Isn't Scalia a strict constructionist/originalist? He was voted on 98-0 twenty years ago. Things have changed! And it's dam sure not for the better. I support changing the rules. Screw this session of Congress, the Judiciary is so out of line, we have GOT to put some people back on the bench who know that they shouldn't be reading decisions from foreign nations to help decide on their cases. Partial Transcript
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SCALIA: It seems to me foreign law is totally irrelevant. It doesn't show what the Constitution originally meant, and it doesn't show what is fundamentally important to Americans today. It shows what's fundamentally important to somebody else today, but not to Americans. The only thing it can really help you on is if you think that you are charged with prescribing for Americans as a platonic guardian of morality what America's current standards of decency ought to be. Now, for that it would be useful to see what other wise, platonic guardians in other countries do, but for what the American people either thought when the Constitution was adopted or think today, I don't see how it's relevant.
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SCALIA: I don't agree that it's much ado about nothing. We decided a case this term involving the question we had already ruled on 15 years earlier, whether it's cruel and unusual punishment to impose the death penalty for a crime that was committed by someone when he was under the age of 21. We held no. This term, we reversed that decision. Justice O'Connor did not go along with that and did not use foreign law, as I did not, but the majority contradicted the views of a majority of those states that have the death penalty and part of the argument the majority used was international treaties, by countries that don't have juries, which decide whether it's fair, given this particular person, to impose the death penalty, and that was part of the argumentation of the majority decision. Now, I think it may have made the difference. I don't know. But I certainly think it had no place in deciding what the American people think, evolving or not. I don't think it should evolve, but even if you think it evolves, what possible relevance does it have to the Americans' view of whether it is cruel and unusual to impose the deathly penalty?
Can a single man be more correct? Scalia is a briliant mind. Sadly, if he was being "voted" on today, it would take 60 votes to break his fillibuster. It's sick.The ethics deal is almost as good, but not quite. Today, Pelosi has changed tactics on the whole thing. FOX News They have now offered to investigate DeLay. Democrats, however, don't want to. Now Pelosi, who is having questions raised about a trip she took herself, said that it isn't about DeLay anymore, but the changing of the rules. Again, they are shifting strategy. I agree with a hypothesis in this article. They don't want to investigate DeLay for fear that he will be exonerated. If that happened, they would look terrible. They are just pissed and scared of losing power.
Anyone who doesn't see both of the above situations as a fight to retain power is close minded. I'm not saying Reps wouldn't do the same, but does that mean we should support either being petty?
