(09-21-2020, 09:12 PM)Mickeypoo Wrote: Gotta love the tweets about burning it all down because they didn't get there way politically.  Such weakness.  Participation trophy crowd.

(09-21-2020, 11:28 PM)Mickeypoo Wrote: I personally think it is far better to have a court of constitutional conservatives vs liberal activists.

(09-22-2020, 03:02 AM)Dill Wrote: Does it matter to you how they get on the court?

(09-22-2020, 07:12 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: Yeah, not like "conservatives" talking about an armed insurrection or challenging the election results if Trump loses. :eyeroll:


I hope you understand that the conservative justices can be, and have been, activist as well. Judicial activism is not a "liberal" thing.

(09-22-2020, 09:04 AM)Mickeypoo Wrote: Yup, both weak minded and both suck.  As it stands right now, I only see liberals freaking out.  Talking about something and doing something are 2 different things.  Liberals have been rioting and looting and "peacefully protesting" and in general freaking out for awhile now.

(09-22-2020, 09:04 AM)Mickeypoo Wrote: Yup, agree, but It appears to be more of a problem from the liberal side.

Liberals were fine when they had the majority, but now that they might have to share the world is going to end and we should burn it all down.

(09-22-2020, 09:15 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: Then you haven't been paying much attention.


Liberals haven't had a majority on the SCOTUS in over 30 years. The Rehnquist and Roberts courts have both held a conservative majority throughout their times. The concern most liberals have is that with another conservative on the bench there will be a push of judicial activism on the right.

(09-22-2020, 09:42 AM)Mickeypoo Wrote: So I am honestly trying to learn more about this.  Can you please give me an example of what conservative activism would look like?  Can you give me an example of a case?

(09-22-2020, 02:56 AM)Dill Wrote: That was me saying McConnell should consider sticking to his own precedent.

McConnell assured Trump stole a pick from Obama. Now he'll make sure Trump gets a third, for a 6-3 court.

He's fine with what you state now.  Maybe in 2024 too.  He hopes everyone will Bfine with his actions.

(09-22-2020, 02:30 AM)Dill Wrote: You didn't trouble yourself to demonstrate you even understood my "position" and then explain what was hypocritical about it.

Quote:Just name-calling isn't "pointing out" anything. It is just name-calling.

Authoritarian pronouncements about what is or is not "up for debate" don't "point out" anything either. Especially from the guy who alternates between moral absolutism and "nuance" when it suits him.

This time it is moral absolutism--If wrong then, then wrong now!

But two wrongs wouldn't automatically make one hypocritical, just wrong twice. 

Wrong then and right now is only wrong once, and not necessarily hypocritical. 

Same for right then and wrong now. And one could be hypocritically right in both cases.

That's because hypocrisy generally isn't assessed separately from intentions and claimed ethical standards from which those intentions determinably diverge. You can't get anything like that from my post.

(09-22-2020, 09:42 AM)Mickeypoo Wrote: So I am honestly trying to learn more about this.  Can you please give me an example of what conservative activism would look like?  Can you give me an example of a case?

Quote:The term "activism" thus used is empty, a mask for a substantive position. "Activism" remains, however, a term of opprobrium. Everyone wants to appropriate and apply the word so that his favored approach is sound and its opposite "activist." Then "activism" just means Judges Behaving Badly-and each person fills in a different definition of "badly." Many of the papers prepared for this symposium are aware of the problem, denounce any definition of "activism" that just equates to "wrong decisions, as I see them"-and then offer a definition of "activism" that equates, once again, to Judges Behaving Badly.

Quote:By my standard, all nine are activist. That all nine subscribe to in principle, and use in practice, the noxious canon of constitutional doubt is proof enough of this. Each of the nine declared more federal statutes unconstitutional in each Term I examined than John Marshall did in a 34-year career. And there does not appear to be any significant difference on the "activism" scale between liberals and conservatives.

Perhaps my findings show that even an objective definition of activism does not capture much of value. But if that is the conclusion, then I will be happy to close this conference with a plea for the word's abolition.

(09-22-2020, 09:51 AM)Vas Deferens Wrote: Citizens United v. FEC

(09-22-2020, 10:11 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: One of the best pieces of writing I have read on this was "Do Liberals and Conservatives Differ in Judicial Activism?" by Frank Easterbrook. Here is the link, but I don't know if it will work without subscription access: https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2135&context=journal_articles

There is also, from the same publication, "Beyond Judicial Activism and Restraint" by Richard Epstein. https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2232&context=journal_articles

Easterbrook actually goes into cases and decisions by SCOTUS, analyzing them based on their "judicial activism" and finds that it's at issue on both sides. But the important thing to note from both articles is that they point out the almost useless idea of the term to begin with. Easterbrook puts it flat out there by saying:


He talks towards the end about his analysis and wraps up with this:

He does provide an appendix of the cases used at the end, so I won't rehash them here. I also just want to point out that this is a Federal Appeals Court Judge appointed by Ronald Reagan and is a rather conservative jurist.

(09-22-2020, 10:30 AM)Mickeypoo Wrote: Very interesting!   Thank you.

Whatever preference they give in polls, don't forget what is still true: Almost no one has strong preferences about political procedure. Committed partisans switch views depending on what helps their party. And the politically disengaged just don't care much.

— Jonathan Ladd (@jonmladd) September 22, 2020

(09-22-2020, 10:38 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: No problem. I spend way more time than I should looking at these sorts of things. Vas mentioned Citizens United, which is one more recent and prominent example of conservative "judicial activism," but I honestly don't get behind the term much, either. I use it almost primarily in mockery or in an effort to point out that the term is like Easterbrook points out, just used when we don't agree with a decision.

Quote:Recent events have brought the term "activist judge" to the forefront of American politics, but some judicial experts say they believe the label may be nothing more than a smokescreen to taint members of the court.
"There is no such thing as an activist judge," said FOX News senior judicial analyst Andrew Napolitano, who served as a New Jersey superior court judge from 1987 to 1995.
"An activist judge is one whose ruling you disagree with. And if you agree with what the judge has done, you call them heroic and intelligent and honest. If you disagree with them, you call them activists."
Napolitano said the definition of "activist judge" differs from the right to the left side of the political spectrum.
"To conservatives, activist judges are those who permit or compel activity in which the opinion of the conservatives can only be done in the legislative branch," he said. "To liberals, activist judges are judges who prevent the government from doing things that the Legislature wants to do."
The dictionary defines an "activist" as someone who fights in support of or in opposition to one side of a controversial issue.
But members from both sides of the political aisle have been applying the label of "activist judge" to jurists who are believed to be applying their own ideological beliefs to their rulings, rather than adhering to established law.

(09-22-2020, 10:03 AM)bfine32 Wrote: I remember this conversation back in 2016. Although it was shown that the Dems were being hypocritical (see Harry Reid filibuster, see Biden's 1992 thoughts on filling SCOTUS in POTUS last year) every Liberal and the vast majority of conservatives in this forum acknowledged Obama should make the nomination and that nomination should be vetted

Fast forward to 2020 and we have the exact situation (including the hypocrisy) and every conservative acknowledges that Trump should make the nomination and that nomination should be vetted; while the vast majority of Liberals feel differently.

(09-22-2020, 10:01 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: You mean I didn't type an unnecessarily long two page paper about how your position is hypocritical on its face?  I leave that type of meandering, overly verbose, response to others.

A very long winded way of saying "it's ok when I do it".  You've been doing this a lot of late.  Like I said, having integrity is difficult.  If it was easy everyone would do it.

(09-22-2020, 12:20 PM)Dill Wrote: You didn't because you can't, and you can't because it isn't.

Your choice was not between "a two page paper" or ad hominem.

Yet you went with the unsupported accusation. You've been doing a lot of this of late--Well, no. for years.

And people who make accusations they cannot support, who dodge support, are not arguing for integrity, however "difficult."

They are demonstrating its opposite.