Redstate

Posted at 3:02pm on Jul. 1, 2008 McCain: Obama would nominate bad justices.

Is it time to throw the Supreme Court under the bus?

By Mark Kilmer

We remember Kennedy v. Louisiana, in which the 5 in the 5-4 split Supreme Court ruled that the State of Louisiana lacks the discretion to apply the death penalty to those who rape very, very young girls. The same ruling applies to the five other States who deemed that such crime was so heinous to their communities as to warrant "the ultimate punishment."

Barack Obama felt the wind on his finger and told his audience that he disagreed with the Court's majority, but in a speech to the National Sheriffs Association in Indianapolis, John McCain pointed out that if elected, Obama would nominate justices like those who ruled in favor of the child rapists:

McCain acknowledged that Democrat Barack Obama had also disagreed with the decision that struck down a Louisiana law allowing capital punishment for people who rape children under 12. Obama said he believed carefully crafted state laws permitting execution of child rapists do not violate the Constitution.

Nevertheless, McCain asked: "Why is it that the majority includes the same justices he usually holds out as the models for future nominations?"

"My opponent may not care for this particular decision, but it was exactly the kind of opinion we could expect from an Obama court," the Arizona senator said.

Indeed, when asked by CNN in May what kind of justices he would nominate, Barry answered: Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and David Souter. Throw in the tremulous Anthony Kennedy and the antique and rusty John Paul Stevens, and there is your Court majority who sided with monsters.

I think that time has come for Obama to toss these justices under the bus; after all, they are not the Breyer, Ginsburg, and Souter he's known. Right?

Posted in 2008 | McCain | Obama | Supreme Court — Comments (4)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 12:35pm on Jun. 27, 2008 Obama's Gun Obfuscation

Obama Sraddles On

By California Yankee

Yesterday, reporting on reactions to the Supreme Court's decision striking down the D.C. gun ban, the Associated Press headlined "McCain backs gun decision, Obama straddles issue."

Here's video of Obama straddling the issue:

Just before the Supreme Courts decision was public, Obama disavowed his "inartful" statement calling the D.C. gun laws constitutional.

Wait. There's more.

Posted in 2008 | Guns | Obama | Supreme Court — Comments (6)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 8:45am on Jun. 27, 2008 One tendentious opinion away.

From the same tyranny.

By Paul J Cella

A quick read of this article will surely leave you outraged. The story is simple enough: a neat amalgam of barbarism and PC bureaucracy, the sort of anarchy compounded by oppression that Liberalism so excels at producing.

A former British soldier endures as his neighborhood terrorized by a pack of feral young thugs (“yobs,” as they call them over there) for several days. He calls the police; they never come. He looks for an officer; finds none. Coming home one day to find his wife in tears and terrified, he finally has enough, and goes out to execute a citizen’s arrest, dragging one of the thugs into house and calling his mother. Thereupon the police arrive with the mother — and naturally arrest the homeowner.

This is justice under Liberalism.

Let it be noted that there was a somewhat similar case in Illinois five years ago, where a man who fought off an intruder in his house was charged with a handgun violation. State Sen. Obama voted against bills to remedy this manifest injustice twice.

Yesterday we all sat around in worried anticipation, hoping the Supreme Court would manage, this time, to maintain the plain meaning of the words of our Constitution and restore to us our self-government. The outcome was a good one — barely. But the tyranny of the Court is still in place. The four Liberals very frequently succeed in persuading Justice Kennedy to join them in their usurpations. They care not one whit about the plain meaning of the Constitution. They do exactly as they please.

Here in America, packs of feral youths exist in appalling abundance, just like in Britain. But most of them are well aware that their potential victims may be armed. On that fact, friends, much of our liberty hangs.

And we are only a tendentious opinion from one of the Liberal Usurpers on the Court, or their creature Kennedy, under the spell of the New York-DC elite adulation — one tendentious opinion citing foreign law, or sweet mystery of life, or mystical evolving standards, away from the same tyranny that would send the homeowner who defends his wife against thugs to jail, while showering the thugs with sympathy.

Posted in D.C. v. Heller | Great Britain | Guns | Law | Supreme Court | thugs — Comments (5)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 7:52am on Jun. 27, 2008 MI Morning Update: Supremes Secure 2nd Amendment - McCain Reacts - State Budget Deal Reached

By saul anuzis

130 Days until Election Day

June 27, 2008

MORNING UPDATE:

SECOND AMENDMENT SECURE...FOR NOW...The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that Americans have a right to own guns for self-defense and hunting, the justices' first major pronouncement on gun rights in U.S. history.  Obama backed the DC gun ban case that lost...judges do matter.

Posted in 2nd Amendment | John McCain | Michigan Republican Party | Republicans | Saul Anuzis | Supreme Court — Comments (0) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 10:32am on Jun. 26, 2008 Keep and Bear Those Arms

By Erick

5 to 4 decision. Scalia writes it for the majority.

Undoubtedly some think that the Second Amendment is outmoded in a society where our standing army is the pride of our Nation, where well-trained police forces provide personal security, and where gun violence is a serious problem. That is perhaps debatable, but what is not debatable is that it is not the role of this Court to pronounce the Second Amendment extinct.

We affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.

Note: Though Senator Obama is today running ferociously away from his statement of last year that he supported the District of Columbia's gun ban, *all* of the Supreme Court Justices that Obama has said he respected voted against the individual right to keep and bear arms.

Posted in 2nd Amendment | Breaking News | Law | Right To Bear Arms | Supreme Court — Comments (139)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 10:54am on Jun. 16, 2008 Ignore the Court

By Mark I

Thursday’s Supreme Court ruling in the consolidated cases of Boumediene v. Bush and Al-Odah v. United States for the first time grants foreign-born enemy combatants of the United States, captured on the battlefield in the process of planning or participating in attacks against U.S. targets, the right to challenge the circumstances of their detention in federal court. It is difficult to overestimate the impact that this ruling will have on the prosecution of the war on terror and, indeed, all future armed conflicts. The specter of American troops Mirandizing enemy combatants on the battlefield, or being called back from the front to testify in civilian court about the manner that a prisoner was captured, and the practical impossibility each of those outcomes would present to the U.S. military, should trouble every American who is concerned about the nation’s safety.

President Bush, reacting almost immediately to the Court’s decision, said that his Administration, “would abide,” with the ruling, adding, “That doesn’t mean I have to agree with it.” He spoke too soon, and did not go far enough. For the reasons cited above, and others, he should ignore this decision of the Court, and continue to apply the Military Commissions Act of 2006 as duly passed into law by Congress.

Read on...

Posted in detainees | Guantanamo | military tribunals | Supreme Court | terrorists | The Bush Administration | War — Comments (50) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 10:14am on Jun. 12, 2008 BREAKING: 5-4 Supreme Court Extends Habeas Corpus To Foreign Nationals Detained At Guantanamo

Court Overturns Congress' Military Commissions Act

By Dan McLaughlin

Initial report from SCOTUSBlog here. 5-4 decision written by Justice Kennedy, with the Chief Justice and Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito dissenting.

UPDATES: The opinions, all 134 pages, are here. More below the fold.

Posted in Guantanamo | Justice Kennedy | Supreme Court | War — Comments (119)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 12:14pm on Apr. 28, 2008 SCOTUS approved Indiana's voter ID law

But the AP ignores the problem

By Soren Dayton

I am not a lawyer, I am a political hack. I am sure that one of our lawyers will give a very scholarly review of today's Supreme Court decision upholding Indiana's voter ID law. Here's the AP's report. And here's the part that shocked me:

There is little history in Indiana of either in-person voter fraud -- of the sort the law was designed to thwart -- or voters being inconvenienced by the law's requirements. For the overwhelming majority of voters, an Indiana driver license serves as the identification.

I refer you to the 2003 East Chicago Democratic primary, which has been in the news recently. The teaser is the closing paragraph of the first story I am going to cite:

The task force filed charges against 53 people, Indiana Attorney General Steve Carter's office reported. Of the 52 concluded cases, 45 individuals were convicted, four cases were dismissed, one person died and two people have been found not guilty at trial.

45 convictions. How did we figure this out? Read on for more details

Posted in Electoral Corruption | Indiana | Law | Supreme Court — Comments (18)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 10:15am on Apr. 28, 2008 BREAKING: Supreme Court Rejects Challenge To Indiana Voter ID Law

Victory In The Battle To Prevent Voter Fraud

By Dan McLaughlin

6-3 plurality decision just came down, split with 3 Justices rejecting the facial challenge. More to follow.

UPDATES: Opinion here. Justice Stevens, joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kennedy, found no showing of an undue burden on various voters who challenged the voter ID law on its face. Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito would have upheld the law on the broader ground that it imposed the same requirements equally on all voters. Both opinions give great weight to the state interest in ensuring that only eligible voters cast ballots. Justice Souter, joined by Justices Breyer and Ginsburg, dissented.

This is a major defeat for the Democrats' efforts to prevent states from requiring valid identification to vote. The lawsuit was brought by the Indiana Democratic Party.

Justice Scalia's separate opinion is redolent of the judicial hangover from Bush v. Gore in its emphasis on the hazards of permitting case-by-case judicial review of neutral rules established by state legislatures before an election takes place.

More below the fold.

Posted in Supreme Court | The Courts | Voter ID — Comments (21)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 2:38pm on Mar. 24, 2008 Attention DC Residents: Don't Let the Police In!

By Mark I

David Freddoso notes in The Corner that the authorities in Washington DC must be a bit nervous about the way the oral arguments in District of Columbia vs. Heller went at the Supreme Court last week. If they were confident that the District's handgun ban would survive the Constitutional challenge, why would they be implementing a new program to try and get as many guns as possible forfeited before the Court's ruling comes down in June?

A crackdown on guns is under way in the District. Police are asking residents to submit to voluntary searches in exchange for amnesty under the District's gun ban.

The program is starting in the Washington Highlands neighborhood of southeast Washington on Monday and will later expand to other neighborhoods. Officers will go door to door asking residents for permission to search their homes. (emphasis mine)

Now, we at RedState certainly don't want to advocate any lawbreaking, but I hasten to point out that the program is voluntary (see bolding). DC residents don't actually have to...you know...let the police in. Fourth Amendment and all that. No warrant = no entry.

Chances are good that by June, this "crackdown" will be a moot exercise anyhow.

Posted at 12:22pm on Mar. 19, 2008 Disassociation and the Running of the RiNOs

When Is It Unconstitutional?

By Dan McLaughlin

Yesterday's Supreme Court decision in Washington State Grange v. Washington State Republican Party is interesting on a couple of levels. Coupled with the Court's January decision in the case involving New York's system for nominating candidates to run for judicial elections, the Court seems to be signalling pretty clearly that it's not eager to get into overturning state primary election procedures - a signal the national Democrats are hopefully receiving, not that there's been any move just yet for the loser to follow the Al Gore plan.

Anyway, the short summary is that the Court ruled 7-2 to uphold a state open election system that allowed candidates from all parties to run in an initial election with their chosen party listed, without having been nominated by the party, followed by a runoff for the top two candidates; the major parties challenged the constitutionality of this procedure under a 2000 decision invalidating California's "blanket primary" under the First Amendment's right to freedom of association. The crux of the Washington case was whether the parties have a right to prevent candidates who have not been nominated by the party from using the party label on a ballot open to the general public.

Justice Thomas, writing for the Court, said no:

Posted in Justice Scalia | Law | Supreme Court — Comments (5)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 10:03pm on Mar. 16, 2008 The Supreme Court And Business Cases

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

An interesting analysis from Jeffrey Rosen on the shape and tenor of the Court's jurisprudence in cases affecting business. What is striking is the degree to which the pro-free market side has a number of people supporting it who are associated with the Democratic Party; Stephen Breyer, Walter Dellinger and Cass Sunstein are not members of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy, after all. For the record, I oppose efforts on the part of the Federal Government to define punitive damage awards in state courts; as clear a violation of the principles of federalism as any that could possibly exist. But I certainly support efforts to demand a greater showing that alleged corporate wrongdoing actually led to damages--the last thing that the country needs is to have the Martin Act afflicting us on a national scale. And while I favor originalism as a method of judicial analysis over the law and economics school, the latter school is absolutely the best one to look to for inspiration in designing legislation either on the federal or the state levels.

Posted in General Business Law Jurisprudence | Law | Supreme Court — Comments (0)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 3:19pm on Feb. 1, 2008 I Have Three Words That Will Bring Every Last One Of You Back To The GOP Fold

By Dan McLaughlin

Justice John Edwards.

Posted at 1:33pm on Jan. 16, 2008 Supreme Court: Constitution Not Violated By Use Of Party Conventions To Pick Nominees

Leaving Politics To The Politicians

By Dan McLaughlin

The U.S. Supreme Court today, in a unanimous opinion by Justice Scalia in NY State Bd of Elections v. Lopez Torres, reversed a Second Circuit decision that had overturned New York's system for selecting party nominees for trial judges. The appeals court had held that the First Amendment right to political association of prospective candidates for New York Supreme Court judgeships* were violated by the system of choosing nominees through party conventions dominated by party bosses, rather than through a more directly democratic system such as a primary.

Justice Scalia's opinion starts out with a concise summary of familiar and settled (if theoretically debatable) ground: the Constitution gives a political party some First Amendment associational rights to control its own processes for choosing its nominees, but imposes some restrictions (including Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendment restrictions against discrimination) on a party's candidate-selection process when the state grants the party the right to a line on the ballot. But as he explains, the problem with the conventions is not any legal restriction on who can throw their hat in the ring but rather a practical, political limit to who can win those contests - a problem for which the solution is necessarily political, not legal:

Read On...

Posted in Election Law | Justice Scalia | Law | Supreme Court — Comments (2)/ Email this page » / Read More »