Jonathan Freedland suggests that the Presidential election represents a conflict between faith and reason. While Freedland may overstate that conflict, even in his expression of grave concern he may well be understating the effect of a second Bush term on the United States.
More of a "what I've been reading lately" than a response.... But there is an interesting take on stare decisis and the Supreme Court in the Times. The author suggests that the Court has been nominally adhering to precedent while ignoring the underlying legal principles. This may be something of a "compromise", whereby the traditionalists on the Court at least nominally preserve a precedent while those inclined toward the Scalia/Thomas position on precedent (which boils down to, "If it's a bad decision, why not reverse it even the next day?").
ReplyDeleteBush's theocratic allies like the Scalia/Thomas philosophy, because of their "take no prisoners" attitude toward the precedents they would like to overturn, even if Thomas and Scalia might disagree with them on specific issues. Add three new Justices with a similar philosophy, but also from a right-wing fundamentalist background, and those horrible "liberal" precedents will fall like cordwood.
Meanwhile, Glenn Reynolds has a piece in the Guardian telling us that we should expect a Kerry presidency to be a lot like GW's. And to think I have historically found his "reasoning" to be unpersuasive.... [insert smiley here for the sarcasm-impaired]