Blaaaaarrrghhhhhhh

The last days of a Supreme Court term rarely show off the Justices to great advantage. Like other mortals, they have put off doing their hardest work, so only the most controversial cases remain. They are tired. They are frustrated. By a vote of 6-3, they need haircuts. (Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Elena Kagan appear recently barbered; Stephen Breyer is bald.) But none of the usual end-of-year excuses explain the behavior in court yesterday of Antonin Scalia.

-Jeffrey Toobin, continuing in his quest to convince me to burn the Supreme Court to the ground.  I haven't finished an article of his in a while because I tend to drop the magazine at the two-thirds mark, my hands quaking with warm, slippery rage.

The Supreme Court hears what, twenty cases a year?  It is THE EASIEST JOB ON EARTH.  Yeah, you have to be really smart.  I think the selection committee checks to see if you went to your high school prom, and if you were able to find a date, 'yer out (John Roberts excepted: you just know that guy was student body president).  But mostly, you sit around, you ask some snotty questions (or not, Clarence Thomas), you deny sexually harrassing your staff (Clarence Thomas), you vote, and you have your overqualified clerks write an opinion.  Oh my Goooooooooooood they must be soooooooooooo tiiiiiiiiiiiiired.

I used to admire the Supreme Court, but I'm pretty sure they haven't done anything good for the country since 1973.  Now it seems like a playground for Thomas and Scalia to apply theoretical principles from the Constitution to a country that needs much more.  Kennedy's the yard monitor who says yes or no.

Also disheartening is that justices have life terms, and my sneaking suspicion that John Roberts is going to live forever.

John G. Roberts

I got so angry reading The Nine, a very well-researched book that (I think) unintentionally took all my faith from the judicial system.  I had to skim the whole Bush v. Gore section (NINE PEOPLE SHOULD NOT GET TO PICK THE PRESIDENT), and was particularly incensed that Sandra Day O'Connor was so thrilled about John Roberts.  First female justice my ass.

UGH.  This is supposed to be a happy day.  I am happy.  Obama will probably not spit at John Roberts  as Mr. Partisan Conservative Who Will Live Forever swears him in.  Maybe a little "unintentional" spraying as he repeats the oath?  Probably.  I can live with that.

It's happening!  It's happening so soon!  My bitterness will evaporate with Obama's soothing dulcet tones.  I promise.  I can hardly wait.

Al Gore is walking in now.  This must be so hard for him, but he looks happy.  If Al can be happy, I can be happy.  Yes.  Good.

Soapbox Time

I know you guys don't like it when I get on the soapbox, but this whole Supreme-Court-abortion thing is just really baking my noodle.

Apparently, the Supreme Court acknowledged the argument that abortion, as a rule, is not in the best interest of the woman; that women are often misled or ill-informed about its risks to their own physical or emotional health; and that the interests of the pregnant woman and the fetus are, in fact, the same.

In other words, that women are mentally defective children who need John Roberts et al to make decisions for them, as we're all pregnancy-brained into wanting to decide for ourselves when to have kids.

Says Justice Kennedy: "It seems unexceptionable to conclude some women come to regret their choice to abort the infant life they once created and sustained." Ok, it isn't an infant when it's a clump of cells. You know what? Sometimes I regret eating a funky piece of sushi when I knew it didn't smell right. Sometimes I regret buying pants that are too small. I often regret drinking Diet Coke before bed, and the fact that I'm working on Memorial Day, but I don't see Justice Kennedy authorizing jurisdiction that gives me a freaking day off. JK! Shut up! But let's have doctors guilt their patients before they decide not to be pregnant anymore anyway, so they feel even worse! Hoopla! Because pregnancy is RISK FREE!!!!

I feel like a sophomore in Tom Ferraro's office, with him telling me I'm too blonde to take his seminar, even though I've read half the syllabus.

Anyway, the American Psychiatric Association doesn't recognize this "abortion trauma syndrome" BS. Thanks, doctors.

Check It Out!

The NY Times has gotten over its potty-training thing and moved on: today's paper had a couple of interesting articles about abortion and OTC contraception. For instance, the congressional General Accounting Office found today that the FDA didn't follow its usual protocol when it decided to reject Plan B, which its own nonprescription drug department considered safe.

My congressman has called it a "subversion" of science. Yay Congressman!

Oh, except that talking doesn't change anything.

In the same edition, some drudged up documents that freakin' Samuel A. Alito wrote in 1985 saying that the Constitution does not protect abortion and how he is a committed conservative, deeply influenced by... wait for it...

Barry Goldwater.

Alito once voted in a case to force a woman to notify her husband before having an abortion. Should she get his permission before an appendectomy, too? Or if she has to pee?

Also, Jump, Little Children is breaking up, my cat has worms, and my friends are pissing me off. I am cranky.

BALLS.

Scalito

Introducing Samuel A. Alito, Jr., nicknamed "Scalito" for his ideological similarities to Scalia. I don't know by whom. His fraternity buddies?

Ew.

At least no boogying babies this time.



Kind of boring without them, actually.

But still... Republicans. Ew.

Judge John G. Roberts

I mean, I knew the White House would nominate a young 'un, but this is taking it a little far. What, he'll just throw on last Halloween's Harry Potter robe and start talking torts?



Oh wait, zoom out--Judge John is on the left. I was confused.



He still looks pretty young--no gray hair, even. Maybe he uses Just For Men. His Fembot there could do a better job controlling the kid, no? Oh wait, that's his wife. I take back the Harry Potter comment--they look too Christian for that. I should stop now. Haven't had my morning Doubleshot. I strongly dislike the Republican party.

I Side With Scalia, Rehnquist, and Thomas: WTF

Justices, 5-4, Back Seizure of Property for Development
"A divided Supreme Court ruled Thursday that local governments may seize people's homes and businesses against their will for private development in a decision anxiously awaited in communities where economic growth often is at war with individual property rights."

Perhaps the Brits had it right at Yorktown, playing the ditty "The World Turned Upside Down" while General Cornwallis handed his pride, nuts, and cocktail party desirability over to Washington and called it a war. I wonder how it played out. Did George look bemusedly at Charles Earl, while Charles Earl stared back, resignedly osmosing the irony of the moment? Did they know that rip-offs of this ironic gravitas would play out endlessly on movie and television screens in the centuries to come? Since this was the eighteenth century, probably not, but I bet neither would've appreciated The Patriot. Though they might've liked how everyone had all their teeth.

"Georgie," Charles Earl might have said. "Well fought. Despite your flagrant abuse of every convention of war, I admire how you stuck with it, even when morale was low. I predict that the US's future illustrious leaders will follow that same idea when attacking random nations for poorly conceived reasons, and the world will blossom for it."

And General George might have smiled politely, because, after all, the guy had lost his army, tea supply, and thirteen original colonies, and thought "This dipshit has no idea what he's talking about." And then he signed the treaty negotiations, tipped his tri-pointed hat, and went home to Mount Vernon, only to find that it had been razed to make way for a shopping mall.

Actually, a shopping mall parking lot. Because apparently, that's the kind of right he'd been fighting for.