Archive for September, 2005

To be a government of laws, not men

Thursday, September 15th, 2005

One of the most frustrating things in watching those excuses for elected officials grill Roberts (when they’re not burning up their time making incoherent speeches instead of asking questions) is the frightening number of times they want to pressure Roberts into saying that he’ll make decisions that lead to “correct” results instead making correct decisions.

It’s the job of a judge to follow the law as she is writ, even if that leads to results that everyone, even the judge, thinks are unfortunate at the time. To do otherwise is to render the law irrelevant. What’s the point of a constitution or statute books if judges are to ignore them whenever the judge things ignoring them leads to a “better” result?

Great summary of Day 2 of the hearings

Thursday, September 15th, 2005

From a comment over at Althouse’s blog. Snarky, but oh, so true. And these hearings are prima facie evidence for repealing the 17th Amendment.

Specter: Do you agree, as I do, that you will refuse to say anything meaningful about Roe V. Wade?

Roberts: I would just like to say, stare decisis, precedents, stare decisis and precendents, precendents and stare decisis, and in closing, Casey.

Leahy: Is the president EVIL or just evil? And why you hate sick children?

Roberts: Could you at least pretend to have paid attention to what I wrote? And just so we’re clear, every time I say “with all due respect…” what I really mean is “Could you be any more of a d*ckhead?”

Hatch: I’ve been in Congress a very long time and I know stuff.

Roberts: I believe judges should be thoughtful and pay attention to all issues under review.

Kennedy: We all know you hate black people so get it over with and say somethng insulting.

Roberts: Reagan was right, you were wrong, the Supreme Court agreed with us, get over it.

Grassley: I like flowers. Do you like flowers? I think flowers are pretty.

Roberts: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to bring the issue of precedents to the table. Also, sometimes the court has to decide hard cases and they should do so in a thoughtful manner. cough Precedents cough

Biden: I would like to use my time to read these overly clever questions my staff wrote for me: baseball, baseball, baseball, Ginsburg, Ginsburg, Ginsburg….and now my Sam Kinison impression, SAY IT SAY IT AH AH AH AHHHHH!!!!!!!

Roberts: Once again, the Supreme Court concluded that it was a correct reading of the law, so talk to the hand, analogy boy.

Speed Kills…

Sunday, September 11th, 2005

We generally get around 48mpg with the Prius on the highway, usually going 70+ mph. Today I happened to have the opportunity to make a 214 mile round trip. Went from A to B at 65mph and B to A at 55mph (A and B are at about the same altitude). Got 54mpg from A to B and 61mpg from B to A.

Blame the poor or blame the system?

Saturday, September 10th, 2005

Jane Galt has a good post up here on the interplay between choices individuals make and the forces that act on them re: being in poverty.

It sounds oh so Glenn-y, but Read The Whole Thing(tm).

Alpha

Tuesday, September 6th, 2005

Initial post.