Supreme Court
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The Supreme Court has now closed the courthouse doors to claims of racial bias at every stage of the criminal justice process, from stops and searches to plea bargaining and sentencing. The system of mass incarceration is now, for all practical purposes, thoroughly immunized from claims of racial bias. Staggering racial disparities in the drug war continue but rarely make the news. The Obama administration has indicated it supports abolition of the hundred-to-one disparity in sentencing for crack versus powder cocaine - the most obvious and embarrassing example of racial bias in a system that purports to be colorblind....The legal rules adopted by the Supreme Court guarantee that those who find themselves locked up and permanently locked out due to the drug war are overwhelmingly black and brown. Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow
Scalia And Thomas Dine With Healthcare Law Challengers As Court Takes The Case (11/14/2011)
The Corporate Supreme Court (Ralph Nader) (7/18/2011)
Chris Murphy Calls For Investigation of Clarence Thomas (6/24/2011)
Supreme Court Rules For Wal-Mart (6/20/2011)
Bush V. Gore's Dark American Decade (12/12/2010)
It was bad enough that the Supreme Court ruled the Corporation is a person with all the rights that implies, it was worse when it ruled that the only purpose of the Corporation is profit, and Citizens United almost certainly will destroy US governance as we know it to allow virtually unlimited amounts of money to buy elections. To avoid total disaster (which appears imminent), we need a Constitutional Convention
Get involved at Move to Amend.
Meanwhile, sign this Petition.
See this letter from Ralph Nader: http://www.nancho.net/corperson/cpnadrsa.html
Justice Roberts: A hard lesson in Why Elections Matter (3/18/2010)
A Supreme Injustice
The Corporate Takeover of U.S. Democracy (2/3/2010)
5-4 Fascism One Court, One Man, One Vote, One Tyranny
Don’t Let Supreme Court Giveaway to Corporations Wreck Our Economy (2/2/2010)
Worst Supreme Court decision since the Dred Scott case (1/22/2010)
How Dubya’s court may undo democracy (9/20/2009)
Sundays I wait patiently for the start of the "60 minutes" program which is one of the last vestiges of television journalism. It is almost invariably delayed by a sports program, which undoubtedly confuses TIVO and keeps viewership down. "60 minutes" like other corporate conglomerate broadcasts, is increasingly undisguised right-wing propaganda.
For example, Supreme Court Justice Scalia was profiled on 60 minutes recently. He spoke on varied subjects, but on Bush v Gore, which selected Bush as President in 2000, he said simply "Get over it." Thanks to Greg Palast, writing for the British press, we now know that there was wholesale election rigging in Florida that year. An honest recount of the votes would likely have made Gore President. Scalia is unrepentant. Seven years later the whole world can see that the Court's decision was likely the worst one ever made. Bush has proved it. It does not take a Supreme Court Judge to know we shouldn't get over the idea that elections no longer have meaning. www.seconnecticut.com/elections.htm.
Scalia claims to be an 'originalist', which he explained is the idea that the Constitution should be interpreted as the framers intended. However, when V.P. Cheney met with people to decide energy policy and kept it secret, Scalia, Cheney's good friend, ruled that Congress could not know details of those meetings. The Constitution clearly intended that Congress should have oversight powers because, without that, there can be no 'checks and balances'. Given two new Bush additions to the Court, it is unlikely that the Bush administration's concept of the imperial Presidency will be overturned. This Scalia decision wiped out Congressional oversight, checks and balances, and certainly crippled the Constitution. In the interview Scalia, like many Republicans, just couldn't seem to figure out what torture is either. We are clearly on a path to fascism.
Scalia strongly defends executive power, opposes the Freedom of Information Act, and weakens the checks and balances that the Constitution incorporated. Without good information there can be no democracy. He is an enemy of good government.
After Scalia's profile, there followed exciting pictures of the Israeli air force preparing for action against Iran. Such pictures are reminiscent of propaganda leading to the War with Iraq: If the President wants to go to war with Iran, is anyone in position to stop him ? The Constitution gives the power to make war to the Congress because the framers knew the danger. Does it matter what the Constitution says ?
None of the Presidential candidates rejected Bush's aggressive power grab, nor have they rejected his secretiveness, his signing statements, or his refusal to be accountable. It is questionable whether we can have a meaningful Constitution if Bush is not held accountable. Scalia's hypocrisy is evident for anyone that cares to look.
Media had a large role in (s)electing Bush, cheerled his wars, broadcast his propaganda, and are continuing to consolidate their oligopoly and are largely responsible for our path to fascism.
SCALIA THINKS IT'S OK TO EXECUTE SOMEONE FOUND INNOCENT BY THE COURTS (8/18/2009)
Jon Wiener | Rupert Murdoch paid Clarence Thomas $1.5 million for his new memoir. Doesn't that create an "appearance of impropriety"?
Links
Supreme Court of the United States
Bibliography
Packing the Court: James MacGregor Burns
The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court: Jeffrey Toobin
Strange Justice, the Selling of Clarence Thomas: Jane Mayer and Jill Abramson. Read this awesome book to appreciate Republicans in action. Read it all.
Vincent Bugliosi, The Betrayal of America: How the Supreme Court Undermined the Constitution and Chose Our President, (2001) ISBN 1-56025-355-X
Supreme Injustice: How the High Court Hijacked Election 2000, (2001) Alan M. Dershowitz, ISBN 0-19-514827-4