Let's call for impeachment of three of the Supreme Court justices

[Hawkeye-X]

Supreme Court Justices have been ignoring the mandates of both the Due Process Clause and the Federal Disqualification Statute, repeatedly refusing to recuse themselves in cases in which their impartiality might reasonably be questioned. Further, in response to widespread criticism of these recusal failures,

Thomas - Wife is a teabagger who just founded a party. Direct violation of the impartiality clause.
Roberts - Dared to criticize the President of the United States in public. Complained about justices' pay. (Here's a hint Roberts, resign and go to Kissinger law firm. Three million dollars if you make partner)
Scalia - Just because he's an asshole and forces religion on us (He's Opus Dei - one of the most dangerous sects of Catholicism)

I'd throw in Alito, but I can't read him.

Hawkeye-X

[TheWraith]

1. I would hesitate to call for Roberts' ouster on those particular grounds.

As much as he's a waste of oxygen, I don't think it's inappropriate for the SCOTUS to criticize the POTUS, or vice versa.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

9. He was far from the first to raise that issue.

[Initech]

2. Definitely get the deciding vote in Bush V. Gore (Scalia) out now!

[anigbrowl]

20. There is no such thing as the 'deciding vote'

5 justices voted in favor of Bush. The order in which they did so, or who wrote the majority opinion, is irrelevant.

[anigbrowl]

3. Um, Thomas and his wife are not the same person

You are not legally bound to folow teh same rules as your spouse; legally speaking, to restrict her political activity because of who her husband is would be a violation of her civil rights. This would be just as true if she or the spouse of another justice were supporting a progressive cause and the freepers were demanding she be prevented from doing so.

There is no basis for impeaching Thomas just because his wife chooses to be politically active. To do so would be very obviously unconstitutional.

[The Northerner]

4. +1

[paulsby]

5. one of the other justice's wife was in the admin of the ACLU

to reinforce your point

[Thothmes]

7. Wasnt one of the Justices an ACLU lawyer?

[ProgressiveProfessor]

10. Ginsburg was at the ACLU for quite some time

http://www.aclu.org/womens-rights/tribute-legacy-ruth-bader-ginsburg-and-wrp-staffqquite

[paulsby]

11. yes

ginsberg.

but also one of the sitting judges' wives was in a ACLU position also.

either way, thomas or the other justice (i can't recall offhand but easy enough to look up if necessary) is not responsible for their wives' political leanings

[Hansel]

8. Money from corporations is being funneled into his wife's treasury.

If any of that money makes it into their personal bank accounts, then there would be cause.

He ruled on corporations being able to funneled as much money as they want into political campaigns and causes and she is directly benefiting from it. There is a case to be made that he should have recused himself from the decision.

[rve300]

17. You figured it out...

The two of them set in motion a 40 year plan to skim off the top of a political organization. Waiting for the right time to spring into action in such a public way that anyone with newspaper subscription could connect the dots. I am sure in his almost 2 decade SCOTUS career now he has never had the opportunity to give the wife a heads up on a decision that could be of financial benefit.

Don't you think that if he was going to do something like this, he would do it thru a 3rd party that has a little less public connection with him?

[anigbrowl]

18. That's a bridge we'll cross when we come to it

You're saying that Thomas should have recused himself from the campaign finance ruling, even though his wife was not (AFAIK) actively involved with any political organization at the time. Since all but one member of the supreme Court are married, by this logic they should all have recused themselves, except for Sonia Sotomayor, based on the possibility that their spouses might become politically active in the future.

You're basically saying that being married to a judge should limit your civil rights. Perhaps so, but that's not how our laws stand at present.

[Thothmes]

12. For some on the forum, the fact that an action is unconstitutional

has little to do with their desire for political retribution.

[Unvanguard]

15. When Stevens resigns, the Court will be split 5-4 between Republican and Democratic appointees.

Not coincidentally, the partisan split will exactly mirror the ideological split.

When that's the political reality of the Court--and when that fact makes the crucial difference in decision after decision, including legal monstrosities like Bush v. Gore--the usual arguments about protecting judicial independence and the rule of law start to mean a whole lot less to me, and I'm not sure why they shouldn't.

[RandomThoughts]

6. A room has 1000 people in it.

Most just going about their daily lives,

But a few people are going around tieing peoples shoelaces together, pickpocketing and taking the silverware, and trying to make rules that help them only. (And the few doing wrong are not one sector or one class they are spread out by a similar ideology. Not right or left, but control by a few through money in this case, but mostly Republican in my view)

They get caught.

They aren't going to admit it, or back down, they are outnumber, and have been doing wrong. And once they are caught, they have to do so much to try and keep their way, that they can't hide it. So they unashamedly start trying to tie up and enslave the people as quick as they can before the people react.

The logic is to create a totalitarian ruling system, in this case money. For a long time things are done in secret, but at some point people figure it out, that is when the totalitarian system goes full to the wall. That is why there is so much conflict in government between sides right now, this is the tipping point, one way or the other.

They are trying to get a control that allows them to do whatever they want in the open, since the hidden stuff is being exposed, that is the only move they got, try to make it happen in broad daylight, and count on people doing nothing.

The other option is a more fair state, but that goes against their ideology of power and control.

The mind set is if they can openly get away with what people think is wrong, then they have complete power, however the truth is it is really a spiral, where they are doing the same things they wanted to do before, just more extreme because they are losing methods. Their only option is moving to full control. And the more they act that way, the more they lose, so the more they have to act that way. Soon they will start losing local justice officials that have had a tendency to like authority also, just like they lost other agencies they have counted on in the past, because most people believe in justice, and most people are more good then bad.

Once the spiral begins it is only a matter of when it turns, the longer to turn, the more damage done, but to some extent the turn rate is based on actions in the spiral, so it is almost a symbiotic relationship between the self destruct of corruption that gives motivation to correction.

But the power grab never works because they think people are like them, and will agree to anything if being paid enough versus doing what they think is right. That is why they push for mercenaries, it is service to money not an ideal. And why they privatise prisons and anything else, since they need obedience to money to make money the controlling part of society.

Its a cascade downward spiral, the hard part is moving back the other direction without implosion, which requires making sure people learn whats going on, and decide to do whats right. to save the system the bad parts have to be allowed to show their motives, and lose their false base of the people they have deceived, to give the strength to the course correction.


That's why the Texas book thing is happening, they are already caught and are trying to complete control before they get stopped by society's views. It is also why the stall in government is happening, and why the ruling on the use of money to buy elections happened.

[Unvanguard]

13. Unfortunately, there aren't really any sound grounds for impeaching any of them

but right now I'm not sure I can honestly say that I care.

[midnight]

14. K& R to hear some thoughts on this.....

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

22. It would fail and cost us the House and seats in the Senate.

[harkadog]

16. If you toss Thomas because of his wife

You would have to toss Ginsburg because of her husband. He was one of the premier tax attorneys in the U.S. (His greatest feat was saving Perot $1 billion in income taxes when he sold EDS in 1996). Because of his associations her vote on any corporation case would have to be considered a conflict of interest. I don't believe however wives and husbands are responsible for each others activities.

[Motown_Johnny]

19. You can replace Thomas with a sign saying "What He Said" and an arrow pointing to Scalia

It would save money

[Unvanguard]

21. No, Thomas is even more extreme.

E.g., he would have overruled the disclosure regulations upheld in Citizens United, and unlike Scalia, he has no respect whatsoever for precedents he disagrees with.