SCOTUS Chatter

Sorry about the length of time between posts kids. The Patriot has had a rather busy work week and frankly, doesn’t really have too much to say. The conservative take-over of the United States government is so complete and the level of acceptable argument so skewed to the right that it almost seems silly to complain about anything.

It was a bad week for free speech at the Supreme Court, unless you are a corporation of course. In the bong hits for Jesus case Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the court's 6-3 majority it that it was reasonable for (the principal) to conclude that a student’s “Bong Hits For Jesus” banner promoted illegal drug use-- and that failing to act would send a powerful message to the students in her charge." Give me a break. Promoting drug use? Promoting reactionary behavior from the Supreme Court is more like it. In dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens aptly noted, “"This case began with a silly nonsensical banner, (and) ends with the court inventing out of whole cloth a special First Amendment rule permitting the censorship of any student speech that mentions drugs, so long as someone could perceive that speech to contain a latent pro-drug message." Arguing the case for the school was none other than the illustrious Kenneth Starr who apparently feels like he didn’t damage society enough with his single-minded pursuit of the Clintons, undertaken at the behest of his Republico-fascist masters.

The lingering aftereffects of the drug wars continue to convulse society. I think if anything this country needs to smoke a lot MORE pot and chill the fuck out.

While the conservatives picked up wins on the issues of free speech and affirmative action at the Court this week, they may or may not be so lucky on the concentration camp prisoner issues. From SCOTUS blog: [T]he Supreme Court on Friday agreed to reconsider the appeals in the Guantanamo Bay detainee cases. It vacated its April 2 order denying review of the two packets of cases. The Court then granted review, consolidated the cases, and said they would be heard in a one-hour argument in the new Term starting Oct. 1.” What does this mean for the detainees? At issue is the right of detained “enemy combatants” to petition for habeus corpus. Succinctly, the question actually presented is “whether the Military Commissions Act of 2006, Pub, validly stripped federal court jurisdiction over habeas corpus petitions filed by foreign citizens imprisoned indefinitely at the United States Naval Station at Guantanamo Bay.” Read that sentence again slowly and think of what it means to live in a society that denies the right of habeas to people detained indefinitely without charge. I wonder whether the Court is taking the case in order to strip itself of the right to review habeas petitions. Seems like that’s where this Court is heading.