The Chamber of Commerce Court Strikes Again
I have an article up at the Prospect about the worst Supreme Court decision you probably didn’t hear about this term. Well, actually, I should clarify that according to what we’ll charitably call the “logic” of the Supreme Court’s Republicans, I didn’t make any of the statements that appear under my name at all.
Since LGM prides itself on being fair and balanced, I should note that according to Ramseh Ponnuru the Court is not nearly pro-business enough. Ponnuru being smarter and better-informed than your typical conservative pundit, there are actually some truths expressed in the course of his column. But to borrow Scalia’s paraphrase of Churchill, what’s relevant isn’t true and what’s true isn’t relevant. Yes, Roberts and Alito are even more reflexively pro-business than Scalia and Thomas, and yes the Court lacks anything remotely resembling a Brennan/Marshall-style liberal, both points widely acknowledged by the Court’s critics and, if anything, more supportive of the critic’s position than Ponnuru’s. As to the more general claim that, despite its very pro-business record, a Court that is willing to hold that financial executives didn’t “make” statements they made in order to insulate them from accountability when they rip off their customers isn’t pro-business enough…let’s just say I continue to demur.
Apparently in Ramseh’s dream-world, a “pro-business” court would pretty much overrule any decision that hurt the delicate fee-fees of *any* business for any reason.
One wonders if he’s thought this all the way through – such a court would likely also uphold the right of business owners to refuse him service for “lookin’ like a furriner”…
Who do we blame for that? George Bush? Rupert Murdoch?
Also, when is Elena Kagan going to start using her legendary powers of persuasion to head off some of these bad rulings?
Yes, why, oh why did not Obama appoint, instead of Kagan, someone who could convert Scalia to liberalism by force of personality? Just goes to show that Obama is a secret Republican . . .
Come now, rea. Haven’t events pretty definitively proven that the Senate would have been happy to approve the nomination of, say, Harold Koh to a high court position?
well in 2009 he was confirmed 62-35 to be legal advisor to the state department. The whole point of naming someone more liberal than Kagan in 2010, was es because of the likelihood of losing some of the majority in the Senate.
An advisory role in the State Department isn’t a seat on the Supreme Court.
Yes, why, oh why did not Obama appoint, instead of Kagan, someone who could convert Scalia to liberalism by force of personality
That would be a pretty ace comeback if it weren’t actually supporters of Kagan who argued that she could convert Scalia by the force of her centrism, while people arguing for a more liberal justice never made any such claim.
But you know, I mean. Aside from that.
Sickburn.
Read Scalia’s dissent in Von Raab. It includes this gem:
(emphasis added)
Scalia in fact may be more respectful of individual liberty and constitutional rights than is Kagan, and he certainly is more so than is Breyer, as shown by Crawford v Washington and its progeny
Objection, counselor. Assumes facts not in evidence.
Well the Gobi Desert is less dry than the Atacama
Oh, you noticed that one, eh? Nice piece, but Konczal was there weeks ago, and he’s wasn’t exactly early to the party.
The real “obscure” SupCt decision of the year is the one allowing Jim Rogers’s people to continue destroying my kids’s lungs by putting even more sulfur into the Midwestern air and treat it after that as if they are Werner von Braun.
Konczal was there weeks ago
Well, no, but there obviously has been (as the links in the article indicate) some excellent work about it.
Let’s see — the Court gave inchoate entities (e.g., corporations) a right to “freedom of speech”. Since the inchoate entities are mute, they need people to “speechify” for them, so the Court had to rule that corporate executives are merely the ventriloquist dummies for the corporations, otherwise the corporations’ freedom of speech would be mooted and also would violate the Americans With Disabilities Act. Since the executives are merely “channelling” the speech of the corporations, the executives should not be held personally liable for what is the corporations’ speech!
I guess I just don’t understand this whole “Originalism” thing, because I totally didn’t know it meant that.
It depends on what you mean by “business”:
1. If as in “a business” (=”company/corporation”), the Court was surely pro-the-businesses-that-choose-to-lie — as long as they delegate the dirty work to puppet corp.s — but not pro-the-businesses-that-mistakenly-invested-in-them.
2. If as in “doing business” (=”trade/capitalism”), I’d call this an anti-business ruling. It undercuts the trust-in-honesty that our system of trade requires.
So, yes, I agree with Ramseh Ponnuru: the Court is not nearly pro-business enough.
Game On! The logic & end application of this, any corp allusion,specific or not, on any aspect of product/service is not binding to the claimer. Truly buyer beware. Claim food is safe, people die, you can keep selling it.
The Supreme Court will just reject the case, as frivolous.
Can I renege on all the contracts promises I claimed something & it’s OK! Alright, Game On!
according to Ramseh Ponnuru
That would be “Ramesh”.