Missouri Figures Prominently In First Supreme Court Deadlock

So the first voting deadlock since Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's death from the now 8-member US Supreme Court comes straight out of a case that began right here in Missouri:

Supreme Court hits first post-Scalia deadlock in bankruptcy case

WASHINGTON -- The risk created by last month's death of Justice Antonin Scalia became a reality Tuesday when the Supreme Court deadlocked in a bankruptcy case that had been pending since the first day of the term last October.

Chief Justice John Roberts read the one-sentence verdict, which could be repeated many times before a replacement for Scalia overcomes a similar deadlock between President Obama and Senate Republicans: "The judgment is affirmed by an equally divided court."

The case was one of the high court's least noticed -- a bankruptcy dispute between a Missouri bank and a development company that defaulted on its loans. The company was owned by two couples, and the wives filed suit, claiming discrimination for being required to guarantee their spouses' loans.

The justices clearly were divided in the case, as evidenced by the length of time it took to issue a decision. By the time Scalia died Feb. 13, the case had been under review for more than four months -- an indication of a close decision with one or more dissents.

Left without Scalia's vote, the justices had to ditch all the opinions, concurrences and dissents they may have been writing and, in essence, throw up their hands.

As a result, the Community Bank of Raymore emerges victorious over the two wives, Valerie Hawkins and Janice Patterson, by virtue of the earlier decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit.

Here's hoping our Congress will, very soon, interview and discuss President Obama's nomination for the Court and have a vote on it.

Hey, we can hope.

Democrats, Progressives, Bringing America Forward

So we Americans, through the Democrats, gave America our first black president. It's been outstanding.

Next up?

The first female president, to follow and carry on the progress.

Then? After that?

Obama Could Become Supreme Court Justice After Presidency

Be still, my heart.

After last week's McCutcheon decision by the Supreme Court

A timely quote:

"We must make our choice. 

We may have democracy or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both."

--Justice Louis Brandeis, former associate Justice of the Supreme Court, as quoted by Raymond Lonergan in Mr. Justice Brandeis, Great American (1941), p. 42.

Links:  85 richest people own as much as bottom half of population

Supreme Court Strikes Down Overall Political Donation Cap

Louis Brandeis - Wikipedia

US Supreme Court lets the wealthy buy everything

Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer's blistering dissent in McCutcheon:

"Corruption breaks the constitutionally necessary “chain of communication” between the people and their representatives. It derails the essential speech-to-government-action tie. Where enough money calls the tune, the general public will not be heard. Insofar as corruption cuts the link between political thought and political action, a free marketplace of political ideas loses its point. That is one reason why the Court has stressed the constitutional importance of Congress’ concern that a few large donations not drown out the voices of the many…."

Link:  A Blistering Dissent in 'McCutcheon'

Money in our elections and government

Thanks to the Supreme Court of the United States, this Chief Justice John Roberts court, corporations are people and money is speech.

We're screwed.


Link:  Supreme Court Strikes Down Overall Political Donation Cap

SCOTUS to the 99%: Screw you people

Yesterday, our own US Supreme Court took ur, all of us, the entire nation, yet further down the deep, dark hole--the money hole--in our politics. It was huge, ugly news for the country and an extremely dark day for the nation:

Supreme Court's abomination: How the McCutcheon decision will destroy American politics

In case you haven't been following this or aren't aware of what was possibly going down:

“Money talks,” Elvis Costello once observed, “and it’s persuasive.” The belief that this is especially true in the world of politics led to the passage of the Federal Election Campaign Act. In the aftermath of Watergate the FECA was strengthened in an attempt to limit the corrupting influence of money on politics, and, until 2010, the Supreme Court largely upheld Congress’s power to do so.

That year the Citizens United case, which essentially found that the free speech rights of corporations were more important than legislative attempts to keep money from corrupting the political process, occasioned a great deal of outrage. But that case marked merely the beginning of what is likely to prove to be a series of increasingly successful assaults on campaign finance laws.

And now, Wednesday, the next blow to attempting to keep the rich from being able to buy politicians as effortlessly as they purchase anything else has been struck by McCutcheon v. FEC, a Supreme Court case dealing with limits on how much money individuals can contribute to candidates.

McCutcheon has now struck down overall limits on individual campaign contributions. This latest outburst of judicial activism in the struggle to render campaign finance laws completely toothless is merely accelerating a historical process that is coming to seem almost inevitable.

So it's been decided by the Court and now the wealthy and corporations have even fewer limitations on the amounts of their millions and billions of dollars they can use to buy, well, every legislator and every possible government bill and law and so, ultimately, our own government, even more than they're already doing now.

And no, it's not that it wasn't unexpected. Too many of us thought this Court might well come down on the side of that same wealthy and corporations but still, here it is. The worst we thought might happen, has, in fact, occurred.

Fortunately, not everyone on the Court voted for the 1%. It just wasn't enough of them.

The fact is, we, the people have to stand up and demand an end to the money, the big, ugly, corrupting, pervasive money of the wealthy and corporations that's buying our legislators, our laws and so, our government.  It has to come from us.  It will only happen if we stand up. we have to take our government back. It can happen but it has to come from us. We must demand it.

Link to pdf of the Court's decision:   McCutcheon v. Federal Election Comm'n - Supreme Court

If you don't pay much attention to the US Supreme Court...

...you should probably be paying attention to this sessions' decisions, at least on this one, if nothing else:

In one of the most closely watched cases of the term, McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, the court will consider the constitutionality of overall limits on how much an individual donor may give directly to federal candidates, party committees and PACs in a two-year election cycle. 
      

McCutcheon is the first major campaign finance case to reach the court since its controversial 2010 ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, which struck down a ban on independent spending in campaigns by corporations and labor unions. In a 1976 case, Buckley v. Valeo, the court upheld limits on direct political contributions to prevent corruption. That precedent is being tested again in the McCutcheon case; the justices should reaffirm it.

And if that's not enough, look how it seems to be trending from this largely Conservative, pro-business, pro-Republican, pro-big money court:

In Major Campaign Spending Case, Supreme Court Gives Oral Argument Time To Republican Senator

As if it weren’t already clear enough that the U.S. Supreme Court’s next money in politics decision is about money in Republican politics, the plaintiffs are spelling it out for you, giving Sen. Mitch McConnell argument time before the justices.

________________________________________________________

 

We need this to go for the people and against the big money and corporations.

 

It surely doesn't look like it will go that way.

 

 

 

Three American "worsts"

And by "worsts", I don't mean German sausages. First, number one:

If for no other reasons than that he lied to us--the entire nation--to get us to attack, pre-emptively and into a war in Iraq, gave tax cuts to the wealthiest of Americans, attacked Afghanistan, too, for a total of two wars at once, without raising any taxes and then it goes on from there. Worst. Ever. Second "worst":

For all of the ugliness and money and greed and corruption he has unleashed on our country, Karl Rove has proven himself, time and again, one of the worst, most vile creatures in the nation. He's partly responsible for, of course, George "Dubya'" Bush getting seated in the White House but then, too, for the ugly, divisive, partisan split in America that exists even to this day, let alone the "Citizens United" decision by the Supreme Court, along with a whole host of other real beauties. Finally, the John Roberts Supreme Court:

They've done a lot of things that have been just horribly, patently ugly on the nation but I'll only mention one item here and that is the Citizens United opinion which said a) that a corporation is a human being and b) that those corporations can spend unlimited amounts of money in our political system and campaigns to get their messages out to us, the American people. History will show this to be one of the most foul, distorting, corrupting rulings handed down in the length of the nation. And now, they may also kill health care reform in the country. I feel sick. Links: http://mostcorrupt.com/Most-Corrupt-Administrations.html; http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article5085.html; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Rove; http://youtu.be/mmwdevPRycY;

From our own KC to Amend!

From the notes: "KC Move to Amend and comedy troupe LSR present a satire of Corporate Personhood: the wedding of a corporation and a human being." How appropriate. Please support efforts to undo the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision so we can help get the big, ugly, corrupting money of corporations and their lobbyists out of our government. Learn more--and participate?--here: KCMovetoAmend.org

Occupy the courts today!

The Move to Amend organization (www.movetoamend.org) is organizing a day of peaceful occupation and protests nationwide at Federal Courts today, Friday, January 20. This is the anniversary of the Supreme Court's monumental--and monumentally wrong--Citizens United decision which gave corporations the legal ability to pour unlimited amounts of money into political campaigns, among other things. Here's what you need to know: 11:30am to 1:30pm, Gather in Ilus Davis Park immediately across the street from the Charles Evans Whittaker Federal Courthouse at 401 E. 9th Street, KCMO. Plan to dress for cold weather! Contact: Mary Lindsay, MTA Kansas City, KCMoveToAmend@gmail.com; (816) 885-9996. See you there! Additional link--you can go here to register for the event: http://action.citizen.org/p/salsa/event/common/public/index.sjs?event_KEY=72556

Occupy the courts tomorrow!

The Move to Amend organization (www.movetoamend.org) is organizing a day of peaceful occupation and protests nationwide at Federal Courts tomorrow, Friday, January 20. This is the anniversary of the Supreme Court's monumental--and monumentally wrong--Citizens United decision which gave corporations the legal ability to pour unlimited amounts of money into political campaigns, among other things. Here's what you need to know: 11:30am to 1:30pm, Gather in Ilus Davis Park immediately across the street from the Charles Evans Whittaker Federal Courthouse at 401 E. 9th Street, KCMO. Plan to dress for cold weather! Contact: Mary Lindsay, MTA Kansas City, KCMoveToAmend@gmail.com; (816) 885-9996. See you there! Additional link--you can go here to register for the event: http://action.citizen.org/p/salsa/event/common/public/index.sjs?event_KEY=72556

Occupy the courts this Friday

The Move to Amend organization (www.movetoamend.org) is organizing a day of peaceful occupation and protests nationwide at Federal Courts this Friday, January 20. This is the anniversary of the Supreme Court's monumental--and monumentally wrong--Citizens United decision which gave corporations the legal ability to pour unlimited amounts of money into political campaigns, among other things. Here's what you need to know: 11:30am to 1:30pm, Gather in Ilus Davis Park immediately across the street from the Charles Evans Whittaker Federal Courthouse at 401 E. 9th Street, KCMO. Plan to dress for cold weather! Contact: Mary Lindsay, MTA Kansas City, KCMoveToAmend@gmail.com; (816) 885-9996. See you there! Additional link--you can go here to register for the event: http://action.citizen.org/p/salsa/event/common/public/index.sjs?event_KEY=72556

Occupy the courts Jan. 20, 2012

The Move to Amend organization (www.movetoamend.org) is organizing a day of peaceful occupation and protests nationwide at Federal Courts Friday, January 20. This is the anniversary of the Supreme Court's monumental--and monumentally wrong--Citizens United decision which gave corporations the legal ability to pour unlimited amounts of money into political campaigns, among other things. Here's what you need to know (I'll post again later, closer to the date, too): 11:30am to 1:30pm, Gather in Ilus Davis Park immediately across the street from the Charles Evans Whittaker Federal Courthouse at 401 E. 9th Street, KCMO. Plan to dress for cold weather! Contact: Mary Lindsay, MTA Kansas City, KCMoveToAmend@gmail.com; (816) 885-9996. See you there! Additional link--you can go here to register for the event: http://action.citizen.org/p/salsa/event/common/public/index.sjs?event_KEY=72556

We must overturn the Supreme Court's "Citizen United" ruling

Corporations are not people. "James Madison and Thomas Jefferson warned Americans to beware of the political ambitions of that system’s managerial class. Madison feared that the “spirit of speculation” would lead to “a government operating by corrupt influence, substituting the motive of private interest in place of public duty.” Jefferson hoped that “we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and [to] bid defiance to the laws of our country.” --Bill Moyers, American journalist and public commentator. Please work, for yourself, your family and for the middle- and lower-classes, to help pass this amendment to the Constitution so corporations don't overrun our individual votes and rights. You can begin by going here and signing the petition: http://freespeechforpeople.org/ Thank you, in advance. Link: http://www.alternet.org/story/153349/moyers:_why_'we_the_people'_must_triumph_over_corporate_power/

Ladies and Gentlemen, your Supreme Court of the United States (and what they're doing to us)

Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) railed against the Supreme Court in a speech to progressive legal scholars Thursday night, declaring that "the Roberts Court has systematically dismantled the legal protections that help ordinary people find justice when wronged by the economically powerful." Franken in particular decried the way conservative legal scholars have changed the popular perception of what Supreme Court justices do -- and what justice is. Thank you, Judy, for that introduction, and for your work on behalf of working Americans. Thank you to Caroline Fredrickson for your leadership and for inviting me to speak here tonight. Thank you all for being here tonight, and for the good work you do to defend the Constitution and the American values it represents. It is an honor to address this convention. Speakers at past ACS gatherings have included Supreme Court Justices, Attorneys General, other cabinet secretaries, federal judges, and distinguished legal scholars. So tonight I guess we'll finally get an answer to the question: "What do Stephen Breyer, Laurence Tribe, and Al Franken have in common?" Other than: "They were all in the front row when the Dead played the Garden back in '71." Tonight, we celebrate the rise of a new generation of progressive legal scholars and jurists. Look to your left. Look to your right. Odds are, at least one of the three of you will someday be filibustered by Senate Republicans. Speaking of which, I'd like to give a special shout-out to all the filibustered nominees we have here with us tonight. The Republican obstruction that is standing between you and the work you've agreed to do for your country is unacceptable. And we will continue to fight it. In particular, I want to recognize Dawn Johnsen, who should be the head of the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. What Republicans have done to keep you from doing that important job is flat out wrong. And I want to recognize Goodwin Liu, who should be sitting on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals right now, and who deserves an up-or-down vote. When I joined the Senate, I was thrown right into the fire as a member of the Judiciary Committee, where, by the way, I enthusiastically voted for Goodwin. On my fifth day in office, I found myself taking part in the confirmation hearings for now-Justice Sonia Sotomayor. Just like I am tonight, I was one of the few non-lawyers in the room, but I didn't mind. You see, I did some research, and it turns out that most Minnesotans aren't lawyers, either. But that doesn't mean they aren't directly affected every day by what happens on the Supreme Court, and in our legal system. I don't think you need to be a lawyer to recognize that the Roberts Court has, consistently and intentionally, protected and promoted the interests of the powerful over those of individual Americans. And you certainly don't need to be a lawyer to understand what that means for the working people who are losing their rights, one 5-4 decision at a time. Tonight, I'd like to talk about how we got to this sad moment in American legal history - because it didn't happen by accident. Conservative activists - led by the Federalist Society - have waged a remarkably successful battle to re-shape our legal discourse, and thus our legal system. And they're not done yet. I should acknowledge up front that this story is kind of a downer. But there's good news: the ending has not yet been written. And I really believe that, if we pay attention to how things got so bad, we'll learn how to make them better. Link to original post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/18/al-franken-slams-supreme_n_617448.html