U.S. Supreme Court: Post-Ginsburg Edition

xps - It's a political office, would you vote for a competent conservative over an incompetent liberal? I wouldn't, I'll take the absolute ninny more inclined to agree with me over the calculating genius that wants to live la vida 1850.

The Supreme Court's aggressive move to revive a Trump-era rule shredding the Clean Water Act is so extreme that even Chief Justice John Roberts dissented. Roberts! A longtime foe of the Clean Water Act! This is getting out of control really quickly. https://t.co/Dyz4gEimDy

— Mark Joseph Stern (@mjs_DC) April 6, 2022

By 5-4 vote (with Chief Justice Roberts joining the progressives in dissent), #SCOTUS issues shadow docket stay of district court decision that had vacated a Clean Water Act certification rule. Per Kagan, J.: "That renders the Court’s emergency docket not for emergencies at all." pic.twitter.com/yX6qvSrzLc

— Steve Vladeck (@steve_vladeck) April 6, 2022

Current conservative majority is setting a record for most shadow docket decisions without opinions or hearings. This one reinstates a Trump administration rule re: when and how states can provide certifications that allow for discharges of pollutants into navigable waters.

they're wilding

majority there issued a brief statement, while the dissent (the 3 libs plus Roberts) issued a full opinion.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/04/supreme-court-trump-clean-water-act-john-roberts.html

Stern article excerpt

Now the Supreme Court has agreed and revived the Trump rule—though we don’t know why, because the five-justice majority did not deign to explain its action. This silence left Justice Elena Kagan to issue a bewildered dissent, joined by the chief justice along with Justices Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor. Kagan pointed out that, by law, the Supreme Court can issue this kind of stay “ in extraordinary circumstances,” when there is “an exceptional need for immediate relief,” including evidence of “irreparable harm.” Here, the Trump rule’s defenders insisted that states were obstructing vital energy projects. But, Kagan wrote, they “have not identified a single project that a state has obstructed” under the district court’s decision or “cited a single project that the court’s ruling threatens.” Put simply, they failed to explain how returning to the pre-Trump regime—“which existed for 50 years”—would hurt them at all.

Gonna be fun when GOP, upon taking control, expands the court further.

U.S. Supreme Court: Post-Democracy Edition "Let's Just Do It and Be Legends"

I’m guessing absolutely nothing at all will come of Ginnnii Thomas situation

With regard to her husband's position on the Court, I am sure you are right.

Hell, I doubt anyone with any power or influence is going to suffer any consequences more serious than the inconvenience of having to answer a contempt charge.

It is done.

lol @ MSNBC anchors fretting over whether Jackson resigns from the DC Circuit and whether she will recuse herself. It's a new era and these fuckwits don't get it.

uphold those norms!

It's a new era and these fuckwits don't get it.

CBS's Major G. openly stating that the future of the SCOTUS is for a "reverse expand the court" in the future whenever the executive and legislative branches aren't from the same party -- from 9 justices to 8, from 8 to 7, etc.

Thomas will be eventually be the only one left

xp

Knock it down to 1. Then replace that person with a Magic 8-Ball.

Public defenders everywhere should take a shot of the hard stuff tonight

It's kind of nuts that a black woman who was 21 years old when Anita Hill testified is joining Clarence Thomas on the bench

Somebody pointed out that she'll be the first Gen Xer on the court.. hoping to hear some Sleepless in Seattle references in her dissents

Isn't ACB younger than her?

Yes, but she's a reptilian humanoid who never listened to Dinosaur Jr.

Amy Coney Barrett is aware of music

She likes the noise of democracy.

All of Trump's appointees are Gen Xers. KBJ is the fourth.

(Kavanaugh 1965, Gorsuch 1967, Jackson 1970, Barrett 1972)

The Kid Rock court

Whew, still a two year gap between me and the youngest SCOTUS justice. When someone younger than I am gets on the bench I might get drunk that night.

"I don't know what religious requires you to pray at the 50 yard line. What religion requires you to pray at that spot?" Justice Sotomayor for the win! #nopraytoplay

— Rachel Laser (@rachelklaser) April 25, 2022

Slate's MJS wrote a typically trenchant piece:

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/04/coach-kennedy-supreme-court-kavanaugh-school-prayer.html

Yep , good analysis there

Amazing how frequently Kavanaugh demonstrates he obviously knows what's up in the high school sports world where this case centers and is uneasy about the consequences of casting his vote with the Christian bullies, but how frequently the article reminds us that Bret is coward enough to hand them whatever they want, because he's afraid to cross them.

crazy that someone at SCOTUSBlog and some others are more concerned/shocked by the act of someone leaking a draft opinion overruling Row v Wade than they are by the substance in the leaked doc

Roe

I don't get being genuinely shocked or concerned about the leak (surprised it happened, sure). But my impression from legal types over the last few months is they have already accepted Roe being overturned as a fait accompli, so the lack of shock over that isn't surprising

If you have access: https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2022/05/02/leak-time-magazine-roe-wade/

Interesting on the leak.

I clerked at the Supreme Court. Last night, I assumed a liberal clerk leaked the draft opinion overturning Roe. Now I think MUCH more likely it was leaked by a conservative fanatically committed to every word of Alito’s monstrous opinion. **🧵**

— Amy Kapczynski (@akapczynski) May 3, 2022

kinda disagree that "Occam's Razor" suggests a conservative leaked it.

also idgaf who did.

Pointless to speculate, another one of those things that the Smart People of Twitter wrongly imagine they can figure out purely by reason

kinda disagree that "Occam's Razor" suggests a conservative leaked it.

yeah, that kind of annoyed me, like that doesn't just mean you can slap the term on your preferred pet theory and call it done.

"Occam's Razor" explanations don't require a 14-tweet storm to elaborate. The whole point of Occam's Razor is that it's supposed to be simple.

Like she literally invented a Robert concurrence, invented a Kavanaugh thought process about the Roberts concurrence, and then invented a motivation for the leaker based on Kavanaugh's imaginary thought process about Roberts' imaginary concurrence - how the fuck is that Occam's Razor?

esp since leaks, albeit not of this exact type, have happened from the Courts before. just not usual for it to be a draft opinion, that's the wrinkle.

xpost lol otm

i would love to believe someone is trying to swing another SCOTUS voter over to instead vote against outright repealing Roe V Wade and more limiting its scope, but true Occam's Razor = this shit is happening and a clerk or a justice who supports abortion rights is fuckin' pissed.

hope people camp outside Alito's house for months

More MURKOWSKI: “If the decision is going the way that the draft that has been revealed is actually the case, it was not—it was not the direction that I believed that the court would take based on statements that have been made about Roe being settled and being precedent.”

— Frank Thorp V (@frankthorp) May 3, 2022

I am shocked, shocked.

"I'm so so disappointed, I had it on good authority they were telling the truth!!!!"

more like durrkowski

"I didn't realize when I voted for the Face Eating Tiger Party that they would eat my face."

i don't where else to say this, but i need to say it. i am venting and not all the way sure about how i feel. thanks for reading.

my whole life i've voted for nothing but the people who were supposed to stop what's happening. i've written to my representatives and even went to some peaceful protests. and yet, it's still happening. i was always promised that things like this will "only happen if we let them." if i was supposed to be doing more this whole time, i didn't know.

of they're just going to do whatever they want anyeay, why should i keep caring?

wow, now THAT jumble of typos is an actual example of "fat thumb" mistakes.

sorry, jeez. think it's clear what i was saying, but can clarify if need be.