The SCOTUS is soo much better without old scags!
I’d have preferred if they had been able to rule on gerrymandering and declare it stupid, unfair and downright unconstitutional.
I thought leaving the seat open was supposed to leave the court balanced 4-4. There are a LOT of 8-0 decisions coming down… Hey Mitch, how’s those three Nos working for you?
Arizona Republicans have been fighting both Clean Elections and the redistricting commission since they were created. Together with the voter fraud bamboozlement, it couldn’t be more obvious that the right wing wants to fix the elections in favor of the wealthy and powerful and white.
Hey, another win for the Democrats and (small d) democratic principles. I’m really getting to like this eight person SC bench! Take that, McTurtle!
conservatives : Wile E. Coyote
this ruling : meep meep
Many more 8-0 decisions like this and “Mitch McTurtle” will come crawling to the podium to push Obama’s nominee.
Don’t be surprised (I won’t be) that the ruling on the immigration case before the Court is decided 5-3 with John Roberts voting as if his legacy depended on it, which it is, but also because he’s going to have to consider the issue of standing. Does Texas have standing, meaning have they been harmed by Obama’s actions which were permitted him by the Constitution.
He has operated under longstanding provisions of law that give the executive branch discretion in enforcement. This presidential prerogative has been recognized explicitly by the Supreme Court. Moreover, the nature of immigration enforcement and the resources (or lack thereof) appropriated by Congress necessitate exactly the type of choices that the president has made.
When the president took his executive action on immigration, he was not flouting the will of Congress; rather, he was using the discretion Congress gave him to fulfill his constitutional duty to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”
This has nothing to do with actually stopping Obama’s actions – it’s all about stirring up the anger & fund-raising dollars, particularly here in Texas, so the Tea-Baggers can keep control of the wheels of power.
Oh sure. It’s comparable to what many Southern states’ governors are doing right now. They’ll say it’s about religious freedom or the right to pee unobserved or unmolested or finding the seat lid left up, but it’s only an appeasement of the right wing forces in those state and an appeal to them to keep vote voting for the RWN governor.
It is unfair, but the solutions are all worse than the problem. There is really no way to solve gerrymandering as long as states get to draw their own districts. Deal with it!
At least there are adjustments made every 10 years. Republicans got lucky in 2010, but Democrats did better throughout most of the 20th century – they controlled the House from WW2 until 1994 for example.
Luckily at least the Senate and Presidential votes are immune (since states are winner-take-all in these cases).
There is a way to solve gerrymandering: independent committees (not state legislators), stricter rules on the creation of districts (reasonable, contiguous borders, etc), and reinstatement of Article V of the VRA. While gerrymandering is in part about control of state legislatures and of course the House, it is far more vital in making Representatives accountable to their constituents. Voters picking their Reps, rather than the other way around. There are lots of districts, on both sides of the aisle, where the voting record and ethics of the Rep count less than whether there is a D or R next to their name on the ballot. THAT has to end.
It would be something that would be great to have in an Amendment honestly. It is sort of crazy that the party in power then controls elections that allows them to keep their jobs or their parties future power in the state. It would never make it through the states though.
Heck, in Arizona the people there passed this and the State is still fighting it.
Of course Texas doesn’t have standing: it’s going to cost them to issue Driver’s Licenses? FFS, in every state I’ve lived in driver’s license applicants (and ID card applicants) have to pay for them. I doubt they are priced to turn much of a profit, but if they aren’t priced at the costs to issue someone’s doing something wrong.
so true. But would be even better with the lovely 9th justice Obama has picked out for us.
Agreed!