If the U.S. accuses China of forced assimilation of the Uyghur people, they can say “you did it too,” and they’d be right. Early 20th century attempts to force Native Americans to become “white” are a dark chapter in American history. “Assimilation” was a di[...]
Posts Tagged ‘Supreme Court’
October 23rd, 2022 - 7:09 pm § in Law and Courts, Racism
Why a genuinely “originalist” Supreme Court would uphold affirmative action
The Supreme Court’s conservatives claim to be “originalists,” a doctrine which holds that the Constitution means what its authors intended. This term, the court will revisit affirmative action, and lawyers opposed to the practice will argue the 14th Amendment requires college admis[...]
October 10th, 2022 - 10:20 am § in Law and Courts
Pig pen fight
I’ll bet you want to spend your Monday reading about the “dormant Commerce Clause.” Your wish is my command. Let’s start with history. Before the Constitution, “economic Balkanization … plagued relations among the Colonies and later among the States under the Arti[...]
The Supreme Court goes on trial
The Supreme Court’s new term begins tomorrow. And with recent polls showing three-fourths of Americans distrusting the court (see, e.g., story here), it’s the court itself that’s on trial this term. Several things contributed to the Supreme Court’s nosedive, most of them the [...]
Who is Ginni Thomas fooling?
Virginia “Ginni” Thomas is the wife of Clarence Thomas, a rightwing Supreme Court justice, and a lawyer herself (see her bio here). She’s also a rightwing political activist and election denier. She was more than a cheerleader for Trump’s efforts to overthrow the 2020 electio[...]
September 26th, 2022 - 6:06 pm § in Democrats, Donald Trump, Hypocrisy, Law and Courts, Politics, Republicans
Why Sinema is wrong about the filibuster
Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) thinks “the Senate should reinstate the 60-vote threshold for all judicial and executive branch nominees,” The Hill reported (here) on Monday, September 26, 2022. She made that remark during a Q&A following a speech at the University of Louisville’s M[...]
Crime blotter: I don’t care what his excuse is
Isabella Thallas (photo, left) didn’t see her 22nd birthday, because Michael Close (photo, below right), 38, killed her over dog poop. Thallas and her boyfriend, Darian Simon, were walking a dog on June 10, 2020, outside Close’s apartment building in Denver. They stopped and encouraged t[...]
September 21st, 2022 - 11:08 pm § in Donald Trump, Law and Courts
Will Trump’s Supreme Court judges turn on him?
Trump got what he wanted from an inexperienced federal judge he appointed shortly before leaving office, but her rulings were riddled with favoritism and legal errors, and an 11th Circuit panel (2 Trump judges, 1 Obama judge) struck most of them down (see story here; read their order here). He coul[...]
Why discriminating against gays isn’t a religious right
Private colleges are in the limelight this week in the religious right’s war against gays. Earlier this week, the Seattle Times reported that Seattle Pacific University, a private Methodist-affiliated college, is suffering enrollment declines and shedding faculty and students because of its po[...]