The Supreme Court's Recent Rulings

The Constitution? (4.00 / 1)

The next amendment should be one that reserves 1st amendment rights only to citizens of the U.S. In other words, corporations shall not possess any 1st right amendments. That should take care of a few trifles that have been bugging me as of late.

Barring that, I'd say we are on the path to revolution. The revolution of the people against corporate america. As of now, the corporations obviously are winning.

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by: JC @ Thu Jul 03, 2008 at 22:02:08 PM UTC

Dang it! (0.00 / 0)

I took the day off to clean the chaos I live in that I sometimes call my house (for guests arriving tomorrow).  And your post is great.  A July 4 invitation to examine personal thoughts about the Court's recent decisions, no less.

I don't think you're wrong, and I don't think you're right.  Civil liberties as set forth in the Bill of Rights and continually fleshed out by court decisions demand each person's active involvement and thought to mean anything at all, and I admire your invitation to think.

On death penalty and the Louisiana case, I'm anti, and I'm aware of the sharp personal edges of that position.  I cannot ask someone to kill another person in my name, and I refuse to kill for anyone else.  That doesn't mean I might not want to kill somebody.  It doesn't mean I wouldn't kill them, if they did something as reprehensible as the subject of the LA legislation.  But I would understand that I live in a society that would put me in jail if I did, and if my personal desire for retribution was so overriding that I had to do it, I would.  The event that caused this problem for me could not be undone by anything I did.  And a good long stretch in jail, with the perpetrator of the atrocity dead and rotting, might give me time to take another step on the path, or let me write a book that made a million when I got out (I'm counting on 2nd degree murder or manslaughter as my conviction, and a sympathetic jury and court that might let me off with little hard time).  In the case of child rape, though, my personal retribution would probably take me away from the one person who needed my love the most to try to find a compassionate and accepting way to live life.  Another sharp edge.

I don't think my killing someone would prevent this terrible event from happening again to someone else.  I'm convinced that retribution is the only purpose served by societally sanctioned killing.  If I was capital g god, and knew for sure, lightning bolts would fly if I wasn't even more imaginative.  But our system of justice is simply not foolproof.  States have killed many people, and taken many people's freedom for years, on unsound convictions.  There are cut and dried cases, of course, a defendant who says "I did it, screw you, I want to die."  But, regarding retribution, what would be the worse punishment?  Granting them their suicidal wish, or confining them for the rest of their life.  I'll pay taxes to put their ass in jail.  And I'll defend their every right to a fair trial.

As long as the death penalty is legal in the state of my residence, I want it to be old school.  Full on circus.  Public, nasty, bloody, with the supreme elected official themselves pulling the garotte across the throat.  To even use the terms "cruel and unusual" in reference to any type of death penalty to me is mind-boggling.  Sterilized, hidden, painless, white sheeted death in a sound proof air tight room is still death.  Air tight so we can't smell their shit, sound proof so we don't hear their agonal breathing.  TV screen death is still death, and all our efforts to hide it don't change that.  Step down from the soapbox, Bob, and go clean your house.

I've got ideas on the gun case, 1st amendment legislation, and all, but I would like to come back for that.  Thanks for invitation.

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by: Bob Gentry @ Thu Jul 03, 2008 at 23:24:45 PM UTC

In all three cases (0.00 / 0)

I believe the SCOTUS acted in the best interests of the Constitution.  That seems to me to be their job.

I personally favor 2 of the rulings, and one .. not so much.  It probably won't surprise anyone that I favor the death penalty for serial rapists (regardless of whether their prey are children or not.)  Some people are just broken, and incapable of living within the bounds of society.  Either we banish them to Mars, incarcerate them forever, or do the efficient thing and exterminate the bug.  But my will is not that of a moral nation.  I fully support the SCOTUS decision on the matter.

As regards McCain/Feingold, I'm happy to see the millionaire provision dropped.  Maybe now, just maybe, people will wake up to the fact that elections can be purchased (though I know of a few Romney favoring dimbulbs who will never get it, because they think money should buy anything.)  The fact is, we can't have equitable elections if we favor money raising tactics for some, and not for others.  That Billionaires can buy elections with their own money is no concern of the Constitution.  Equitable treatment under the 1st is.  And it does remind us that it's about time we did somethin' 'bout that, ya' think?  Public financing does come to mind ...

I don't think I need to point out how I feel about DC v. Heller, save to say that I'm so relieved that the SCOTUS finally grew a p[air and ruled on the 2nd.  In fact, I am as happy as a little gurl ....

Hey jed, why don't you "write about the vigilantism inherent in the gun decision."  I'd be fascinated to read it.

And JC, I couldn't agree more.

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by: Rob Kailey @ Fri Jul 04, 2008 at 00:07:54 AM UTC