued to exist were suddenly on borrowed time: the government could no longer constitutionally enforce these social norms.

When state governments sought to do so in contravention of these constitutional guarantees, the people thus aggrieved brought suit, and won. Courts ordered states to comply with the guarantees.

And when states refused, using a variety of stratagems, the courts fashioned more direct remedies.

I acknowledge that the busing issue was at times an overly invasive exercise of judicial power, but it arose from an even more blatant disregard of legitimate judicial authority by state and local governments. The courts did not set out to usurp legislative or executive authority; they simply fashioned an equitable remedy where legislatures and governors failed to act as they were mandated to do.

Thanks for this one as well. It reaffirms my assessment that the value you provide in “keeping us honest” (or at least “on our toes”) is not self-serving political hackery that you only deploy against those who do not share your political preferences.

Cheers!

[Doyle]

As an Independent trying to become a Democrat, I find the vitriol of this tread to be horrifying. Maybe I’ll just stay where I am.

[gigi]

@Fiveyearlurker

Apropos of nothing, I just watched The Daily Show from Thursday, and Trevor Noah had a joke in there (pre Scalia death) that the Supreme Court justices were so old that it was possible that some of them wouldn’t make it to see the premiere of the Game of Thrones season.

Jon Stewart involved in death of Scalia? Retires, sets up a puppet host and can’t resist slipping this clue into the show? Almost daring them to come get him at his farm in NJ.

[Acsenray]

@Doyle

As an Independent trying to become a Democrat, I find the vitriol of this tread to be horrifying. Maybe I’ll just stay where I am.

Because this thread defined what it means to be a Democrat, somehow?

[wonky]

@andros

But I do not believe for a second that he was on the take.

Agreed. Corruption is really not remotely necessary to explain his decisions.

[Doyle]

@Acsenray

Because this thread defined what it means to be a Democrat, somehow?

You’re right.

[Merneith]

Because it gives him a rationalization for supporting the Republicans.

[Sunny_Daze]

Because he missed the “BBQ Pit” forum location?

Most of us are just expressing ourselves with our usual, loving snark.

Which reminds me, Bricker, yes, kudos to you for starting the STFU about the email thread. It was well done. You are not a right-wing wing nut.

I took the inquiries about what Scalia was doing at the ranch to be semi-comedic responses to the Freepers insinuations that the WH had somehow caused Scalia’s death.

While the Pit occasionally devolves into serious discussions, the expectation that anyone engaged in a Pit thread can automagically be taken seriously is flawed. Reader beware. Objects closer than they appear. Etc, etc.

[Doyle]

@Merneith

Because it gives him a rationalization for supporting the Republicans.

Wrong. I can’t remember the last time I voted Republican.

[Bricker]

@kaylasdad99

Thanks very much; I shouldn’t have missed the simple one that was staring me in the face (it does, however, make me curious to know what was the specific case in which someone claimed that torture was violating the Eighth).

I think the dividing line would be pre- and post-conviction. Since the Eighth Amendment forbids cruel and unusual punishment, it would presumably apply to torture infected as part of a penal system or regime.

Thanks for this one as well. It reaffirms my assessment that the value you provide in “keeping us honest” (or at least “on our toes”) is not self-serving political hackery that you only deploy against those who do not share your political preferences.

Of course, here the majority of weak commentary from the right doesn’t sit long unanswered, and there are comparatively few commentators from the right anyway, so I end up with fewer chances to point out flaws. But when they loom up like this, I am happy to do so.

[GIGObuster]

@Doyle

Wrong. I can’t remember the last time I voted Republican.

Good, now please take into account that if Scalia had not made many of his notorious votes based on his hate, ignorance and vitriol we should not be having this pit thread.

[Doyle]

@ddsun

Because he missed the “BBQ Pit” forum location?

Most of us are just expressing ourselves with our usual, loving snark.

Which reminds me, Bricker, yes, kudos to you for starting the STFU about the email thread. It was well done. You are not a right-wing wing nut.

I took the inquiries about what Scalia was doing at the ranch to be semi-comedic responses to the Freepers insinuations that the WH had somehow caused Scalia’s death.

While the Pit occasionally devolves into serious discussions, the expectation that anyone engaged in a Pit thread can automagically be taken seriously is flawed. Reader beware. Objects closer than they appear. Etc, etc.

I was aware of the forum location. I just have a hard time of speaking so ill of the dead. It reminds me of when Margaret Thatcher died and parties broke out all of the UK. I found that very distasteful.

[Doyle]

@GIGObuster

Good, now please take into account that if Scalia had not made many of his notorious votes based on his hate, ignorance and vitriol we should not be having this pit thread.

I wasn’t a fan either, but I don’t wish him to burn in Hell.

[DMC]

@Bricker

I think you’ve confused the disease and the remedy.

The “wholesale upsetting of social norms,” did indeed happen. But it was the passage of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments which did so. The social norms that continued to exist were suddenly on borrowed time: the government could no longer constitutionally enforce these social norms.

Just because the amendments abolished slavery, as well as extended a few rights to blacks, doesn’t necessarily prohibit Starving Artist from missing those “good ol’ days”, when people knew their place.

[Acsenray]

@Doyle

I was aware of the forum location. I just have a hard time of speaking so ill of the dead. It reminds me of when Margaret Thatcher died and parties broke out all of the UK. I found that very distasteful.

I don’t see why dying should offer an aura of protection. What are the bounds of such a shield? Would you apply it to say Stalin or Pol Pot? If not, where do you draw the line? Or should we be subject to a time-based restriction?

There doesn’t seem to be anything tragic or cruel about Scalia’s death, so far as we know. He wasn’t murdered or tortured or hit with an unfortunate illness at too young an age. His death didn’t interrupt some great life’s work now left unfinished. It doesn’t unleash a reign of terror on the world. Why should we not speak freely and honestly?