US Politics Mega-thread - Page 1378

On April 24 2019 02:22 farvacola wrote:
Yeah, the census question will almost certainly stand.


So fucking dumb.

On April 24 2019 02:31 On_Slaught wrote:


Deeply ironic as well. They will base their decision on the VRA, which this very court gutted a few years ago. Also, it will most harm poor and minority communities that the VRA was supposed to help. Basically they will find a way to use the VRA to hurt minorities which is some impressive shit.

Oh and ofc the irony of originalists like Thomas/Gorsuch looking past the constitutional requirement of counting all people with no reference to citizenship to get a desired political outcome.

On April 24 2019 03:19 Danglars wrote:
I was just curious if there was legal reasoning to why the conservative justices were leaning towards the “wrong” decision. Law correctly interpreted is the function of judges. Changing the law because the outcomes are argued to be bad creates new statutes for judicial interpretation. Just because you don’t like the result of a Supreme Court case, doesn’t mean they did not respect the law as written. That’s why I asked for legal reasoning, instead of “damage caused” and “harm poor and minority communities” and “so fucking dumb” and “hurt red states” which are consequential arguments.

On April 24 2019 03:33 Acrofales wrote:

Presumably Judge Furman isn't an idiot and he seemed to think there were legal reasons to disallow it. The law still needs to be interpreted and the current supreme court interpreting it as allowing the question doesn't mean there is not an alternative interpretation that disallows it. It's just that the current justices prefer the arguments in favour of allowing it.

On April 24 2019 03:32 Plansix wrote:
This argument assumes that judges are unencumbered by political leanings or that the make up of the court has not been shaped to create this political outcome. Given the amount of political capital spent spent by senate Republicans to achieve the a firm conservative majority on the court and stack the federal bench, it is hard to take this rhetorical line of questioning seriously.

Or to put it bluntly, why do the legal arguments matter when the real world goals and impacts are clear?

On April 24 2019 03:59 Plansix wrote:
You don’t want to assume what people think, so you assume that people must think the conservative justices hate minorities. That is some galaxy brain concern trolling right there.

On April 24 2019 03:32 Plansix wrote:
This argument assumes that judges are unencumbered by political leanings or that the make up of the court has not been shaped to create this political outcome. Given the amount of political capital spent spent by senate Republicans to achieve the a firm conservative majority on the court and stack the federal bench, it is hard to take this rhetorical line of questioning seriously.

Or to put it bluntly, why do the legal arguments matter when the real world goals and impacts are clear?

On April 24 2019 03:19 Danglars wrote:
I was just curious if there was legal reasoning to why the conservative justices were leaning towards the “wrong” decision. Law correctly interpreted is the function of judges. Changing the law because the outcomes are argued to be bad creates new statutes for judicial interpretation. Just because you don’t like the result of a Supreme Court case, doesn’t mean they did not respect the law as written. That’s why I asked for legal reasoning, instead of “damage caused” and “harm poor and minority communities” and “so fucking dumb” and “hurt red states” which are consequential arguments.

On April 24 2019 04:02 Simberto wrote:


Indeed. Conservatives have made it quite clear that the US supreme court is not actually a court, but basically a weirdly randomly delayed version of congress and the presidency.

I will believe that they make independent decisions if one of the republican judges ever actually ever follows the law or the constitution over their party line.

This could have been avoided if there were rules to make sure that there is bipartisan agreement over judges. But there is not, and thus there are republican judges and democrat judges, and whoever has more at the current time wins.

On April 24 2019 04:06 On_Slaught wrote:


The conservatives are arguing that a citizenship question will help with the enforceability of the Voting Rights Act. Also that historically it was asked until the 1950s and many countries ask the question in their census.

The liberals are arguing that the censuses own experts say this question will lead to depressed/inaccurate counts, thus making it at odds with the original purpose of the census. The result will disproportionally hurt minority communities' funding and representation in Congress.

The govt doesnt really deny that it will probably lead to less turnout, but that it is ok because 1. It helps them better enforce the VRA and 2. Making such a change is within the discretion of Commerce Secretary Ross.

Originalist like Thomas should hate an unnecessary census question which undermines a requirement laid out in the constitution, but that would require legal consistency which isnt conducive to getting the outcome you want personally. They are using the VRA to ironically justify a decision which they should be against.

On April 24 2019 04:08 Plansix wrote:

To be fair, the naked efforts to stack the court at all costs is a relatively recent turn of events. It was not present in the Bush administration. This new, naked effort to fill the courts with as many conservative justices as possible began once McConnell took a leadership position in the Senate. From blocking lower court justices to stealing the seat on the Supreme Court. It is his number one political goal at all costs, banking on the belief that the Democrats will never be as shameless as him.

On April 24 2019 04:18 On_Slaught wrote:


The silver lining is that maybe now Dems will take it as seriously as Republicans do. It is by far the biggest issue in 2020 imo. Nothing comes close, which is kinda sad when you think about it.