Friday, June 19, 2009

Roberts' Rules of Order

I was reminded by Scott Lemieux, writing about the recent denial by the Supreme Court of a prisoner's right to a DNA test, of this observation made by Jeffrey Toobin:

In every major case since he became the nation’s seventeenth Chief Justice, Roberts has sided with the prosecution over the defendant, the state over the condemned, the executive branch over the legislative, and the corporate defendant over the individual plaintiff.

I believe I first came across this in something else I meant to pass along, TBogg's "The Conformist."

I thought I'd recommend all of the above, in anticipation of the upcoming Senate confirmation hearings. The Republican sneering about empathy and different life experiences offering different perspectives (you can almost see Gingrich or one of those other cretins making air quotes, can't you?) and other stupid talk about Judge Sotomayor has died down a little, but I'm sure it'll come roaring back as soon as Obama surrenders to Iran, on Twitter.

2 comments:

Joe "Truth 101" Kelly said...

Yeah. But Roberts had such a nice smile how could they not confirm him?

bjkeefe said...

Remember the over-the-shoulder graphic The Daily Show used during his confirmation hearings? One of my faves.

"Judge Cutie."

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