Posted 1:43 PM by Jason
Torture Cont.

Sen. Schumer is up now, claiming that since Harriet Meirs didn’t get an up or down vote  Alito may not deserve one, busted out the term “flip-flop”, and deified Sandra Day O’Connor (as so many of the Democrats have).  He also claimed he hadn’t yet made up his mind, which for him must mean he hasn’t decided between a no vote and filibustering.  Then, to cap it off, he tells us that “the court is not a legislature” and that it should respect the elected branches, though not the executive too much, mostly just him.  He brings up Alito’s Rybar dissent to discuss this, since “the people” apparently wanted this law (prohibiting intrastate simple possession of machine guns) so much that no judge should have even questioned whether or not it passed commerce clause muster.  Ok, let me try to work this out.  In Rybar, the people wanted a federal law so bad (according to Schumer) that it didn’t matter if it was outside the federal government’s power.  In Roe, even though “the people” in the states, acting in the appropriate state forum, wanted laws against abortion, Schumer apparently believes the court was using only its legal judgment to find this “right” to an abortion.  That’s deference to the elected branches how?  What a putz.      

Now Durbin, invoking Rosa Parks and coal miners, claiming to be worried about judicial activism.  Wait, I think I fell asleep…

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