Assault on the Judiciary

[mrnoodle]

i don't disagree that he's a touch slimy, but no more so than anyone else in congress.

what kind of disturbs me is taht the supposedly kind, caring liberals are the ones who say things like "<politician> should be forced to dig their own shallow grave in the desert". That's a kinda evil notion, isn't it? What if I said "I wish Hilary Clinton would get raped in an alley and her throat cut"?

I think libs hate more deeply than conservatives. odd, considering they accuse us of hate constantly.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by mrnoodle

--snip--I think libs hate more deeply than conservatives. odd, considering they accuse us of hate constantly.

I believe you're right. The current breed of conservative doesn't do "nuance". If you're not wavin the right color flag/motto/dittohead/goosestep, then you're "hated". With us or against us. 'member that winner?

Think about this administration's famous consistency, the ability to stay on topic, to toe the party line. The world I live in isn't so binary. It's more gray in the middle, the wide middle. There are easily recognized extremes at each end, but I see time and time again a tendency to oversimplification and that leads to stereotyping, prejudice and shallowness. Match the situation to a label, if there isn't one handy that fits, then it must be the enemy. Lazy thinking.

I'm a liberal. I do hate *some* things the conservatives talk about, hate deeply. In contrast, I see the "red team" as shallow, with the "hate" you describe spread "thinly" to follow your illustration. But spread w-i-d-e-l-y. Yeah, shallow.

[melidasaur]

I think that if we got rid of the two party system and all people who label themselves as conservative or liberal we would live in a great place. Really - if those of us who don't give a damn ran the world...

[Troubleshooter]

Originally Posted by melidasaur

I think that if we got rid of the two party system and all people who label themselves as conservative or liberal we would live in a great place. Really - if those of us who don't give a damn ran the world...

You should check out some of the Federalist Papers. Some of them were quite adamantly against the party system because they were afraid it would turn out the way it has.

[melidasaur]

Originally Posted by Troubleshooter

You should check out some of the Federalist Papers. Some of them were quite adamantly against the party system because they were afraid it would turn out the way it has.

I have read some of them... I just can't remember which ones. And you're quite right - many of the founding fathers are tossing in their graves.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by mrnoodle

I think libs hate more deeply than conservatives. odd, considering they accuse us of hate constantly.

You should check the Humor thread, and count the number of conservative jokes that involve death or torture of liberals, and compare it to the opposite. And you wouldn't have to search very long for someone who wished rape and murder on Hillary Clinton, though it would be even faster to find someone accusing Bill Clinton of rape and murder.
</politician>

[wolf]

Originally Posted by mrnoodle

What if I said "I wish Hilary Clinton would get raped in an alley and her throat cut"?

Well, if she weren't so hot on banning guns, that wouldn't be an issue.

A favorite quote: GUN CONTROL: The notion that a woman found dead in an alley, raped and strangled with her own pantyhose, is morally superior to the a woman in the same alley, explaining to a police officer how her attacker died of fatal bullet wounds.

[Beestie]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

You should check the Humor thread, and count the number of conservative jokes that involve [the] death ... of liberals [and] compare it to the opposite.

Comparison Exhibit number One.

[jaguar]

Well I don't consider myself a liberal, certainly not in the US sense. It's not so much hatred, it's not something I can be bothered getting worked up about, after all it doesn't really affect me. It's simply that on the balance he seems distinctly a net loss to humanity in general. Just one of those people, like Karl Rove or Mark Textor who the world would be a better place without.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by lookout123

ok, TS - you work on the nuclear solution and Els and I will start looking for suitable replacements for the asshat brigade.

We don't need replacements. Democracy got us into this problem it won't get us out. We really need a movement of inaction, getting folks to ignore these pocket tyrants and their dictates.

I find it amusing that the party of FDR would be concerned about an assault on the judiciary. Both of these evil parties are more than willing to abuse the system to please their masters or herd their sheep.

[richlevy]

Ecuador President Dissolves Supreme Court
QUITO, Ecuador - President Lucio Gutierrez declared a state of emergency in the capital city of this Andean nation and dissolved the Supreme Court, saying the unpopular judges were the cause of three days of pot-banging street protests in Quito.

***snip***

Speaking in a televised address to the nation Friday night with his military high command standing behind him, Gutierrez said he was using the powers granted him by the constitution to dismiss the justices. In explaining their dismissal, he said opposition to their appointments was causing the protests.

"The measure ... was taken because Congress until now has not resolved the matter of the current Supreme Court, which is generating national commotion," he said.

***snip***

Street protests began Wednesday in response to an impromptu suggestion of a local radio station that residents of Quito form a nocturnal pot-banging caravan. They increased in numbers until at least 10,000 people — banging pots and sticks and shouting "Get out, Lucio!" — were marching in the streets as Gutierrez made his announcement Friday.

The court crisis was set in motion in November when the former justices sided with opposition politicians in a failed effort to impeach Gutierrez on corruption charges. Gutierrez then assembled a bloc of 52 lawmakers in the 100-seat unicameral congress, which voted in December to remove the judges. Legal experts said the vote ran contrary to Ecuador's constitution.

So a couple of thousand people banging pots in the streets is enough justification to dissolve the Supreme Court with a simple majority vote of Congress. Add to this that the protestors were shouting to remove the President, not the court.

This sounds like Tom Delay's wet dream. I can almost see the GOP e-mails going out.

Clinton might have liked this strategy during his impeachment, except that professionally, he had more ethics than our current crop.

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by Beestie

Comparison Exhibit number One.

For the T-Shirt they should add "P.S. I'd settle for a persistive vegetative state."

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by Troubleshooter

You could probably add John Bolton to the list. He's pretty damn scary. Check him out in his own inimimimimitable fashion here.

Looks like the Democrats won a victory today on that front. After what was reportedly an extremely heated debate, Voynovich (R-Ohio) crossed party lines and caused a 3 week delay on the nomination. In that time, evidence is supposed to be released relating to Bolton using the NSA to spy on colleagues, which will probably figure heavily in the vote when it comes up.

Or at least it will make the Republicans look even worse when they vote party line - except perhaps for Voynovich.

[vsp]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

Looks like the Democrats won a victory today on that front. After what was reportedly an extremely heated debate, Voynovich (R-Ohio) crossed party lines and caused a 3 week delay on the nomination. In that time, evidence is supposed to be released relating to Bolton using the NSA to spy on colleagues, which will probably figure heavily in the vote when it comes up.

This was a big enough deal that I was glued to C-SPAN's online feed to watch the hearing, especially after Frist pulled a parliamentary maneuver to make sure that the hearing would go through yesterday. GREAT political theater.

The Dems were hoping that either Hagel or Chafee would turn, and neither seemed primed to do so; when Hagel said "I'm not saying that I'd vote for him on the floor, but I _will_ vote for him today to get out of Committee," it seemed all but over. Then Voinovich popped up and said "Well, _I'll_ be voting with the Democrats" and you could almost see Lugar AND the Dems do a spit-take simultaneously. Lugar's "Ha, ha, I have the ten votes I need so STFU" grin vanished abruptly, while Biden and Kerry and Boxer had this "Did he just say what I THOUGHT he said?" expression.

Chafee's "Um... um... me too, sort of, though I don't want to say it" afterwards was anticlimactic.

[Happy Monkey]

And then that slick-looking guy from Virginia had no idea what would happen if there was a 9-9 tie, which led to Lugar giving 3 options, and Biden saying that actually none of those three options were correct.

I think the Virginia guy was legitimately ignorant, but Lugar was trying to pull something. At least, I'd hope that the committee chairman would know the rules.