George H.W. Bush could have nominated Bozo the Clown to the Supreme Court in 1991 and gotten him confirmed. Bush was coming off his post Gulf War I victory and enjoying high approval ratings.
Unfortunately, Clarence Thomas was less qualified than Bozo the Clown to be nominated to the court. I still believed he lied about the Anita Hill incident and was chosen only because of his youth and color.
Clarence Thomas had a law degree from Yale, was an Assistant Attorney General of Missouri from 1974-77, was John Danforth’s Legislative Assistant from 1979-81, was Assistant Secretary of Education from 1981-82, chairman of the EEOC from 1982-1990, and a judge on the US Court of Appeals for the DC circuit from 1990-1991.
Larry Harmon, who was the most famous Bozo the Clown, had a bachelor’s degree in Theater from USC, and never worked for a law firm or served in a judicial or administrative post in the governemnt.
So, on paper, at least, Clarence Thomas seems more qualified for the seat than Bozo the Clown.
Bozo the Clown did a good job as a clown and made people laugh.
Clarence Thomas sexually harassed Anita Hill at the Dept. of Education and the EEOC. He also sexually harassed other women. The American Bar Association was split as to him being qualified.
Thomas lied on the stand. He knew damn well he’d vote against *Roe *any time he could. He also lied about sexually harassing women.
Actually, Long Dong Silver would have been a better nominee.
Here is Thomas’ Wikipedia entry.
Well then, just what are the qualifications needed to be nominated for a seat on the US Supreme Court? Note, I am not asking what *should * be the requirements.
But you don’t deny that Bush *could’ve *nominated Mr. the Clown and gotten him confirmed…
What, in your estimation, would make a nominee “qualified” to serve on the Supreme Court? Should he/she have to be a judge for a certain number of years or what?
Clarence played the race card, complaining that the sexual harassment allegations against him generated a circus atmosphere and he was getting a high tech lynching. I guess that might have helped him win the Supreme Court post.
Thomas denied all allegations of sexual harassment and sexual impropriety by Hill and the others. Of the committee’s investigation of the accusations, Thomas said: “This is not an opportunity to talk about difficult matters privately or in a closed environment. This is a circus. It’s a national disgrace. And from my standpoint, as a black American, it is a high-tech lynching for uppity blacks who in any way deign to think for themselves, to do for themselves, to have different ideas, and it is a message that unless you kowtow to an old order, this is what will happen to you. You will be lynched, destroyed, caricatured by a committee of the U.S. Senate rather than hung from a tree.”
There are none. None at all.
Not only is he qualified for the Supreme Court, based on that, he could be President!
Thomas was not unqualified. I don’t think he was the most qualified possible choice, but two-thirds of the U.S. government approved him and that’s all that matters.
As far as I know, Mr. Silver didn’t have any legal education either. (And I don’t think the ABA would have found either Bozo or Long Dong Silver qualified, although this is just supposition on my part, because neither of their names were submitted.)
And while I acknowledge Bozo’s ability to make people laugh, I don’t think that’s really the skill set you need to become a Supreme Court Justice. Equally, sexually harrassing women, while it’s certainly not appropriate behavior, doesn’t really touch on your qualifications to serve on the court either.
An excellent example of a highly qualified Supreme Court Justice is Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
From the Wikipedia article:
She was a Professor of Law at Rutgers School of Law-Newark from 1963 to 1972. In 1970, she co-founded the Women’s Rights Law Reporter, the first law journal in the United States to focus exclusively on women’s rights. From 1972 until 1980, she taught at Columbia, where she became the first tenured woman and co-authored the first law school case book on sex discrimination.
In 1977 she became a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University. As the chief litigator of the ACLU’s women’s rights project, she argued several cases in front of the Supreme Court and attained a reputation as a skilled oral advocate.
Ginsburg was appointed a Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit by President Carter in 1980.
Yes, Ruth Bader Ginsburg is probably more qualified to be a Supreme Court Justice than Clarence Thomas. But you’re moving the goalposts here.
Wow. Just wow. I’ve seen political rants on this board, I’ve seen childish rants on this board. There isn’t even a category for your post.
His age and skin colour were certainly factors, but I think President Bush I still needed to nominate someone with legal qualifications and experience. If Bozo the Clown had been a young black Republican, he would still not have been on the list, because of certain gaps in his resume.
he was probably vetted by Monica Goodling.
Oh, shut the Hell up, Thomas. When, in your entire career, have you not been the white man’s Boy? When have you ever thought for yourself? What different ideas have you EVER had, you loser? You haven’t just kowtowed to the old order, you’ve become the old order’s boot licker, you freak. Perhaps you and that self-hating rhetoritician Alan Keyes should both go and get your skin bleached, as it’s obvious to me that you feel the worst thing in the world is being black, and you’re going to spend the rest of your life making the lives of black people as difficult as you possibly can. Just die already, you animal.
That’s right. Even a developmentally disabled infant could theoretically be appointed to the Court. But even though there are no legally mandated “qualifications”, I think it’s generally accepted that a certain intellectual depth and willingness to do hard work is needed to perform the job.
The fact that he very seldom speaks during oral arguments, and writes the least number of opinions out of all the justices seems to indicate a certain laziness on his part. Don’t get me wrong, if I were appointed to a cushy lifetime job where it’s virtually impossible to get fired I’d be coasting through it too. My votes would be diametrically opposite, but I’d have the same attitude.
Of course, George Bush Sr was full of shit when he said that Clarence Thomas was the “best qualified person” to be on the Supreme Court. He was nominated because he was young and thus would likely be on the bench for decades, because he was extremely conservative, and because he was black (liberals aren’t the only ones who can play the race card) and thus it would be harder for senators to vote against him.
Really? It isn’t even the most childish political rant I’ve seen this week.
While I strongly disagree with Thomas’s legal philosophy, I also strongly disagree with the notion (of recent vintage) that a Supreme Court nominee must be a law professor or long-serving judge. I think the perspective of someone who has lived a life outside those narrow worlds is greatly beneficial to the court.
Many of our most prominent justices never served a day on the bench before being appointed to the Supreme Court: Earl Warren, Abe Fortas, Arthur Goldberg, Byron White, Felix Frankfurter, William Rehnquist, Lewis Powell, and Hugo Black, to name just a few.