Judging the United States Supreme Court

The United States Supreme Court, the highest court in the United States, in 2010. Top row (left to right): Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Associate Justice Stephen G. Breyer, Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, and Associate Justice Elena Kagan. Bottom row (left to right): Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, Associate Justice Antonin Scalia, Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy, and Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Does it feel like the United States Supreme Court is becoming less and less relevant?  If you hold the quaint view that the court possesses the power of “judicial review” and that it exists to ensure an objective application of the United States Constitution as the supreme “law of the land”, well perhaps irrelevancy isn’t the right word.  The idea the justices are objective defenders of the law seems less than quaint, seems less than relevant.

My understanding of the law and my recollection of American history isn’t as sharp as it should be so I consulted the Constitution — specifically Article III — for some guidance.  Not much there.

I do recall history lessons describing the court’s trend toward favoring broader government powers, especially judicial powers, during Franklin Roosevelt’s presidency so I looked there for some background.  Got confused.

And don’t even think of looking for historical “facts” regarding the court’s proper purpose today.  Facts, you see, no longer exist in political discourse.  Hard to find in school, too.

So I will trust my gut, open today’s newspapers, and tell you what I think.

First off, it is indeed the case that about half of the court rulings are decided unanimously and less than 1-in-5 cases fall to a 5-4 decision.  But that alone does not excuse the politicization of the court, and if the court mirrors our nation’s political divide is it a relevant tool of judicial review?

Unfortunately the court does seem overly political.  Beginning with the process of nominating and confirming judicial appointments the politics of judicial review comes into full view.  Less in full view is the hiring of clerks and aids, frequently assigned as political favors, that work behind the scenes with the court’s justices.

Opposing Affordable Health Care Act. Relevant?

Perhaps most plainly visible and so common it occurs without much comment is how the court politicians, the media, and anyone else paying attention discusses the court.

It is taken for granted that the Court has its liberal and conservative wings.  The politics of Senate and Presidential elections often include discussion of court appointments.  If we have an objective law — the Constitution — and people appointed to defend it objectively, then should politics be an overt issue in a matter before the Supreme Court?

It’s a bunch of humbug.

Is there a more political issue in this country today that the Affordable Health Care for America Act?   Not at the moment.  Conservatives question the constitutionality of the Act and have taken the issue to the Supreme Court.  Let’s look at how the court handles this.

If we were looking for an objective interpretation of law we would expect objective constitutional debate, would we not?

Chief Justice John Roberts challenged the government solicitor by asking if we mandate purchasing insurance today, what will be next?  I don’t see how this is a question of Constitutional power.  Whether or not government might or might not mandate the purchase of some other good or service hardly answers the question of whether it is Constitutional to do so.

Antonin Scalia mocked the idea that health care insurance should be mandated because health care is a universal need.  He pointed out that eating is a universal need, so shouldn’t the government mandate the consumption of broccoli if it can mandate the purchase of health insurance?

Relevant?

Maybe Scalia is attempting some form of modal logic I don’t understand, but seems irrelevant on the face of it.  The point doesn’t deserve serious argument, but if we were to take Scalia seriously — and it is a disgrace that we ever should — we can point out that the government, under pressure from conservatives and the insurance industry, has not written a law mandating what kind of insurance a person should by or from whom, but that they maintain insurance coverage that meets different needs.  There is no mandatory “broccoli” in the Affordable Health Care Act.

Moreover, we don’t have a problem with people eating to stay alive, but we do have a problem with people not paying for insurance — whether by choice or otherwise — that creates a hardship on the health and economy of America overall.

We already do have laws that require compliance with good economic and health practices, although those are being chipped away.  We have clean air and water laws, for example.  Regardless of whether I choose to drink clean water, I pay for it through my taxes as a citizen…don’t I?

I also pay for Wall Street bailouts.  And sports franchises for billionaires.

Relevant?

And then back to Chief Justice Roberts again.  He asked why people should be required to insure services they would never need like pediatric and maternity care.

I’m just going to talk common sense here and not pretend to have a legal argument.  (Broccoli anyone?)   I might not ever need the police to arrest an intruder or the fire department to save my house, but I pay for it.  Gladly, by the way, because a society without law and fire protection would be pretty horrible.  (cf. Mogadishu) We are all better off with a community force to police our laws and keep our cities from burning down.  Correct?

Likewise, we would all be better off with a healthy, more cost-effective form of health insurance, unless your someone like UnitedHealth Group CEO William McGuire.

Relevant?

Plus…we’re paying for maternity care and pediatrics anyway.  The high cost of health care is driven in part by the uninsured.  This affects everyone.

The rising cost of health care is a vicious and stupid cycle.  People cannot afford health care and they go without it.  They have no choice.  They cannot afford it.  It is a tautology in this country.  You cannot afford private health care, you don’t get private health care.

So the uninsured take advantage of more costly options, primarily emergency rooms or inadequate clinics which ultimately end up in emergency rooms.  The other option is to die, and judging by the response to questions at recent GOP debates, there are some sick Americans who literally applaud this solution.

Aren’t we better than that?  Seriously.  Does anyone think it should be a point of national pride that we cannot find the political will to provide universal health care to our citizens?  The Affordable Health Care for America Act doesn’t even go that far.

We are not world leaders in many issues so let’s not pretend to be.  As long as we fight to be less than average we should back up and ask ourselves how well our political system really does work for us.  That should include a review of the political United States Supreme Court.

Relevant?

Related articles

• Partisan Supreme Court Decides America’s Access to Health Care (fidlerten.com)
• Judicial Activists in the Supreme Court (washingtonpost.com)
• Supreme Court Tackles Individual Mandate (247wallst.com)
• Chants, Marching, Debate, Even Jazz, Outside Court (slate.com)
• Is Obamacare heading for a ‘train wreck’ at U.S. Supreme Court? (theglobeandmail.com)

Talking to Strangers You Know

It occurs to me that some people are strangers because I have never met them.  Others are strangers because they have never met me.  There is a difference.

The difference is paradoxical and potentially frustrating.

I am not thinking about people with whom I haven’t any contact.  I am thinking about people I know, people with whom I have shared time…and perhaps more importantly….people with whom I have shared thoughts, dreams, and emotions.  How can these people still be strangers?

And the more you try to become known and familiar, the less that is known and more that is strange.  Isn’t that frustrating?  Think about it.  We all must have these people in our lives.  What has been the result of these missed encounters?

A friend shared a David Whyte poem that got me thinking about this and the puzzle is fixed in my thoughts.  I won’t quote the poem, I have seen it too much.  It is starting to frustrate me.  But I found this one instead.  Maybe this captures my frustration.

 

Everything is Waiting For You

Your great mistake is to act the drama
as if you were alone. As if life
were a progressive and cunning crime
with no witness to the tiny hidden
transgressions. To feel abandoned is to deny
the intimacy of your surroundings. Surely,
even you, at times, have felt the grand array;
the swelling presence, and the chorus, crowding
out your solo voice You must note
the way the soap dish enables you,
or the window latch grants you freedom.
Alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity.
The stairs are your mentor of things
to come, the doors have always been there
to frighten you and invite you,
and the tiny speaker in the phone
is your dream-ladder to divinity.

Put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into
the conversation. The kettle is singing
even as it pours you a drink, the cooking pots
have left their arrogant aloofness and
seen the good in you at last. All the birds
and creatures of the world are unutterably
themselves. Everything is waiting for you.

– David Whyte
from Everything is Waiting for You 
©2003 Many Rivers Press

 

Related articles

• Ending the Year On a Poetic Note: Reading David Whyte and Tomas Tranströmer (chalkthesun.wordpress.com)
• Connections (artistoftheeveryday.wordpress.com)

Predicting Ice Out on Lake Harriet

Lake Harriet, Minneapolis, March 18, 2012.

It looks like today will be ice out day on Lake Harriet in Minneapolis.  If it isn’t a record, it has to be damn close.

Just two days ago the lake was mostly frozen over with the exception of a broad crack or two and open water along the shoreline.  But a combination of very warm weather both night and day, a persistent wind, and bright sunshine appears to make quick work of lake ice.  Once the lake loses the white coating of frost and snow, it darkens and absorbs the heat of the sun better, too.

This morning more than two-thirds of the lake is open and the remaining ice is little more than rafts of ice shards rolling in the wind.

If you’re in the area, go down to the lake and catch the once-in-a-year opportunity to hear the broken ice wash up on shore.  It sounds like an endless row of crystal chimes tinkling in the wind.  Very much worth the trip.

Let’s Use Some Bachmann Logic to Sort This One Out.

Today’s StarTribune features a story telling how women are recovering at a slower pace than men in the job market.  The article suggests that cuts and stereotypes are to blame.

Well, don’t blame anyone but yourself for the cuts.  We do more with less in this country.  Period.  The end.

The stereotype angle is interesting, however.  Really?  Stereotypes.  Who would have thought?

I find it interesting that it was back in the days of pre-progressive politics that America took it for granted that these stereotypes were true.  Women are not as reliable as men, they have to work at home, men should be first because they are the bread winners and so one.  Now the country is slipping back toward those more traditional “family values” as a mainstay of the conservative agenda.  Now I am not blaming the Republicans, but I am just saying that I find it interesting that we have a rise of conservatism and with it a rise in these stereotypes and inequities.  I just think it is an interesting coincidence.

Isn’t that a Bachmannite way of seeing things?  What scares me is…well, I don’t think this joke is so far from the truth!

Save your country.  Don’t vote Republican.  Especially if you’re a woman.  Or a worker.  Or a college student…or even a college professor.  If you have kids, don’t vote Republican.  That includes doctors, lawyers, and dishwashers.  If you have a job, don’t vote Republican.  Or if you have or want an education…or were born with opposable thumbs, don’t vote Republican.  In fact if you eat, don’t vote Republican….or breath air and drink water.  Just don’t do it.

Related articles

• Michele Bachmann: Feds Could Mandate A One-Child Policy (outsidethebeltway.com)
• Overview of BLS Statistics on Women Workers (bureauoflaborstatistics.gov)
• Michele Bachmann Had No Idea She Was Meeting the ‘Dangerous Radical’ Running Against Her [Bachmania] (jezebel.com)

Bullying Lawsuit a Frivolous Waste?

Should Be on Every School Library Book Shelf...

An eye-opening opinion in today’s StarTribune exposes how screwed up some on the right interpret Judeo-Christian values.  Their jingoistic interpretation of values is, I would argue, at the root of our political and social decline.

Laurie Thompson, a spokesperson for the Parents Action League, identifies with these “Judeo-Christian values” and we can conclude that her essay damning the lawsuit which attempts to protect the civil rights of students in the Anoka-Hennepin school district is written from her interpretation of those values.

On March 5 of this year, the Anoka-Hennepin school district agreed to a  consent decrees settlement to address anti-gay bullying in the district.  Thompson whines about the cost of the lawsuit — but that shouldn’t surprise us, money is at the root of her brand of Judeo-Christian values — but more telling is the … well, the bullying tone her essay takes.

Sure there were tragic suicides, Thompson agrees, but leave that to the gays to exploit “in an effort to achieve their ultimate goal, which is to abolish conservative moral beliefs about homosexuality by indoctrinating the impressionable, young minds of all our students (via the curriculum” with their propaganda.”

Thompson then calls out a list of pro-gay rights and pro-civil rights organizations — including the Department of Justice — which she says act “under the socialist Obama Administration to wage an all-out war against parental rights, Christianity, and those who strongly support Judeo-Christian values.”  (Yawn.)

With parents like Laurie Thompson it isn’t hard to imagine where bullying children come from.

So what has Thompson all worked up?  I haven’t any idea.  Only in right-wing America would teaching tolerance and protecting rights and safety be considered a threat.

Thompson encourages us to read the 61-page consent decree so we can see what is “coming our way.”  Maybe this will give us a clue of the what’s the looming threat.  Well, I did read the consent decree and I wonder if Thompson took her own advice.

She argues, for example, that the homosexual indoctrination will be part of future curriculum.  I’m not sure where she sees this unless she thinks teaching students to recognize harassment and bully is a curriculum change (and a bad one).   Or perhaps she believes providing parents, teachers, and students with resources on gender identity, gender nonconformity, and sexual orientation is a curriculum change.

At the very heart of this issue is intolerance, but intolerance spins around this issue at many levels.  Laurie Thompson is just another layer.  (She’s even a name-caller:  ”Press-hungry, money-grubbing attorneys from the Southern Poverty Law Center.”  Way to go, Laurie!)

In essence Laurie Thompson is saying her conservative values are right and others wrong.  Attacking her values is an attack against families, children, and blah, blah, blah…yeah, whatever, Laurie Thompson.  Come over here and I’ll give you a wedgie.

My values are not Laurie Thompson’s and they are just fine…although Laurie Thompson is testing them.  Indeed.

I like to think I am tolerant of ignorance, but I’m growing quickly intolerant of flops like Laurie Thompson and the Parents Action League. Things have to change.   We are better than this.   Thompson encourages us to “clean house” in the next election and in my opinion that sounds like a grand idea.  I couldn’t agree more.  Let’s do that.

Save your future.  Don’t vote GOP.

 

Related articles

• Raising the issue of bullying and LGBT young people… (cedarlounge.wordpress.com)
• Minnesota District Reaches Pact on Antigay Bullying (nytimes.com)
• When Anti-Gay Bullying Goes Unchecked:  A Student’s Story (ProgressivePuppy.com)

Kurt Zellers: Logic Never Bothers Him

Kurt "Choo Choo" Zellers

In today’s StarTribune, Kurt Zellers — Maple Grove Republican and Minnesota State Speaker of the House, that guy — is quoted saying he is not “a rail fan.”   Kurt would rather spend money expanding freeways in his district and adding a dedicated bus route to the freeway.  He explains that people like their cars too much.   “We like our independence and having our own car,” he says, “to drive where we want and when we want.”

But wait a minute…that bus rapid transit is working just fine, according to Kurt, and he wants to expand it.  Bus?  Car?  Whenever I take the bus, I go where the bus goes.  I move on its schedule.

Moreover, for a lot of people, rapid transit IS a means of independence.  It allows them to go places because they don’t have a car, for example.  Some people might want to be freed from the burden of traffic and parking.  Others might enjoy the more environmentally and economically friendly alternative that smart mass transit offers.  Am I wrong?

And you would think that a fiscally responsible and economically wise Republican — yes, I nearly puked, too — would see the wisdom in upgrading to modern technology at 10 cents on the dollar.  Not Kurt Zellers.  Not Republicans.  They’d rather pave another lane here and there — in their districts — than invest in smart growth.

Republicans prove once again that today when dealing in politics, if you see an “R” designation or one of those silly elephants, you’re dealing with nonsense.  Look to the future, don’t cling to the past.  Be smart, invest in the common good, and please, Kurt Zellers, get a better haircut.

 

"Hey Kurt! It's Casey. Step away from the crazy train."

 

Related articles

 

 

 

• Senate GOP leader floats special stadium session (mysanantonio.com)

 

 

 

A Post For Gary and a Video for Everyone

“A Post for Gary” sounds like the title of a bad 80s-era melodrama, but I want Gary to see this outstanding YouTube find and until I get an email address I’m not sure how to send the link.

One of my Twitter connections (@Panndder) posted a link to “Walk“, a point-of-view walk through parts of early-1980s Minneapolis.  You don’t have to be familiar with Minneapolis to enjoy the film.  It is quite engaging regardless of the city.

The filmmaker (@geoffoo) creates an almost dreamy, floating tour of the city while a subtle sound track of street sound music rolls in the background.  I like to see how much life that I recall being so near and recent has actually changed.  Parts of my neighborhood are almost unrecognizable and yet it feels very much a part of my present memories.  In some ways it is a bit disconcerting.  Thirty years is a long time and many things change.

Take a look!

Wise Men Talk When They Have Something to Say…

Don Knotts

…fools talk when they need to say something.  Or something like that.  Plato is the guy credited with the quote and he’s been away for a while.  So while there is no offense intended there likely is none felt.

I am simply looking for a reason to post a picture of Don Knotts who passed away exactly six years and two weeks ago.  Or did he?  I’m not sure if I am supposed to add two days for the two leap years that have occurred since his death.  In fact, this question has relentlessly nagged at me since the idea first came to me on February 29.

When we measure time, we don’t give a damn about that extra day.  It is irrelevant, but I am troubled by the inaccuracy of it all.

Saying Don Knotts died six years and two weeks is different from saying Don Knotts died six years and 14 days ago, but if we are talking about orbits around the sun and the Earth’s spinning revolutions…we should say he died six years and 16 days ago.

But then I started thinking…

A year is a year and time is something else.  Don Knotts died a while ago.  And eventually leap years will mean Christmas will happen July.  Thank god for popes!

Watching the Earth Spin

Wise men talk when they have something to say and fools talk because they have to say something.

Related articles

• Why Is There a Leap Year? (wired.com)
• How to Explain Leap Year to a Kid (alicia-arnold.com)
• Blogging Resolutions (alittletourinyellow.wordpress.com)
• Leap year, 1896. (nupepa-hawaii.com)

Using My Phone at Eat Street Social

Probably a pointless post, but I have never used my WordPress phone app.  I am at Eat Street Social…and the bar service is great.  (See my previous post.). Come hit me up for a good time.  I am the fun good looking guy at the bar.

Climate, Geopolitics, and The Truth

Be Afraid.

Think the Cold War has ended?  Not me.

I don’t care what George H. W. Bush once said, I’m not buying it.  I know a lot of you will claim to have visited post-Soviet era Europe and all of its “former” Soviet domain, but it will take a lot more than scratchy video of people from central casting costumed in Members Only knock-off jackets swinging sledge hammers at a wall of graffiti-covered concrete to believe that that signaled the reunification of Germany.  Casting got it wrong anyway.  Those “rebels” all looked Lithuanian, not German…but it is the tenor, if not the detail, that matters.

And China?  Well, I think the Global Conspiracy runs China anyway.  Hu Jintao even dresses like Richard Nixon.  Americans frantically invest in China while The Conspiracy hoards the wealth of the West in kimchi pots buried all over China…or is it in Korea?  I don’t know.  I’m just suspicious.  And paranoid.

But I have my facts and one fact that cannot be denied:  Our climate has changed and it is not good.

We are enduring the worst winter ever here in Minnesota.  Worst ever.  The VERY worst winter ever.  And we’re supposed to believe it all has something to do with excessive carbon dioxide in the atmosphere caused by human activity, things like burning fossil fuels.  We know that isn’t true, however, because Republicans say it is true.  (Leave my campfire alone!)

So there has to be another answer and as I see it that answer is obvious.  The Soviets are responsible.  But, you say, the Soviet Union ceased to exist in 1991.  Ah ha!  That’s were I got you.  Because if the Cold War isn’t over, perhaps the Soviet Union isn’t over either.  Think about it.   Control the climate and you control the world.  We all know the Soviet Union wanted to control the world, right? and we see the climate changing and…need I go further?

No, I think nothing has changed other than our climate and — surprise, surprise — our country’s global economic power.  We have to share more, for crying out loud!

So I don’t see the end of Soviet influence, instead I see it everywhere…I see crazy Soviet scientists in some officially nonexistent city standing over their weather machines flipping switches and spinning dials.  Guys named Vladislavor Yuri assisted by a special East German alchemist

named Blaz.

Snow in Minnesota?  Nope!  Sleet instead for you and very little of it.  It makes sense.  It is the Butterfly Effect to economic ruin.  First kill off the winter sports economy and watch the rest of the Western economy tumble like dominoes.  Yes, the Cold War warriors had it right when they feared the domino effect, but they shouldn’t have been targeting Vietnam and Chile, they should have been watching the damn weather!

Don’t be distracted by scientists and politicians…or even trips overseas!  Step outside and feel the Truth!  Something is amiss.  It doesn’t snow anymore, lakes don’t freeze, and the sun shines too much.  None of this is good.  It must be the fault of someone and their evil ambitions.  It cannot be any other way.  It has to be the Soviets.  Duck and cover.

Related articles

• Weather as a Cold War Weapon (smithsonianmag.com)
• Good Reads: China’s next leader comes to Washington, as US enters a funk – Christian Science Monitor (csmonitor.com)
• Pei: Why the U.S. and China are destined to clash (globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com)
• Introduction to the Cold War, as told by CNN (molinahistory.wordpress.com)
• 5 Things You Didn’t Know About The Cold War (libraryindus.wordpress.com)