The SCOTUS Nomination and Confirmation Thread

[sturg33]

I think ACB did great on her hearings and like her much more than Kavanaugh. Gorsouch is still the best though

[57Brave]

Did great ???

What did she say to make you think that?
To my knowledge she didn't say or commit to anything
Which is understandable

[Metaphysicist]

I think ACB did great on her hearings and like her much more than Kavanaugh. Gorsouch is still the best though

I actually don't disagree with any of this. Gorsuch believes some stuff about interpretation I don't necessarily agree with, but he seems pretty thoughtful and usually writes pretty well. He had a pretty interesting career in the private sector and has a DPhil from Oxford.

ACB is waaaay too conservative, but she is an actual honest-to-god (lol) legal scholar. I have no problem appointing that class of folks as justices. More variety on the court is generally better.

Even ignoring the... "allegations"... Kavanaugh was a terrible choice. Like, compared to Joe Sixpack, he is definitely a smart guy. But in context, he really stands out as a weak addition to the court. He is a bog standard FedSoc/Bush II/DC Swamp lawyer who networked his way to the top. His great life accomplishments before getting on the DC Circuit (where he sucked because he was being super conservative to gun for SCOTUS) are working as a partisan hack for Ken Starr and working as a partisan hack for the W White House. It's like appointing Don McGahn or something.

His opinions are also unbearable to read because he is just not in the same class of thinker or writer as the other folks on the Court. For contrast, every Alito opinion could be summarized as "Whatever the Republican party thinks, that is the right answer"; but he writes that opinion much better than Kavanaugh does.

[Jaw]

You can have an issue with a law or how it’s written and just say so without insinuating the woman is racist and so were all the other judges that were involved

Are..are you new here?

[Runnin]

Hyperbole again?

Its getting hard to figure out when you are or aren't serious.

No, dead serious. He's a felon and worse. Any judge worthy of the position would refuse this position at this time.

[sturg33]

No, dead serious. He's a felon and worse. Any judge worthy of the position would refuse this position at this time.

Lol

TLHLIM

[57Brave]

she deemed climate issues political rather than scientific

this has bugged me for a few days.
Which leaves the door of impartiality closed and and her claims of impartiality ring hollow
////////////////////

I saw this today, " she is Sarah Palin with a vocabulary"

[chop2chip]

she deemed climate issues political rather than scientific

this has bugged me for a few days.
Which leaves the door of impartiality closed and and her claims of impartiality ring hollow
////////////////////

I saw this today, " she is Sarah Palin with a vocabulary"

Seems rather misogynistic that last sentence

[57Brave]

ok, Dan Quayle with a vocabulary

[Tapate50]

She’s a legal scholar not a climate scientist. Would you rather have a biologist interpret the law?

You are grasping at nothing.

[Tapate50]

No, dead serious. He's a felon and worse. Any judge worthy of the position would refuse this position at this time.

Wow. Busted and broken dude.

SC nomination finally recognizing my work ? PASS.

Gtfo.

[Tapate50]

Are..are you new here?

Unfortunately not, just a slow learner

[57Brave]

She’s a legal scholar not a climate scientist. Would you rather have a biologist interpret the law?

You are grasping at nothing.

given the opportunity
she didn't separate the political from the scientific

Kinda the mess we're in now huh ?

[cajunrevenge]

Heres the questions I would have for ACB, and first let me say I might have an issue putting a muslim person on the supreme court. No chance in hell if they were as muslim as ACB is Christian.


"In what circumstances if any should a Supreme Court Justice recuse themself from a case"



"If your christian faith should not be relevant to these hearings would you agree that the same should apply to a Muslim or Atheist nominee"


"Does the intestate commerce clause in the constitution give the federal government the right to regulate something that is neither sold nor crosses a border."



" Do police have the right to stop anyone at anytime to frisk them?"


"what constitutes reasonable suspicion for a stop and frisk and is there anything a cop cant use to justify reasonable suspicion, for example, one police officer pulled over a car after he saw the passenger flipped him off and claimed he thought that was a distress signal but never asked the person he interrogated if he needed help. Would that be an example of a crime being committed against a motorist."



"Does a citizen have the right of self defense against a police officer engaged in criminal actions such as planting drugs."



"If a person spends 60,000 in lawyers and spends 2 weeks in jail over a false charge. Would you consider that the system working?"



"Is it acceptable in any way shape or form for a police officer to retaliate against a person exercising their constitutional right such as declining a vehicle search?"



"There has been a long history in this country of prosecutors striking jurors simply because they are black. Do you believe this happens and is a serious problem that needs to be addressed?"



"The constitution guarantees us the freedom of religion, I assume you agree with that, what makes a religion legitimate to receive this protection. If me and 5 friends want to start a potato worshiping religion whats the legal standard for determining a legitimate religion that has consititutionally protected rights."



"ok, and what if a religion involves doing a drug like alcohol as some give out wine, if alcohol were to be made illegal would they still have that right to use alcohol in their religious services or practices"



"In 1976 in the case of US vs Robert Randall he was found innocent by medical necessity for harvesting cannabis. 2 years later he was arrested again and charged, the day before the trial began the US dropped the case and agreed to a federal medical marijuana program. This federal medical marijuana program still exists to this day. Can you explain to me the legal reasoning here that would allow the federal government to both admit the medicinal value of marijuana while at the same time classifying it as a schedule 1 drug that means it has no medicinal value."



"In the Controlled Substances Act there is a clause allowing for an appeal of the scheduling of drugs. NORML appealed the ruling of cannabis as a schedule 1 drug and after years of the DEA refusing and the courts ordering them to they finally had the appeal hearings before the Chief Administrative Law Judge for the DEA Francis L Young. He determined that cannabis did have medicinal value and should not be a schedule 1 drug. The DEA head rejected the ruling and an appeals court later upheld that. Could you explain to me the legal reasoning that would allow the DEA, which has a financial incentives to keep cannabis illegal, to ignore the ruling of their own judge."



"follow up question, does the appeal clause actually exist in the CSA if it takes 6 court orders over 14 years and millions of dollars to get a hearing if the DEA head can unilaterally decide to ignore it."

[goldfly]

[striker42]

I prefaced my original thought with something about my untrained legal opinion or something like that --- but I can read.
Regardless this particular case or it's outcome, or who voted what, who agreed or disagreed --- she wrote what she wrote

"The n-word is an egregious racial epithet. That said, Smith can’t win simply by proving that the word was uttered,” she wrote. “He must also demonstrate that Colbert’s use of this word altered the conditions of his employment and created a hostile or abusive working environment.”

Did she really write that the use of the N word by a supervisor does not constitute a hostile work environment ?
Is the bar making Mr Smith pick cotton to be evidence of hostile workplace ?
/////////////

I asked earlier and received no specific response, Say a supervisor is being sued in court by a Jewish person assaulted with the K word or a Latino the S word or LGBTQ F word or, a woman accuses the use of the B word, can and would said supervisor use this opinion as a defense ?

My limited legal expertise says yes

There's something called a legal term of art. These are words that might have one meaning in the general vernacular but another in a legal context. A hostile work environment means one thing if you're just talking about it in general. Legally, there's a specific definition.

Here's the SCOTUS's definition of a hostile work environment, "When the workplace is permeated with "discriminatory intimidation, ridicule, and insult," 477 U.S. at 65, that is "sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of the victim's employment and create an abusive working environment," id., at 67 (internal brackets and quotation marks omitted), Title VII is violated." Harris v. Forklift Sys., 510 U.S. 17 (1993).

So there must be intimidation, ridicule, and insult permeating a work place that is severe or pervasive enough to alter the victim's employment and create a hostile work environment.

Generally, courts require the conduct be severe AND pervasive as is evidenced in the case Mack v. Port Auth where the New York Southern District Court stated the requirement to be "that the conduct was so severe and pervasive that a reasonable person would find the environment hostile or abusive on account of race" Mack v. Port Auth., 225 F. Supp. 2d 376, 389 (S.D.N.Y 2002).

Single instances can be sufficient to establish a hostile work environment but those cases tend to be things like a woman being raped by her boss for a hostile work environment based on sex.

In fact, ACB is far from the only judge to state that a single utterance is insufficient. "a single "utterance of an epithet" does not constitute a hostile work environment" Wise v. Ferriero, 842 F. Supp. 2d 120, 126 (DC 2012); "a single utterance of an epithet, while offensive, is not sufficient to establish a hostile work environment," Maldonado v. Invensys Bldg. Sys., 157 Fed. Appx. 904, 906 (7th Cir. 2005).

And if we need go further, the SCOTUS itself has already spoken on this issue. "mere utterance of an . . . epithet which engenders offensive feelings in a employee," ibid. (internal quotation marks omitted) does not sufficiently affect the conditions of employment to implicate Title VII" Harris v. Forklift Sys., 510 U.S. 17, 21 (1993).

So ACB was actually following SCOTUS precedent in that case.

[nsacpi]

I'll just put this here and add that I am a fan of Diane Feinstein. She is well to my left politically, but she has always struck me as someone looking for constructive ways to work with people who do not agree 100% with her.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/polit...?ocid=msedgntp

[cajunrevenge]

Exactly, adding justices to the supreme court is within the power of the presidency. The only thing stopping a President from doing it is precedent, like the precedent of not confirming a lifetime appointee to the supreme court in an election year.

[sturg33]

like the precedent of not confirming a lifetime appointee to the supreme court in an election year.

Thats happened like 30 times

[cajunrevenge]

Sorry I got my Republican propaganda mixed up. Watched too much fake news/foxnews.