Scalia: corrupt or just stupid?

The BBQ Pit
21

If you look at the docket of the Supremes (but even more so, the DC Circuit), you’ll find that cabinet officials are named parties in a huge chunk of the cases. For example, see:
http://www.supremecourtus.gov/docket/docket.html
Type in any cabinet member’s name, and I’ll bet you are likely to find a case with them as a named litigant (I tried Powell, Snow and O’Neill, and got hits on them all, plus Bill Clinton).

So I guess what you’re saying here that the Supremes are basically precluded from having any social interaction with anyone in the federal government? You’d have to throw in state government too, since most of the criminal appeals name the attorney general or the governor as a party.

Come on, this really is a ridiculous argument. You think Bader Ginsberg or Souter skipped all those White House banquets during the whole time that Slick Willy was trying to postpone the Paula Jones suit?

22

A. Exactly how many years must pass before we don’t get the obligatory “slick willy” reference in any thread that dares to suggest that any member of the Bush administration is less than perfect?

B. Do you have some evidence which suggests that Ginsberg /Souter were at the White House during that time?

C. In any event, do you not see any realistic difference between some one in Washington attending a large party at the White House vs. a party to a lawsuit going on a cross state trip with one of the judges about to hear said suit?

23

Never. In 2343, the SDMB will still have stupid political arguments and some wizened Republican will be unearthed to say “Oh yea! Well, Zaqhwqhhawhdf 3 may do it, BUT YOU WEREN’T COMPLAINING WHEN CLINTON DID IT!”

24

Slick Willy gets used more than just in threads relating to the Bushes. Same as “Dumya” or the like gets raised in threads relating to issues like the war.
And what’s wrong with “Slick Willy”? Seems like there’s a lot of criticism of Dubya/Dumya for his lack of polish…

I’m willing to bet that at least one of Ginsberg, Souter, Stevens or Breyer (the reasonably solid liberal votes on the court, two of whom The Right Honorable William Jefferson Blythe Clinton, Esq. appointed) were at a White House gala in late '96 and early '97 when the Jones v. Clinton case was before the Supremes. If you’ve ever lived in Washington and read The Post, those folks are frequent guests at the very frequent White House galas.

But no, I didn’t keep a copy of the guest lists from the White House parties then. Did you?

“Justices!” I’m not sure I do see the difference. Is it the travel? The ducks? Louisiana? Don’t recall reading about those prohibitions in the Codes of Judicial Conduct (or perhaps they’ve been amended since last I read…)

25

[QUOTE=schplebordnik]
Slick Willy gets used more than just in threads relating to the Bushes. Same as “Dumya” or the like gets raised in threads relating to issues like the war.
And what’s wrong with “Slick Willy”? Seems like there’s a lot of criticism of Dubya/Dumya for his lack of polish…

[/quote=schplebordnik]
I did not use “Dumya”, nor do I see it here in this thread. Over and above that, this response is non responsive to this thread at all, let alone the point made.

[quote=schplebordnik]

I’m willing to bet that at least one of Ginsberg, Souter, Stevens or Breyer (the reasonably solid liberal votes on the court, two of whom The Right Honorable William Jefferson Blythe Clinton, Esq. appointed) were at a White House gala in late '96 and early '97 when the Jones v. Clinton case was before the Supremes. If you’ve ever lived in Washington and read The Post, those folks are frequent guests at the very frequent White House galas.

But no, I didn’t keep a copy of the guest lists from the White House parties then. Did you?
[/quote=schplebordnik]
I’m not the one who made the claim. back it up or drop it.

Didn’t claim prohibitions of Codes of Judicial Conduct did I? (looks back) nope. What I did suggest is that in your original response, you threw out some bs about the other justices (and we’ll charitably assume that you intended it as the basic ‘oh yea, well your guys did the same sorta stuff and you didn’t complain then’ defense), claiming (though refusing to support the claim) that they’d probably attended some White House gala. And I pointed out that there’s a material difference between a public official in the capital attending a ‘gala’ type gathering in the White House (which is any President’s personal residence, merely where they reside during the term of office - IOW, it’s connected to the job), a public gathering as it were, where the likelihood is that there are many, many guests, and an apparently private gathering where both parties travel to a different state from which they reside, in order to have a small, private gathering shooting water fowl.

The liklihood of press at the White House Gala approaches 100%, likihood of press at the hunting trip approaches 0, Press being involved = potential of photographs etc, number of people involved at WHite House Gala = many, which then = liklihood of a small, private conversation being held between the two people being slim, vs. at the hunting trip, where I would be astounded if the two didn’t have a chance to have a private talk or two. Length of time spent at White house gala = one evening, length of time spent on hunting trip most likely much more (I doubt that even folks as wealthy as Mr. C travels from DC to LA for a single couple of hours hunting trip).

apparently we must point out these rather obvious differences.

26

Scalia should be arrested for attempted murder, plying the Vice President with heart-damaging foie gras like that.

Seriously, though. What evidence do we have that Cheney and Scalia are really longtime friends? Longtime friends since Scalia singlehandedly cancelled five hundred thousand votes in 2000? Or longtime as in the two grew up together providing the back-beat for their local choir by thumping bibles?

27

Regardless of how close they are, a Justice and one of the main parties in an upcoming case shouldn’t be going on long, isolated vacations together. It might not be illegal, but there’s such a thing as PROPRIETY which Scalia should be aware of, the scholar that he is.

Scalia may be a scholar, but he’s also a pretty arrogant man- I’d be willing to believe that it never even crossed his mind that people would doubt the integrity of a Supreme Court Justice and the Vice President of the United States. And seriously, in a perfect world, we’d have no reason to. Unfortunately, this is not a perfect world (and fortunately, Scalia is not as right as often as he thinks he is). So I wouldn’t call him corrupt or stupid, only a bit self-preferentially oblivious.

28

Never said you did. But those are the rules that all judicial officers of the United States are required to abide by, not:

We can all say "well I think that government officials ought to do things this way and I think that government officials clearly ought not to do certain types of things which I think clearly show the conspiracy they are hatching up outside of the prying eyes of the press, but unless there is some sort of rule that sets that down, it ain’t improper.

That’s why, despite the fact that lots of people thought the Hillary/Ira Magaziner health care task force was some sort of hidden socialist conspiracy that needed prying into, or that the Right Honorable William Jefferson Blythe Clinton, Esq. shouldn’t have been performing sex acts which didn’t legally qualify as “sexual relations” inside a government building with a subordinate government employee, well there weren’t any laws or regulations prohibiting what they did and it ultimately didn’t result in judicial or criminal sanctions.

The rules is the rules. Everything else, well, it’s just grist for the mouth-foaming mill…

29

<rant>
Oh my, you’re still not over the 2000 election? Perhaps you are unaware that Presidents are chosen by the Electoral College, not the popular vote, in which case all Scalia did was uphold the Constitution (Article 2, Section 1). (The last president to be elected that way was also a Republican–clearly a conspiracy!) What’s that? “Hanging chads”? Perhaps you are unaware the Miami Herald, USA Today and Hearst newspapers checked the “undervote” and found ::gasp:: that Gore got an extra 49 votes.

I am reminded of the scene in “Trading Places” where Randolph Duke is pathetically crying “Turn the machines back on! Turn the machines back on!”
</rant>

I trust you are experiencing similar righteous indignation over Howard Dean’s refusal to disclose hundreds of thousands of pages of public records and papers? :wink:

30

Hmm. I don’t think he’s corrupt. And I know he’s not stupid.

I think maybe he’s just so arrogant that he doesn’t think the rules apply to him.

31

Yeah, fer Christ’s sake, the “no hunting in another state with a small group including a Cabinet-level named party unless there are sufficient members of the press to prevent you from spending your time talking to one another how to rig the outcome of the case (by making sure you vote my way and execute on my nefarious strategy to get the Court conservatives and at least one of the Court liberals to follow your lead)” rule! If you haven’t read it lately, well that’s what law clerks are for!

32

There really isn’t anything that a Supreme Court justice can do “singlehandedly,” since you need at least four of your compatriots on the court to join in on anything.

Case in point: Lawrence v. Texas. Now, if you read Scalia’s dissent, that case put about the biggest bug up his ass (metaphor intentional) as about anything he’s seen come across his docket since he was appointed (although the pledge case may now tie for first, but he’s recused from that one). If he ever had the ability to singlehandedly do anything, he would have prevented that decision from issuing. No dice though.

As has been pointed out before, the 500K or so votes nationally that Gore got above Bush weren’t “canceled,” they were just immaterial to the manner in which a President is elected. It was the couple of hundred in Florida that were the real debating point. If you’ve got a beef with the fact that Gore lost the presidency but got more of the popular vote, you need to blame it on those bastards at the Constitutional convention, or those Nader voters who saw no appreciable difference between Gore and Bush on the issues they cared about.

33

All right, all right. Forget I made the vote-cancelling comment.

I still want to know exactly how long Scalia and Cheney have been good buddies. Were they pals when Scalia was on the Appeals court and Cheney was Chairman of the Republican Policy Committee in Congress? Or before that?

34

In my moderately informed opinion:

  • Not corrupt;
  • Definitely not stupid;
  • Maybe, so damn convinced of his moral rectitude that he can’t fathom any substantive criticism of his actions: *"What’s the big deal? I’m an *honest man!"

This is not the same as the arrogance suggested above, but is along the same lines.

35

Don’t be disingenuous. This isn’t just another suit against a bureaucracy in which the current secretary’s name goes on it just for paperwork, and this isn’t just another Washington dinner, and this isn’t just about the facts of disinterest. The case is about Cheney’s ownenergy-policy committee (remember that, or has the stonewalling been successful?), created and chaired by him personally, and its membership and recommendations. The personal contact is a *week-long vacation * in close quarters. The requirement is to maintain the *appearance * as well as the fact of disinterest. Got it now, Bubba?

Scalia is not, it appears, corrupt in the usual sense, but has an inflated sense of his own righteousness. He simply can’t understand how anyone could think he might not be a superior lifeform - the thought of appearance’s sake just doesn’t occur to him. A venally-corrupt man knows it and can be understood and controlled, but not a religious zealot.

36

**
http://www.uscourts.gov/understand02/content_5_0.html

http://www.flcourts.org/sct/sctdocs/ethics/canon2.html

37

I find these nicknames insulting and degrading. I insist from this time forward I be referred to as “Slick Schplebordnik, Esq.” thank you very much.

I seem to recall that Jones v. Clinton was about The Right Honorable William Jefferson Blythe Clinton, Esq.'s own tallywacker (remember that, or has the vast left-wing conspiracy been successful?), proffered by him personally, and his instructions to Ms. Jones as to the form of affection he desired to to be displayed towards it.

Again, so the issue here is: 1) social function in DC, OK, no possibility or appearance of anything improper; social function outside the Beltway, clear appearance of (if not actual) conspiracy. 2) evening, OK; week, conspiracy. 3) close quarters in White House ballroom, OK; close quarters in Lousiana swamp, conspiracy. Got it.

May have to dig around and see where Bader Ginsberg, Souter, Stevens and Breyer have been taking their vacations; I bet under the test above I can find you a conspiracy.

38

In the article in the paper this morning, it said Tony and Dick were the guests of a private party - I forget their exact position, but they were an executive in an energy-related business. Given the subject matter of the pending appeal, I thought that interesting.

I certainly cannot imagine how someone cannot see a huge distincton between attendance of a public function conducted during the course of an official’s exercise of his job duties - i.e., a state dinner, and private socialization such as a duck hunting trip. I suggest failing to admit the difference is tantamount to willing obtuseness.

Sure, they may all be shades of grey, but different situations certainly tend towards different ends of the spectrum.

39

Don’t be so obtuse, schplebordnik. You understand, or at least *should * understand, the explanations given you, but any difficulty in accepting them is your own entirely. Nobody said “conspiracy” except you, for instance - it’s about disinterest and its appearance, nothing more, got it? If you want respect here, you have to earn it with the strength of your arguments - but you don’t have one left, do you?

40

Yabbut, “a bit self-preferentially oblivious” just doesn’t roll off the tongue quite as easlity as “stupid” or “corrupt” does.

And it definitely won’t fit on a bumper sticker.