This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis. It was originally published at The Conversation.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1475363
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1475363
Yadda Yadda Yadda. She also gave us 8 awful years of Cheney/Bush because she was “loyal to the team” instead of the Constitution. It was a huge mistake, so let us not forget, even though the author of this piece deliberately did so.
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The Electoral College gave us 4 years of trump no matter that he lost the popular vote. I was no fan of Bush/Cheney. I’m waaaay far less a fan of trump and whoever kisses his privates to get the veep spot.
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Yep. No article that serously wants to discuss her legacy can omit that. Her legacy not only includes Bush v. Gore, but pretending that that decision couldn’t be precedent, plus the invasion of Iraq and a million dead Iraqis. That’s all on her soul, and can’t be overlooked.
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Which, in addition to Iraq, gave us Roberts and Alito. Both of whom deserve eternal opprobrium.
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Now there was some consensus building. Yup. /s
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Just joining the chorus here. Any article on O’Connor that omits a reference to Bush v. Gore is a puff piece. Just click bait that can be ignored.
I know TPM relies on other sources like “The Conversation” for content, and it’s nice to have another thread on the weekend, but I don’t know why they had to pick this one. The replies here will be predictable.
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Ot but just a couple of “of courses”
Republicans to meet allies of Hungary’s Viktor Orbán on ending Ukraine aid (msn.com)
Allies of Hungary’s far-right prime minister Viktor Orbán will hold a closed-door meeting with Republicans in Washington to push for an end to US military support for Ukraine, the Guardian has learned.
Márton Ugrósdy, the deputy state secretary for the prime minister’s political director’s office, and Attila Demkó, a leading pro-Orbán academic, along with members of the Hungarian embassy in Washington, will on Monday begin a two-day event hosted by the conservative Heritage Foundation thinktank.
Elon Musk Says Alex Jones Can Return to X, Reversing His Stance Last Year (msn.com)
Elon Musk Says Alex Jones Can Return to X, Reversing His Stance Last Year© Provided by The Wall Street Journal
Elon Musk said conspiracy theorist Alex Jones would be reinstated on X, a reversal from the billionaire’s previous position that comes as he openly battles advertisers over their concerns about toxic content on the platform.
Musk late Saturday night Pacific time announced the reversal of the platform’s five-year-old ban on Jones after running a user poll on X about whether to reinstate him. Musk had said earlier Saturday that the reason for rescinding the ban, if the X voters approved, was to foster free speech.
About 70% of respondents voted for reinstatement, and about 30% voted against. “The people have spoken and so it shall be,” Musk subsequently posted.
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Ho Hum nothing to see here. GOP response, defund FEMA
At least six people are killed in severe storms and tornadoes in Tennessee - The Boston Globe
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An SDO hagiography comment thread going OT before comment #10 is entirely appropriate.
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No need to post my thoughts on this “legacy.” Everyone beat me to it.
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I guess that pretty much sums up the state of “X” these days.
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Those defending O’Conner because she did some good things reminds me the hypothetical convicted bank robber “But judge, consider all the times I went into a bank and didn’t rob it.” She violated her oath for personal gain [wanted to retire with a Republican as president] and caused incredible death and chaos. At least those alibiing authors usually get raked over in the comments.
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" Yet despite this power and innate political sense, her commitment to principles – structural ones such as federalism, which is the division of power between national and state governments, and procedural ones such as stare decisis, in which courts followed precedent in their rulings – was never in doubt."
Several commenters have pointed out the dire consequences of the Bush v Gore decision, for which O’Connor provided the decisive fifth vote. You could argue that it’s unfair to hold her responsible for what happened after the decision, since none of us can predict the future.
Just in general, the problem with excusing her on this grounds is that people who steal from the electorate the choice of the next president have to take on the responsibility for that president’s misdeeds. Bush’s second term is on the electorate, his first is the responsibility of the five who chose to act as R party apparatchiks rather than justices.
Specifically, these two principles, federalism and stare decisis, that O’Connor was supposedly faithful to beyond doubt, would have told her, without any need for her to see into the future, to reject the decision that her vote put over the top in Bush v Gore. That decision ripped from Florida its power to name its electors according to its election law, and it did so in the complete absence of any precedent for such a high-handed violation of one of a state’s fundamental powers. The decision was so lacking in any weight of precedent, and would if pretended to establish precedent, be so destructive of all future presidential election processes, that the majority declared it to be of a status that did not create precedent.
Forgive me for some doubt as to O’Connor’s commitment to federalism and stare decisis as anything beyond cynical pretexts used whenever convenient to mask her nakedly partisan commitment to a lawless party, and her commitment to results that fit her narrow and destructive ideological preferences over justice. It was an utter disaster that she was ever put into a position with such power to commit the whole nation to injustice by means of the lawlessness of many of her rulings.
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Mini Moo the waist high cow was playing hide and seek this frosty morning. She didn’t show up while I was getting her water, hay and sweet feed. Festus the dog didn’t find her either. So I took a lap around the pasture and still no cow. By that time I needed a coat and hat and gloves from the house. Dog and I went back out in the arena area for another looksee. Zero. Back to her stall and feed area and there she was munching away.
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THEN
Reproductive rights should be overtly and consciously balanced with important state interests in protecting life, both maternal and fetal.
NOW
The state has no interest in protecting maternal life.
This is the time to vote Democratic. Lots of Republicans will.
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O’Conner railed against legislating from the bench, but now we know she did. But I came not to point out how awful she was, but how awful Bremerton was.
3 Justices stated the coach was fired in their opening paragraphs concurring with the decision. He was not fired. When this point was made repeatedly in court arguments, 25 times, Alito accused the districts lawyer of “over complicating” the case.
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The Five to Four Whore set in motion things that we have never recovered from. She knew she F’ed up, too, never fully admitting it, but said things like “I might have got that one wrong.”
F her. She, along with 4 other bought and paid for SCOTUS judges, largely poured the foundation for the demise of the once great United States of America.
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X - Where Lies Live
Come join the
A. Fun
B. Cause
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I personally can/will never forgive her for injecting the Supreme Court into the election well before they should have been involved. Despite the current look through rose colored glasses at her life, she was a major early player in the far-right using the courts to intercept and interrupt due process and prevent the system from working as it was intended. The Supreme Court became an openly political entity by that decision. Add Senator McConnell’s preventing a simple vote on a new Supreme Court Justice, and we are where we are today. Sorry, I can not forget the role Justice O’Connor played in this evolution, whether intentional or not.
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