One of my Facebook friends is featured in this image from the Maskachusetts State House (source of more than 50 governor’s orders this year):
My favorite part of this is the Statue of Liberty wearing a mask while holding a sign that reads “yearning to breathe free”.
These handmaids remind me to ask… What’s happening with the Amy Coney Barrett confirmation?
(Separately, the image contains RBG’s dying wish: “My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed.” Does that wish, following an 87-year life, remind anyone of (the awesome) Sandra Bullock’s response to “What is the one most important thing our society needs?” in Miss Congeniality? “That would be… harsher punishment for parole violators, Stan.”)
Related:
- How will Amy Coney Barrett rule on the big question for 2021?
- Amy Coney Barrett will inspire Americans to get fit?
- RBG worked to maximize government while her husband worked to minimize tax payments
- Regarding governors issuing orders: “There is a little-known codicil in the Faber College constitution which gives the dean unlimited power to preserve order in time of campus emergency.”
- “Amy Coney Barrett’s Rise Is a Threat to Families Like Mine” (NYT, from an author who lives in California): It’s not often that I get gay married. The week I did it a second time was the same week we heard about the anti-gay proclivities of the Supreme Court nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, and some current justices called into question the very ruling that allowed me to get married in the first place. … You can see why the Obergefell decision was such a keystone for us, extending the same rights and protections to all when it comes to marriage. That even includes the right to divorce, which I did in 2017. … In 2018, I unexpectedly fell deeply in love again. Within a year, I was engaged, and we had a baby in late 2019, adding a daughter to my two sons. … A few weeks ago, we married in a tiny, socially distanced, masks-on event in an outdoor venue.
Abortion is Health Care!
Mitt Romney voted for her and gave a what I can only call a haltingly eloquent explanation, which many would say characterizes all of his pronouncements since the beginning of Time.
I think it’s not going to matter a year from now. The Democrats are going to upend the Supreme Court through one or another of a variety of means at their disposal. They are absolutely going to change the Court, it’s as sure as the Moses.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Id6oS3L-D9A
Erwin Chemerinsky says so!
How are the Democrats going to do anything with another 4 years of Trump? I have known Erwin Chemerinsky for far too long and he is always wrong despite going to Harvard.
Well, Toucan Sam, it’s well known that I suffer from Stockholm Syndrome. I offer no explanations of the vote and neither do I deign to take polls of public opinion. My explanations are purely my own. My belief is that either way right now is fraught with peril, which will surely arrive.
It’s also interesting in my experience to note that an individual afflicted with Stockholm Syndrome who comes to understand the disorder doesn’t do them much good. You can never completely reverse it. Once you’re broken, you’re broken.
And the shit is getting very close to hitting the fan. In a lot of places it already has. So we’re in a very different place now than we’ve ever been, it’s even more foreign than the late ’60s, because it is being amplified from without in a way that could never have been done in the 1960s. And we have a pandemic. Which isn’t going away. Any time soon.
https://abcnews.go.com/US/shooting-knife-wielding-man-philadelphia-police-presents-difficult/story?id=73847412
We can talk all we want about the theoretical role of the Supreme Court in our Republic, but in many ways their status in the public mind is similar to that of the local police: it relies fundamentally on the public’s acceptance of their authority. Once that comes apart, the police are essentially overwhelmed and greatly outnumbered. And then you have a revolution, and nobody knows what happens then, because we’ve never had it in America yet.
Alex I am the parrot here. Why do you keep responding to yourself? Is it the Stockholm syndrome?
Republicans have no integrity, nor do they stand for democracy. We now have a court which represents the bankrupt morals of republicans and conservatives, not the American public. I’m looking forward to hearing the gallant speeches about the sanctity of the courts, the courts legacy, norms, pitfalls of politicizing the court, etc. if the democrats use their power to restore the courts balance to represent all Americans.
Do you folks even believe the stuff you write?
“Amy Barrett and this power grab pose a grave threat to every freedom and right we hold dear and tears the very fabric of our democracy.” – NARAL Pro-Choice America
You make it sound like this mother of seven, incredibly talented woman, an excellent jurist by all accounts a wonderful person. is the incarnation of Satan himself, so that you can go on pushing for federal funding to abort children.
Are courts supposed to “represent” Americans? I thought that was Congress’s job!
Alex – you could say all the same things about a liberal judge if the tables were turned. If it’s not important, why are the republicans tying themselves in hypocritical knots to get all these appointments? It’s a continuing devolution of norms, because conservatism is a lost and dying cause on it’s last breath, becoming more desperate by the year. For republicans, whose morals are already episodic to begin with, winning is more important than integrity or dignity and that’s been on full display for more than a decade.
Philg – congress is supposed to represent the people, but it’s a loose collection of rules and procedures which can be gamified by folks with low integrity and morals. So instead of representing the american people, congressional republicans represent themselves. And, that’s how you get to a supreme court which is tilted 6-3, and which does not remotely represent the views of the population they preside over.
@Senorpablo: I lament more than almost anyone else the the lack of integrity when it comes to the tactics to both parties in this country. It’s a very sad state of affairs indeed.
Alex – The ol’ fine people on both sides apologist. Sure. Like when Obama wore a tan suit. Or when he said you could keep your health insurance–most people did. Passing health care for all–which the majority of american’s approve of, once everyone got past the republican lies and fearmongering(death panels!). The audacity of democrats to expand health coverage! Or, when Hillary bombed Benghazi. Oh wait, US embassies have been attacked over a dozen times and there were far more embassy casualties during Reagan’s terms. No doubt I’m biased, but I just don’t see anything close to the level of hypocrisy and sheer lack of integrity going on from the democratic side. Swiftboating, whitewater, and Benghazi were all desperate and absolutely fruitless witch hunts, except for the tic-tac-toe playing voters who dupe easily. The current Hunter Biden sham is desperation on a whole new level. There is no floor to republican’s lack of dignity.
@philg – someone from boston herald is reading your blog 😉
https://twitter.com/jacobkschneider/status/1321080192060821507
Here’s a legitimate question: The constitution says the president shall appoint justices to the supreme court. Over 4 years ago, with 9 months to fill a vacancy, republicans told us the voters should decide. This year, with less than two months to election day, republicans tell us they’ll ignore the voters and filled a vacancy in under a month. Essentially, republicans senators have usurped this duty from the president using procedure and technicalities. They warmed up for this by refusing to confirm any of Obama’s judges so it should be no surprise. But where does this end, and what comes next? Cabinet members, ambassadors, directors of the FBI, NSA, CIA, secretary of state, etc.. Are there any government appointments at all which aren’t subject to these same procedural games?
@Senorpablo:
It’s a legitimate question and unfortunately for our country, I think we’ve gone well past the point of “tit-for-tat and never give a sucker an even break.” This behavior has been normalized over the past 30 years, and actually intensified under the Trump Administration. Broadheaded people who think the general trend is damaging to our society are correct. You can’t have our Republic descend into a melee and expect anyone to have trust in the mechanisms of government, which for most people are very remote and quite obscure, things they never learned or forgot from their grade-school Civics classes. It’s no surprise in light of this that every single nomination to any Federal appointment is now fraught with dire political overtones. We’ve stepped into the quicksand of that because people have not been cautious. Our democracy was once thought to be based on “low but solid ground” and unfortunately we’ve all managed to undermine that. And there are a lot of people around the world who don’t like and would enjoy nothing more than to see us fail.
It started under Obama. The idea of a black president was unacceptable to enough republicans, that Mitch McConnell carried that torch. Proud obstructionist and contrarian. They’re sore losers, and couldn’t stand replacing a conservative on the court with a moderate liberal–which was a good faith gift from Obama. Trump and his republicans have taken it to the next level and the utter hypocrisy speaks for itself. There has never been such an issue with supreme court judges that I can recall. It’s ironic because, the party that eschews regulation in favor of responsibility, has proven exactly why regulations are necessary–to prevent corruption. They chose to discard honor, integrity and tradition for winning at any cost. It’s the end of a very long era of professionals and adult behavior.