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Saturday, February 13, 2016

REQUIESCAT IN PACE, SUPREME COURT JUSTICE ANTON SCALIA


It is quite concerning who will be nominated next, so pray for a good nomination or an openness to conversion for the next one and pray for our country.

Pray for the souls of all the faithful departed in particular Justice Scalia. Pray for his priest-son who I presume will celebrate his Requiem, Fr. Paul Scalia. I suspect too it will be a traditional Requiem and more than likely in the Extraordinary Form, but if not, an Ordinary Form Requiem with the proper chanted propers. Time will tell.

26 comments:

gob said...

No matter who President Obama nominates, the "conservative Christian, right wing Republican, straight, white, American, male" congress will not confirm him or her...because they won't agree to ANYTHING that our President wants to do.

Gene said...

Gob, you are absolutely correct. Obama will appoint a political hack who will parrot leftist ideology. I pray that Congress will block any effort he makes.

Anonymous said...

Scalia, the "originalist," would be appalled if Republicans follow through with their threatened obstructionism.

May the senior associate Justice rest in peace.

Anonymous said...

Obama will appoint a Leftist, non-white, LIBERAL judge there is no doubt about that, as Trump said last night Obama must be stopped from doing this or the country as we know it is finished. As for Scalia's Mass I for one pray that it is in the EF form, his devotion to Holy Mother Church and the TLM was unsurpassed. Requiescat in pace!!!

Anonymous said...

Does it really matter? Scalia's court approved gay marriage, upheld Obamacare, Abortion is still legal. The war is over. We're just fighting for survival now.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous at 10:57 AM is correct on all points, the country is finished.

gob said...

Anon 10:45....neither you nor I knows what kind of person President Obama might appoint. BUT I know what kind you would appoint....a right-wing, white conservative.

You sound like a racist bigot. Are you one?

Anonymous 2 said...

Here is an interesting take on the Supreme Court (and nominations to the Court) by Larry Kramer, Professor of Law and former Dean at Stanford Law School:

http://www.ozy.com/pov/the-problem-with-the-courts/6035

His premise is that Supreme Court decisions are not determined by the law as such because if the law were clear the case would never have reached the Supreme Court in the first place (in this he is surely correct). And his basic focus is, give this premise, what kind of people should we want on the Court as final decision makers in controversial cases with lifetime appointments. His answer is the kind of people who used to be on the Supreme Court prior to the 1970s, those who brought experience of public life and politics, not ideology, to their decisions. Here are some extracts:

“If we are going to leave controversial and contested societal choices to an oligarchical council of nine, I at least want its members to have the kind of experience and wisdom needed to make the best possible decisions. There was a time when Supreme Court justices were drawn routinely from the ranks of our most accomplished public figures. Not every justice, of course. But we could count on the court being comprised of people who had been in the thick of our civic life, with personal responsibility for important governing decisions: former governors, senators, party leaders, cabinet officials, even a former president.

That’s a model of judging that could possibly work for the Supreme Court. Yes, those judges had been partisan while they were in politics, but they also gained experience about what governing entails — the kind of experience that encourages thoughtfulness and fosters wisdom. So when the Supreme Court faced those hard cases — the cases that make the court important, the ones that get there precisely because the law doesn’t offer a clear or easy answer — they could fall back on that experience. With politics behind them, thanks to a lifetime appointment to an independent court, they were free to decide thoughtfully by drawing on what they had seen and learned from being at the heart of things.

Unfortunately, as the Supreme Court has grown in importance (a process that began with the Warren Court and has been accelerating since) so, too, has the importance of each appointment — and with that, the controversy surrounding each nominee. We’ve reached a point where it has become impossible to nominate anyone who has actually accomplished anything significant or important in the public life of the nation. Instead we get legal technocrats, justices who may have been very competent — even great — lawyers, but who never held important positions in politics or government or public life. Which means they never had an opportunity to learn from the responsibility this entails. Since the early 1970s, we have, for no good reason, instead embraced the idea that being on the Supreme Court requires prior judicial experience. . . .

And it matters. Because when we get to those momentous cases, the cases where the law runs out, so too does the only expertise these justices possess. Without real guidance from the law — and lacking experience and understanding of the political world their decisions affect — today’s justices fall back on the only thing they have left to guide their decisions, which is ideology. Which, to my mind, makes it all the crazier to entrust them with the important decisions we do.”

What do you think?






Anonymous said...

Typical of Marxist-Leninist types such as gob, attack and call somebody else names because you cannot win argument!! I don't answer to you gob just keep drinking your Obama communist koolaide!!

TJM said...

God, ad hominem is a sign of low intelligence. Congrats!You are a winner

Scalia's Ghost said...

TJM has stated: "Kavanaugh, I see you are engaging in the libs favorite past-time: projection, accusing others of the very conduct you are a master at! You are the perfect disciple of the old Alinsky School. Thanks for the many, many laughs."

And: "gobby just confirmed he is a lib: judgemental, totalitarian, and a dim bulb"

Now, TJM asserts: "God (sic), ad hominem is a sign of low intelligence. Congrats!You are a winner"

TJM has surpassed gob (and others) and become, by his own calculus, the winner in the Ad Hominem = Low Intelligence sweepstakes!


Gene said...

Know the difference between the Klan and the Supreme Court? The Supreme Court wears black robes and scares the Hell out of white people.

Jusadbellum said...

what's with gob's obsession with racism and bigotry? The only political party that is officially racist is the Democratic party - in that it definitely looks first and foremost to a person's skin color rather than the content of their character.

And bigotry? Again, it's the Democratic party which pigeon holes people into voting blocks with the presumption that "all women" will vote for women. That "all blacks" will vote for a fellow black. That "all Hispanics" are necessarily pro-illegal immigrant. That all gays are necessarily pro-gay marriage. That all guns in the hands of authority are safe and that the criminally insane will stop at the gates of a Mall on account of a 'no gun zone' sign.

To be bigoted is to refuse to listen to a differing point of view. What other word would describe Politically Correct speech codes on campus than institutionalized bigotry?

The country is becoming polarized but it's not the vast right wing conspiracy that is doing the polarizing. We're not the socio-cultural aggressors. We're not the ones in bed with the Frankfurt school people or the Cloward-Piven people. We're not the ones egging on La Raza or the New Black Panthers or the NOI with their "Justice or else" slogan. We're not the ones running the major urban cities' police forces or public school systems that systematically lock minorities into intergenerational poverty and mal-education. We haven't been the ones promoting an Us vs. them vision of women vs. men or fomenting generational cultural cohorts whereby the youth speak a different language from their parents.

In short, we aren't the cause of the problems facing our society. We are reacting to socio-cultural aggression. We're the victims, not the unjust aggressors.

TJM said...

Scalia's Ghost (Obviously not since Scalia and I are soulmates)

The first statement is not ad hominem

I agree the second statement does border on ad hominem, but the gobster was just getting paid back in kind. All of his statements are ad hominem

Scalia's Ghost said...

TJM - Yeah, both statements are ad hominem attacks - "appealing to personal considerations (rather than to fact or reason)." Both are personal attacks - ad hominem / "to the man" - attacks.

And, yeah, by your own calculus you have moved to the front of the line in the Low Intelligence sweepstakes.

Anonymous said...

Jusadbellum well said mate, the Democrats are completely and utterly obsessed with race, ethnicity, sexual preference, male, female, black, white, hispanic, asian, that is the first thing they bring up in any discussion. Conservatives and Republicans don't care about any of that and Dr. King told us to get past all of that but the DEMOCRATS cannot.

Jusadbellum said...

Anonymous, whenever I have had the blessing to speak with avowed liberal progressives I always preface my remarks by first asking them if they agree that diversity is a good thing. All readily agree. Then I specify "viewpoint diversity is good too" - and again, all but the most cagey agree.

Then I give my opinion.

If they reject it out of hand I ask why my viewpoint is not tolerated since they've agreed to the ground rule that a liberal progressive must be 'for' diversity. I point out that toleration does not mean "total slavish agreement". It just means to accept the right of another to hold a different opinion with which we disagree.

Unfortunately many simply don't realize this. To "tolerate" their opinion means I must agree and vociferously applaud them as heroes, while they may be intolerant of my opinion, beliefs, and feelings all day long without a qualm to their conscience.

The thing is...they believe their own rhetoric about how tolerant and open minded liberal progressives are. They will straight facedly claim strategic relativism when in practice it is only tactical. Thus they may claim to be moral relativists - that there is and can be no 'objective' truth or objective morality for all people, valid for all time because "times change" or cultures are different .... but then in the next sentence they'll advance as 'good' some newly proposed sexual or political or economic theory that MUST be forced on others by law or gun point because it is intolerable to be patient. And of course this is accompanied by a cry to silence all who oppose them in the name of these brand new 'rights'.

But what is that if not dogmatic objective-truth, objective morality talk?

The funny thing is, I'd be happy to welcome them to the club and TOLERATE their crazy view points...so long as they pay me the favor of doing so unto me. If it's a two-way street then we're OK. But if they insist on being Nazis about it I can't help but be the 8th Air Force.

Anonymous said...

I find it strange that the Left always equates the Right as Nazi's when in fact it is the Left who are the Nazi's. The Nazi party was called the National Socialist Workers Party, the key word being "Socialist"" you see there is no difference between the Nazi's and the Communist-Socialist's both parties were mass murdering entities. The Left is in league with Islam as well and I don't say the words "RADICAL ISLAM" as the Dutch Politician Geert Wilders always tells us ISLAM IS ISLAM there is no difference ladies and gentleman they will kill Christians, Jews, Homosexuals, Hindus, Buddhists, atheists, feminists, and as they do every day fellow Muslims, George W. Bush came up with that stupid phrase "RELIGION OF PEACE" right after 911. No more Bush or Clinton's, enough is enough we are not fooled any longer and yes it will be Mr. Trump who will lead this country out of the abyss. Yes, he swears so what, do you for one minute think that Rubio, Cruz, Clinton, Sanders, have never uttered a swear word? Grow up people these are rough times calling for a tough and rough leader who does not mince words.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Anon 2 - A tangential response:

"Interviewer: In 1868, when the 39th Congress was debating and ultimately proposing the 14th Amendment, I don't think anybody would have thought that equal protection applied to sex discrimination, or certainly not to sexual orientation. So does that mean that we've gone off in error by applying the 14th Amendment to both?

Scalia: Yes, yes. Sorry, to tell you that. ... But, you know, if indeed the current society has come to different views, that's fine. You do not need the Constitution to reflect the wishes of the current society. Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex. The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't. Nobody ever thought that that's what it meant. Nobody ever voted for that. If the current society wants to outlaw discrimination by sex, hey we have things called legislatures, and they enact things called laws. You don't need a constitution to keep things up-to-date. All you need is a legislature and a ballot box. You don't like the death penalty anymore, that's fine. You want a right to abortion? There's nothing in the Constitution about that. But that doesn't mean you cannot prohibit it. Persuade your fellow citizens it's a good idea and pass a law. That's what democracy is all about. It's not about nine superannuated judges who have been there too long, imposing these demands on society."

The author who quoted this Q&A, does not favor Scalia's brand of "originalism."
He wrote: "The other major problem with Originalism is that it completely ignores the entire point of having a Supreme Court in the first place. Every first year law student knows the infamous case Marbury v. Madison. In short, this landmark case basically says that the Constitution specifically gives the Supreme Court the power to interpret the Constitution. That is its #1 job. So it doesn't really take too many mental gymnastics to arrive at the conclusion that EVEN IF women were not included in the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment in 1868, the Supreme Court specifically has the power to say that Women are included in that amendment today."

In response to Scalia's suggestion that contemporary questions are best left to legislatures, he asked, "Who do we trust to safeguard our Constitutional Rights:

A. 9 old-school legal academics in black robes who may be out of touch with the common man?

or

B. 535 career politicians in Congress who allegedly represent the will of the People by way of the "ballot box"?

TJM said...

Scalia's Ghost, I now suspect you are a stage name for either the gobster or Kavanaugh, nice try.

Scalia's Ghost said...

TJM - "Do or do not. There is no try." - Yoda

When you attack others rather than disagreeing intelligently with the ideas they post, that's "ad hominem."

Gene said...

What if you attack them AND disagree intelligently with their ideas...a perfect response.

George said...


Former Justice Scalia's position, his judicial philosophy on interpreting the Constitution, on reading no more or no less into the words it is comprised of, has much merit. If you want to permit something, which is to say make it allowable, then there is there exists the legislature (state or national), whose function is to do that by passing laws, and in addition, an executive whose function it to sign or not sign what the legislature has sent to him. There also is a process in place to amend the Constitution if that is found necessary. Contrast that with the judicial philosophy of extrapolating a law or a right to something or other from deliberating, surmising and conjuring the penumbras and emanations somehow perceived arising out of the written lines.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

George, is recognizing the right of women to vote "extrapolation?". Was Marbury v Madison " extrapolation"?

Jusadbellum said...

Fr. K, women got the right to vote via constitutional amendment, not via a court case.

18 year olds got the right to vote via constitutional amendment, not via a court case.

Much of the mischief (or seen by liberals, much of their success) has come not from democratically enacted legislation or amendments but from judges asserting that what the Constitution says nothing at all about actually means whatever it is they want to 'grant' the American people.

If we were to use their logic, the 2nd amendment ought to REQUIRE the federal government to reimburse every citizen who wants to purchase ANY type of 'arm' inasmuch as Roe vs. Wade is invoked to demand the federal government pay for abortions as 'health care'.

So I get to buy a machine gun and you, the tax payers must pay for it. I get to buy a rocket launcher and mortar and you, the tax payers must pay for it, no questions asked and my privacy rights respected utterly - just as women are allowed to have abortions 'on demand' with zero data-bases, zero checks on eligibility, etc.

See how fun it could be to use the liberal "jurisprudence" against them?

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Jus - Women HAD the right to vote, they did not "get" it. It was denied to them by . . . men. The recognition of that right came via the efforts of many women and men who, often at the cost of their lives, forced the issue.

You can, hypothetically, argue the point of REQUIRING the gov't to pay for weapons, but that's just hypothetical. Could it be argued? Sure. Could it happen? Nope.