We have recently run an excellent natural experiment about the rule of law:
On Tuesday, Donald Trump was indicted on 34 counts of business fraud. Response was partisan, of course. Republicans unanimously blasted the legal basis for the case as both trivial and wrongheaded. Democrats . . . were split. Some defended the legal reasoning but others agreed the case was iffy.
On Friday, a federal judge in Texas ruled that the FDA had wrongly approved the abortion pill mifepristone two decades ago and ordered it taken off the market. Again, response was partisan. Democrats unanimously blasted the judge's legal reasoning as specious and biased. Republicans . . . unanimously supported the judge.
By any sensible standard, the mifepristone ruling was farcical. The judge plainly struggled to invent a plausible argument that would allow him to make abortion pills illegal, and in the end he failed. So he just went with what he had.
And so far, Republicans are 100% behind him. He accomplished the right goal, and nothing else matters.
The Law™ is a toy, to bash your friends with! From Wham-O!
Seriously, supposedly serious people, with deeply held beliefs and loudly proclaimed convictions in the Constitution are incrementally subverting its spirit daily. And then I'm not supposed to be cynical, to have trust in institutions, and respect my "betters?!"
You're not supposed to be cynical. It is naïve to be cynical, and vice versa. Together, they define the "dark side." To be wise is to be skeptical and open minded. Together they define a state of mind in which a person is learning and understanding how to make changes that are actually improvements.
Trust institutions to the extent that they are trustworthy.
Who are your "betters?" The way I see it, our species' dominance hierarchy is one level. That puts you on level one with the rest of us.
The problem is in your first sentence, one is not supposed to be cynical. Who writes this stuff? Hallmark? The Vatican? Who says I can't be cynical, especially when Law™ is subverted in broad daylight. I'm naive?
Navel gazing is fine and dandy when everyone upholds good faith belief in law. Not while whole cloth decisions are handed down stemming from what I suspect is a perverted religious origin.
"stemming from what I suspect is a perverted religious origin."
This bears some exploring. I think that religious doctrine might be part of the problem, but I think there's something else happening, too: the dramatic drop in family size and the fracturing of extended family networks. I had dozens of cousins; but 20 years later, my children have a few cousins, and those few cousins have fewer-still young children.
I really think the memory of those extended families filled with more children than adults is twisted now, more adults than children. That change, I think, works in concert with religious belief.
And I don't think it's gotten near enough examination as a root for the reactionary right's overreach.
That is why the Republicans (not "conservatives") are into child labor.
Very interesting. You remind me, we should always step back every now and again and remember, it's about food, fucking, and punching. This isn't to diminish any other achievement, in fact to emphasize them, we are animals, social animals and we are living in a sick environment as you point out, leading to dysfunction. My experience is similar...
How quickly we forget the dance, the festival, the storytelling...
BINGO - it's not just about the subjugation of women, it's also about the great replacement theory - They want to force up birthrates for white women to make America White again. SIGH.
Well, that same Law and that same Constitution were used to justify many many rulings along the lines of Dred Scott.
And in that case, we're supposed to cheer people who considered "moral law" more important than "legal law"...
Most (not all, but most) of the people who are against abortion are every bit as morally committed to their viewpoint as were anti-slavery advocates.
So my cynicism is warranted! Thank you.
There's no getting around it. We are a tribal species. Republicans are pretty much exclusively part of the "Republicans are better than Democrats" tribe. Some Democrats are part of the "Democrats are better than Republicans" tribe. Some are part of the "I think being tribal is bad so I don't want to admit I'm tribal" tribe.
For anyone actually wants to do something about it, in lieu of complaining, join the "Our 21st century context is one in which our species is all one tribe whether we want it to be or not" tribe. Except maybe someone can come up with a better name.
Is this guy giving us a non-funny parody or just a big pile of steaming ...
In the modern era, all of this started with Heller, a decision by conservative justices that had no basis in Constitutional language. That lead to Dobbs, a decision, again by conservative justices, chucking longstanding precedent to favor a religion. This guy in Texas has learned well.
Really? Someone with a longer memory might say that it began with "penumbra and emanations" and similar which had "no basis in Constitutional language".
Hell, someone with an even longer memory might consider cases like Schechter Poultry to be somewhat relevant...
The point is that "both sides do it", and once you stretch the law (or at least how you want it interpreted in one particular situation) you don't get to complain when that same stretching the happens in other situations.
Republicans and Democrats are equally dumb and equally unprincipled on this score. If there's any difference, it's that (*in cases the adults care about*, of which this is not one) the Republicans are a little more far-sighted in seeing how a stretch today could be used against them tomorrow,
Time to admit that Marbury v Madison was just invented out of whole cloth. The right-wing judiciary has thoroughly discredited the judicial branch. Biden and the executive branch should give them the finger and ignore this ruling.
Slippery slope to anarchy? Maybe. But right now, we're well down the slippery slope to judicial Bolshevism.
Fedpost
Yeah it’s annoying but it also isn’t new. Not worth tearing down the republic for Pete’s sake
"Republicans . . . unanimously supported the judge"
What does this mean as a quantifiable statement?
That Fox News supported the judge. Well, what do you expect? But Fox News is not "unanimous Republicans".
That every Republican member of Congress supported the judge? Even, eg, Susan Collins?
That every elected Republican in America, down to the city level supported the judge? Really!?! How would you know?
That every Republican voter supported the judge? Above and even more so.
My point is not that plenty of dumb Republican supported a dumb ruling (just as plenty of dumb Democrats supported a dumb ruling); it's that it's very easy to make crazy statements when you're preaching to the choir. And it's very easy to believe your dumbness when you're surrounded by people and media who all say exactly the same thing.
I think this is a slightly more specific version of the question "Who takes honoring their agreements more seriously?" I think we all know the answer to that one. "Your purpose, then, plainly stated, is that you will destroy the Government, unless you be allowed to construe and enforce the Constitution as you please, on all points in dispute between you and us. You will rule or ruin in all events."
The mephitic red repulsives are like lemming and will follow, almost anyone over the cliff. Please, let them all drown and we can be done with them, forever.
The era of natural experiments has been over since Nixon declared "If the president does it, that means it is not illegal," Reagan started Iran-Contra, Bush had Powell present phony evidence of Iraqi nuclear weapons at the UN, and Trump ordered Raffensperger to find him 11,780 votes. It should be a given by now that Republicans are a lawless party.