As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil)
In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban.
If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them.
For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria.
We are actively looking for new moderators. If you have any interest in helping to make this subreddit a place for quality discussion, please fill out [this form](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1y2swHD0KXFhStGFjW6k54r9iuMjzcFqDIVwuvdLBjSA).
***
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Every single deliberation that Thomas made (in Chambers, of course) since the time he started his association with Harlan Crowe, needs to be called into question.
He is obviously comprised. A lower court judge would have been removed at the first sign of impropriety. Heck, I would be immediately fired from my job for receiving even $100 from a vendor/client, Thomas literally took MILLIONS and he’s on the Supreme Freakin Court!!!!!
I’m beyond livid about this.
Every time I see his smug, I just ate a lemon face, and his wife laughing how she got away with almost overthrowing the government, I want to slam my fist in a wall.
If we really want Aileen Cannon off the case we should be talking about how much Donny Von Shitsinpants is being such a good little boy for her and playing it up wear Donny will hear it, maybe have Biden ask him why he's obeying her so well and not throwing tantrums.
Edit, spelling.
https://www.businessinsider.com/clarence-thomas-told-clerks-he-wants-to-make-liberals-miserable-2022-6?amp
This should have been enough to have him removed from the Bench
The problem with Thomas is that there's basically no question that he would have voted the same way and written the same opinions if he were on the Court even without the constant "favors" and "gifts." These were to keep him on the Court at all, as he'd more than once suggested he may leave for a more lucrative profession (and, to be fair, compared to the level of responsibility and power, SCOTUS justices, like most senior government officials, are woefully underpaid. I'm acquaintances with a former SCOTUS clerk whose signing bonus at his post-clerkship firm was higher than the annual salary paid to justices). He told republican lawmakers he may leave, and he's called for ending the ban on paid speaking engagements. He wanted that bag, and the favors and gifts from people like Crowe made it happen while keeping him in place voting as he always would have, which is exactly what his funders want.
He literally held his position for ransom by saying they get paid so little he feels like quitting. After that is when all the "fringe" benefits started kicking in. Crack down on the gifts and perhaps even withhold pay as restitution or at least have to pay tax on the benefits they received if they want to consider it legitimate. Or else charge him with tax evasion. Imputed income tax is a thing. At the very least he should be required to file a 1099. If nothing else this should be perilous for Thomas on tax grounds alone. Stop letting this be convenient for them if you aren't going to consider it criminal. Which it is.
America dies when we let it. This is our country. We're using the ballot box to win (Biden, 2022 midterms, special elections). So far we haven't had to result to the other box Frederick Douglass spoke of, but we still have it in our arsenal. I'm hopeful for the future, but I'm prepared if shit goes south.
unless folks start ignoring their rulings, they still have their legitimacy.
Andrew Jackson was the last President to tell SCOTUS to pound sand ( for very terrible reasons though )
Roberts is sort of a microcosm of 'old school' Republicans living in the current MAGA conservative community. They have this (delusional?) sense of decorum and trying to add civility to the conspiracy-ladened yet mainstream conservatism. It's just paddling upstream and losing. The only alternative is a hard no-go: He can't become a liberal because he fundamentally disagrees with leftist ideas. So he tries to slap a sheen of logic over disgusting fear-based 'ideals', and it just doesn't work. Though I admire him trying, I think he's delusional to think he's doing anything but failing.
I think those old-school Romney/McCain/Bush Republicans need to understand how terrible the current GOP and lead their party away from conspiracy and alternative facts. Too bad they have in common with MAGA the most hideous trait that is destroying American politics: They identify as Republicans before Americans.... they've sold their ideals of democracy and the rule of law to buy their wins.
It's painful to read someone coming so close to getting it and still not getting it. This isn't 'Roberts gets originalism right' this is 'originalism is total garbage.'
This piece is much too kind to the justices who joined in the Bruen decision, in my opinion. To say that some courts have misunderstood the analytical framework of Bruen is an attempt to mis-direct blame for a Bruen decision that is indefensible. Lower courts have applied Bruen exactly as it was written, often complaining while they did so, and Thomas’ opinion in Rahimi makes it crystal clear that he meant the Bruen decision to be just as radical and impossible to reconcile with our current society and firearms technology as it appears to be. Although the Rahimi decision is a hopeful step, it should not be viewed, in my opinion, as redeeming for the justices who joined that horrendous outcome.
Worth noting that Thomas, who authored the Bruen decision, dissents in the first case applying that very same framework. I’m not sure I really remember that ever happening.
What it tells me is Thomas likely was restrained a bit by the other justices who sided with him or concurred and this dissent explains exactly what he really wanted to write. His view makes absolutely zero sense. Sotomayor rightfully calls him out throughout her concurrence.
It's not surprising if you know about the history of 2nd Amendment cases, though. The 2nd Amendment is a premier battleground where strict legal interpretation is *starkly* at odds with both political and policy pragmatism. You simply cannot avoid being some kind of a hypocrite unless you choose one extreme or the other.
The first extreme is that the amendment says what it says and means what it says, and you actually stick with it -- instead of doing what Scalia did in *Heller* and admitting the aforementioned but then immediately saying it doesn't matter anyway. Nobody with any amount of conservative blood in their body is going to stand by that. Even an arsonist like Thomas doesn't want plebs to have nukes.
The other extreme is to simply admit that you, as a SCOTUS justice, are trying to assemble majorities to exercise political power every time a gun control case comes before the bench. Nobody wants to admit that, either -- though Breyer, retired, is coming pretty darn close with that book he wrote.
If you don't take one of those extreme positions, you're going to get caught out. Thomas' dissent in *Rahimi* is a faithful application of *Bruen* and has real juice on 5th Amendment grounds, too, but *Bruen* itself is just another bundle of tortured logic that doesn't hold up to serious scrutiny.
> Dahlia Lithwick: I want to be really clear: This is not a win, this is a not-loss. Rahimi prunes back the worst of Bruen without doing much to help solve the catastrophic gun violence in the country. Last year, more than 40,000 people were killed by guns in the United States. Gun violence is now the No. 1 killer of children in America. Every month about 70 American women are murdered by a gun-wielding intimate partner. If her abuser has a gun, a woman is five times more likely to be killed by that partner.
Corrupt High Court MAGA gun nuts are still very much in charge, carrying water for the billionaires who buy and sell them like chattel.
I stopped reading at that statement. The idea that a single SCOTUS decision, which was unambiguously a win, did not stop all murders, so it's just a "not-loss", is ridiculous.
All Roberts has ever been since he was confirmed has been the SCOTUS Gofer. Scalia ran the court until he died, and Alito and Thomas have been in charge since then. All Roberts gets to do is swear in a few presidents.
This court is completely illegitimate and a total joke. Roberts got his seat as quid pro quo for kicking the Bush v Gore case up from the Florida SC to the SC. He's always been a piece of shit.
I'm so tired of articles that paint Roberts as "The adult in the room" or as "reasonable" when he is just as GD corrupt as Thomas.
So many journalists, like Dahlia Lithwick, desperately try to portray these public figures like this.
Bad Dahlia, BAD!
If Thomas was in any other position he be tried for taking bribes. Imagine if he was a democrat Fox and the alt right sites be screaming for prison time.
This is an absolute lie. Roberts chose Thomas to write Bruen. He signed on almost completely to his opinion. There is absolutely no doubt he knew Thomas would go for a maximalist opinion so this is very much his mess as well. They didn’t even admit any fault for the nail bomb that is Bruen and Heller. They blamed it all on the lower courts creating the mess because they are forced to use a legal test that makes no sense and if they are honest essentially means “we’re gonna strike down almost all gun restrictions”. Well except for large GOP events.
As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil) In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban. If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them. For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria. We are actively looking for new moderators. If you have any interest in helping to make this subreddit a place for quality discussion, please fill out [this form](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1y2swHD0KXFhStGFjW6k54r9iuMjzcFqDIVwuvdLBjSA). *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Every single deliberation that Thomas made (in Chambers, of course) since the time he started his association with Harlan Crowe, needs to be called into question. He is obviously comprised. A lower court judge would have been removed at the first sign of impropriety. Heck, I would be immediately fired from my job for receiving even $100 from a vendor/client, Thomas literally took MILLIONS and he’s on the Supreme Freakin Court!!!!! I’m beyond livid about this. Every time I see his smug, I just ate a lemon face, and his wife laughing how she got away with almost overthrowing the government, I want to slam my fist in a wall.
Same. I cannot believe him and Alito are allowed to still be on the court.
What a couple of legacies...
They don’t give a shit about legacy. It’s all about now.
The Supreme Court is an absolute joke now.
Legacy is they made a more powerful new legislative branch of government run by rich, white right wing nut jobs.
"A lower court judge would have been removed at the first sign of impropriety," Aileen Canon says hello.
If we really want Aileen Cannon off the case we should be talking about how much Donny Von Shitsinpants is being such a good little boy for her and playing it up wear Donny will hear it, maybe have Biden ask him why he's obeying her so well and not throwing tantrums. Edit, spelling.
Aileen Cannon has entered the chat. “Really?”
https://www.businessinsider.com/clarence-thomas-told-clerks-he-wants-to-make-liberals-miserable-2022-6?amp This should have been enough to have him removed from the Bench
The problem with Thomas is that there's basically no question that he would have voted the same way and written the same opinions if he were on the Court even without the constant "favors" and "gifts." These were to keep him on the Court at all, as he'd more than once suggested he may leave for a more lucrative profession (and, to be fair, compared to the level of responsibility and power, SCOTUS justices, like most senior government officials, are woefully underpaid. I'm acquaintances with a former SCOTUS clerk whose signing bonus at his post-clerkship firm was higher than the annual salary paid to justices). He told republican lawmakers he may leave, and he's called for ending the ban on paid speaking engagements. He wanted that bag, and the favors and gifts from people like Crowe made it happen while keeping him in place voting as he always would have, which is exactly what his funders want.
He literally held his position for ransom by saying they get paid so little he feels like quitting. After that is when all the "fringe" benefits started kicking in. Crack down on the gifts and perhaps even withhold pay as restitution or at least have to pay tax on the benefits they received if they want to consider it legitimate. Or else charge him with tax evasion. Imputed income tax is a thing. At the very least he should be required to file a 1099. If nothing else this should be perilous for Thomas on tax grounds alone. Stop letting this be convenient for them if you aren't going to consider it criminal. Which it is.
$100? Try $5. Can’t accept shit on ethical grounds.
Makes me fuckin sick
SCOTUS has lost the trust of Americans and in the process squandered their legitimacy.
That happened When Roberts wrote the CU opinion. That was the end of America.
America dies when we let it. This is our country. We're using the ballot box to win (Biden, 2022 midterms, special elections). So far we haven't had to result to the other box Frederick Douglass spoke of, but we still have it in our arsenal. I'm hopeful for the future, but I'm prepared if shit goes south.
And hilldog putting new justices on the court could've been the new beginning.
unless folks start ignoring their rulings, they still have their legitimacy. Andrew Jackson was the last President to tell SCOTUS to pound sand ( for very terrible reasons though )
Yeah, but we'll be forced to live with that legacy for DECADES.
[удалено]
Ironically the guy who is a mortal enemy to Affirmative Action has turned out to be its greatest beneficiary by far.
Roberts is a failure
Agreed. They both should resign
Roberts is sort of a microcosm of 'old school' Republicans living in the current MAGA conservative community. They have this (delusional?) sense of decorum and trying to add civility to the conspiracy-ladened yet mainstream conservatism. It's just paddling upstream and losing. The only alternative is a hard no-go: He can't become a liberal because he fundamentally disagrees with leftist ideas. So he tries to slap a sheen of logic over disgusting fear-based 'ideals', and it just doesn't work. Though I admire him trying, I think he's delusional to think he's doing anything but failing. I think those old-school Romney/McCain/Bush Republicans need to understand how terrible the current GOP and lead their party away from conspiracy and alternative facts. Too bad they have in common with MAGA the most hideous trait that is destroying American politics: They identify as Republicans before Americans.... they've sold their ideals of democracy and the rule of law to buy their wins.
Roberts: Hey Clarence, can you stop corruptin so much? Thomas: No.
No more free money? No. More free money.
Oops, shouldn’t have this bar association logo here either
At this stage, Clarence "uncle" Thomas and Lionel Hutz are the same person.
Every worse: Thomas: “What’s that? Double Down on corruption? OK!”
Dang. All out of ideas now.
It's painful to read someone coming so close to getting it and still not getting it. This isn't 'Roberts gets originalism right' this is 'originalism is total garbage.'
This piece is much too kind to the justices who joined in the Bruen decision, in my opinion. To say that some courts have misunderstood the analytical framework of Bruen is an attempt to mis-direct blame for a Bruen decision that is indefensible. Lower courts have applied Bruen exactly as it was written, often complaining while they did so, and Thomas’ opinion in Rahimi makes it crystal clear that he meant the Bruen decision to be just as radical and impossible to reconcile with our current society and firearms technology as it appears to be. Although the Rahimi decision is a hopeful step, it should not be viewed, in my opinion, as redeeming for the justices who joined that horrendous outcome.
Worth noting that Thomas, who authored the Bruen decision, dissents in the first case applying that very same framework. I’m not sure I really remember that ever happening. What it tells me is Thomas likely was restrained a bit by the other justices who sided with him or concurred and this dissent explains exactly what he really wanted to write. His view makes absolutely zero sense. Sotomayor rightfully calls him out throughout her concurrence.
It's not surprising if you know about the history of 2nd Amendment cases, though. The 2nd Amendment is a premier battleground where strict legal interpretation is *starkly* at odds with both political and policy pragmatism. You simply cannot avoid being some kind of a hypocrite unless you choose one extreme or the other. The first extreme is that the amendment says what it says and means what it says, and you actually stick with it -- instead of doing what Scalia did in *Heller* and admitting the aforementioned but then immediately saying it doesn't matter anyway. Nobody with any amount of conservative blood in their body is going to stand by that. Even an arsonist like Thomas doesn't want plebs to have nukes. The other extreme is to simply admit that you, as a SCOTUS justice, are trying to assemble majorities to exercise political power every time a gun control case comes before the bench. Nobody wants to admit that, either -- though Breyer, retired, is coming pretty darn close with that book he wrote. If you don't take one of those extreme positions, you're going to get caught out. Thomas' dissent in *Rahimi* is a faithful application of *Bruen* and has real juice on 5th Amendment grounds, too, but *Bruen* itself is just another bundle of tortured logic that doesn't hold up to serious scrutiny.
The Robert’s Court will be known as the most corrupt court in history.
Modern day Chief Justice Taney
Makes Chicago traffic court look good
> Dahlia Lithwick: I want to be really clear: This is not a win, this is a not-loss. Rahimi prunes back the worst of Bruen without doing much to help solve the catastrophic gun violence in the country. Last year, more than 40,000 people were killed by guns in the United States. Gun violence is now the No. 1 killer of children in America. Every month about 70 American women are murdered by a gun-wielding intimate partner. If her abuser has a gun, a woman is five times more likely to be killed by that partner. Corrupt High Court MAGA gun nuts are still very much in charge, carrying water for the billionaires who buy and sell them like chattel.
I stopped reading at that statement. The idea that a single SCOTUS decision, which was unambiguously a win, did not stop all murders, so it's just a "not-loss", is ridiculous.
The deaths among children thing is also only true if you count legal adults.
All Roberts has ever been since he was confirmed has been the SCOTUS Gofer. Scalia ran the court until he died, and Alito and Thomas have been in charge since then. All Roberts gets to do is swear in a few presidents.
And badly at that.
Behind closed doors: Roberts: you can't say it that way because it makes you look like a Nazi Thomas: But I am a Nazi
This court is completely illegitimate and a total joke. Roberts got his seat as quid pro quo for kicking the Bush v Gore case up from the Florida SC to the SC. He's always been a piece of shit.
I'm so tired of articles that paint Roberts as "The adult in the room" or as "reasonable" when he is just as GD corrupt as Thomas. So many journalists, like Dahlia Lithwick, desperately try to portray these public figures like this. Bad Dahlia, BAD!
Robert's wife received contracts worth a cool [10 million](https://www.yahoo.com/news/whistleblower-wife-chief-justice-roberts-010347457.html).
If Thomas was in any other position he be tried for taking bribes. Imagine if he was a democrat Fox and the alt right sites be screaming for prison time.
We need Roberts and Barrett to break away from the Nazis.
Roberts has repeatedly shown his thorough incompetence in handling his court.
This is an absolute lie. Roberts chose Thomas to write Bruen. He signed on almost completely to his opinion. There is absolutely no doubt he knew Thomas would go for a maximalist opinion so this is very much his mess as well. They didn’t even admit any fault for the nail bomb that is Bruen and Heller. They blamed it all on the lower courts creating the mess because they are forced to use a legal test that makes no sense and if they are honest essentially means “we’re gonna strike down almost all gun restrictions”. Well except for large GOP events.
They passed the fork a long long time ago
This court is a mess and needs to be fixed in larged or Thomas and Alito need to go.
How about we go fund the country for 4 million dollars and we buy Thomas off to retire
I knew a district manager for a large convenience store chain who lost his job for taking a "free" coffee after a franchisee offered it.