Posts Made By: Rod Kaufman

Originally Posted by James Brown

Not exactly.  My understanding is that Thomas disclosed what he had to.  Then the rules changed and now he has to disclose more.  Is that correct?   I have not seen any allegation that these billionaires have exerted any influence in any case before the Supreme Court.   

Jim,
Some of what you state is correct with regards to what Thomas had to disclose except he reportedly did not disclose all that of what he should have. Hence, he had to go back and amend disclosures filed years ago. Moreover, he should have known better given his years on the bench. 
Leonard Leo has directly shaped the conservative bloc in SCOTUS. His influence is undeniable. It may not be seen directly in a specific case before the court that he himself is advancing on his behalf but it is the overall structure of the conservative bloc that bears his ideology in the cases that are heard.
With regard to Thomas, and as I've noted in past threads, he's essentially a known quantity that we're seeing, a pattern of ultraconservative viewpoints being advanced by him, to the extent that he has been an outlier to the opinions and the decisions of the court. For example, "Clarence Thomas was the lone dissent in the Supreme Court's January order rejecting Trump's bid to withhold documents from the January 6 panel".  "In January, the Supreme Court rejected former President Donald Trump's bid to block the release of some presidential records to the House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riot."
"Only one of the nine justices dissented: Clarence Thomas."
"At the time, Thomas provided no explanation for why he would have approved Trump's request"
"But Thomas' objection came under scrutiny on Thursday after The Washington Post released a bombshell report that the justice's wife, Virginia "Ginni" Thomas, sent text messages to Mark Meadows, then-the White House chief of staff, urging him to try to overturn the 2020 presidential election results after Trump's loss to Joe Biden."
https://www.businessinsider.com/clarence-thomas-only-justice-dissent-in-trump-january-6-bid-2022-3
Additionally, "Trump lawyers saw Justice Thomas as ‘only chance’ to stop 2020 election certification"
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/11/02/trump-lawyers-saw-justice-thomas-as-only-chance-to-stop-2020-election-certification-00064592
Basically, as I've noted before, Thomas doesn't even have to show up to vote on a decision, it's already stamped on his forehead, or he can email, text or call it in or just use the same reply he issued from one of his previous "opinions" since they're all the same ultra-conservative outlier positions, no matter what...

Originally Posted by James Brown

It is not quite that cut and dry, unanimous decisions are not uncommon.  It is entirely true however if there is a conservative/liberal split then Thomas will be on the conservative side.   I am not sure if or why this bothers you.    RBG, Kagan and Sotomayor are always on the liberal side.   Yes, the Federalist society shaped the courts in the Trump years.   I am not sure if/why this bothers you.   Elections have consequences as Obama said, and everyone knew of Trump's Federalist Society shortlist before the election.


p.s. I amended my reply above while you were posting this.  Sorry for the delay.   I think the free vacations, jet travel and so on make Thomas look bad.  But without more, I can't say it is unethical.   I have friends too.   Thomas just happens to have extremely wealthy, like minded and generous friends.   It looks bad, but is there any influence peddling?   Like you mention, Thomas appears to be more or less impervious to influence because his core judicial philosophy is well know and pretty much unshakeable.

"I think the free vacations, jet travel and so on make Thomas look bad.  But without more, I can't say it is unethical.  I have friends too.  Thomas just happens to have extremely wealthy, like minded and generous friends.  It looks bad,..."
I think you're forgetting Thomas's self-made video in which he states he prefers RVing in Walmart parking lots instead of going to beaches, mountain resorts, etc. Basically all of the kinds of places he failed to disclose Harlan Crow provided to him...

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

"I think the free vacations, jet travel and so on make Thomas look bad.  But without more, I can't say it is unethical.  I have friends too.  Thomas just happens to have extremely wealthy, like minded and generous friends.  It looks bad,..."
I think you're forgetting Thomas's self-made video in which he states he prefers RVing in Walmart parking lots instead of going to beaches, mountain resorts, etc. Basically all of the kinds of places he failed to disclose Harlan Crow provided to him...

I was remiss in adding that only Clarence Thomas has advocated bringing cases to him so they can be heard except when it pertains to his situation:
"He then expressly named the cases that guaranteed the rights to contraception, same-sex relations, and marriage equality — Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), Lawrence v. Texas (2003), and Obergefell v. Hodges (2015), respectively — as being appropriate for the court to “reconsider” given they relied on similar reasoning."
“We have a duty to ‘correct the error’ established in those precedents,” Thomas wrote.
"(Observers noted that Thomas, a Black man who is married to a white woman, did not say the court should reconsider Loving v. Virginia, the 1967 case that also relied on the 14th Amendment to guarantee interracial marriage rights.)"
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/davidmack/supreme-court-abortion-same-sex-marriage-contraception
and:
" Justice Clarence Thomas invites new legal challenges to contraception and same-sex marriage rights"
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/06/24/roe-wade-clarence-thomas-contraception-same-sex-marriage/
WTF?! What kind of a judge advocates for cases to be brought before him when it's obvious he's already made up his mind before hearing them?

Originally Posted by James Brown

Not WTF at all.  Judges with a conservative judicial philosophy have thought that cases decided under the "right to privacy" found in the "penumbra" of the bill of rights were decided wrong.   They have thought this way for 30-40 years.   The right to privacy cases include Griswold, Roe, and the follow up cases to Roe.

Loving and Obergefell were decided under the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment and are on much stronger ground (in my opinion), as I myself argued here almost twenty years ago!   

Both doctrines arise out of the 14th Amendment, but the "Right to Privacy" cases and the "Equal Protection" cases are not the same.   That said, the conservatives who objected to Obergefell had strong state's rights arguments which I understand, but in the Equal Protection cases, I strongly disagree with.   

No doubt Thomas would overturn Obergefell and Loving if he got the chance.   His opinion would be that the states should have the authority to decide who gets to marry in that state.   He is a conservative purist.   No doubt all 50 states would then (or already have) passed statutes authorizing interracial marriage.   No harm done, Thomas would say that is as it should be.   If gay marriage is overturned it will be a lot like Roe.   Most states will legalize gay marriage, or they already have.  Those that don't will drag the R brand even lower than it already is, if that is possible.

I would be surprised if a majority voted to overturn Loving or Obergefell, the reasoning behind these cases is much stronger than the reasoning behind Roe.   I've been surprised before though...

Jim

The difference here is that Thomas is advocating that these cases should be brought before him so they can be heard and decided by him. It's not simply a case of a conservative opinion being espoused by a sitting jurist; it's a case of judicial activism to the extreme. It's this same kind of extremism that we all now have to contend with, and judges in lower courts in particular, with Thomas' inane decision that today's gun laws have to match historical equivalents, as if there are any, in 1791. So, in the latter example, if we didn't have particular restrictions or gun controls in 1791, then how can we have them today? Did they have the same kind of firearms and proliferation of firearms back then that we do now,ie ghost guns? I don't mean to go off on a tangent with this but this is another example of an extremist outlier position that shackles our judicial system.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/11/federal-judge-clarence-thomas-gun-rights-originalism.html

"A well-known conservative legal activist who has helped shape the modern Supreme Court arranged for the wife of Justice Clarence Thomas to receive tens of thousands of dollars for consulting work, according to a report Thursday in The Washington Post."
"Leonard Leo, the former longtime vice president of the Federalist Society who helped President Donald Trump’s administration vet nominees for the high court, instructed GOP pollster Kellyanne Conway to bill a nonprofit called the Judicial Education Project and to pay Virginia "Ginni" Thomas $25,0000, the Post reported. Leo made the request in 2012."
"No mention of Ginni, of course," the Post quoted Leo instructing Conway."
"The Post reported that Conway's firm, the Polling Company, paid Ginni Thomas's firm $80,000 between June 2011 and June 2012 and expected to pay $20,000 more before the end of 2012."
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/05/04/clarence-thomas-leonard-leo-ginni-thomas/70186040007/

Originally Posted by Greg Shaffer

LOL....He delivered more of his campaign promises in his term than any president I can recall....sounds like BS to me lol

Really? Here's the Trump meter scorecard:
https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/trumpometer/?ruling=true

"A man who stormed the Capitol and attacked police with pepper spray and a chair during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection was sentenced to more than 14 years in prison on Friday, the longest sentence yet."
"U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta sentenced Peter Schwartz, who is from Kentucky, to 14 years and two months in prison followed by three years of supervised release on Friday. The sentence surpasses the previous record — 10 years — that retired New York Police Department officer Thomas Webster received in September."
“There remain many grifters out there who remain free to continue propagating the ‘great lie’ that Trump won the election, Donald Trump being among the most prominent,” his attorneys said."
“You are not a political prisoner,” Mehta said. “You’re not somebody who is standing up against injustice or fighting against an autocratic regime.”
https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/3991238-jan-6-rioter-receives-longest-sentence-yet-for-using-pepper-spray-chair-to-attack-police/

“If you believe in his policies, what he’s advertising as his policies, he’s the last person who could actually execute them and achieve them,” Barr said of Trump at an event in Cleveland. “He does not have the discipline.”
“It is a horror show when he’s left to his own devices,” Barr said. “And so, you may want his policies, but Trump will not deliver Trump policies.”
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/3990804-barr-trump-will-deliver-chaos-and-horror-show/
That's for all you cons that say you don't like Trump but you like his policies...

GEORGIA's GOP, taking a cue from FLORIDA's Ron DeSantos, has passed and Kemp has now signed a bill to remove democratically elected DAs and prosecutors they don't happen to like. Obviously, with Fulton county DA Fani Willis investigating Trump for election fraud along with the fake electors scheme, the GOP is circling the wagons and pulling out the stops to get Willis first on bogus claims before she can bring charges:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/05/politics/georgia-elections-oversight-commission-kemp-willis/index.html

Our resident dick doesn't have any evidence of what Comer is alleging any more than he does which is to say he has nothing. Just like Jim Jordan's so-called whistleblowers,  none of 'em stood up to scrutiny. Joe Biden is clean and the lunatics on the right have been trying to pin this crap on him for years and have NOTHING to show for it except their desired fan time on Fox news...