Judicial Tyranny

I’m getting sick of ignorant, arrogant nutjobs, some of whom unfortunately seem to be in national GOP leadership positions, trying to erode the rule of law. In case they haven’t noticed, an independent judiciary and the depth of the common law is the soil in which our Democracy grows. Or maybe that’s the point, I don’t know. You’ve got Senator Cornyn (R-Texas) suggesting that maybe that rapist in Atlanta who shot his way out of a court room was doing it because of “activist judges”. You’ve got Tom DeLay and Rick Santorum lying about the Schiavo law they passed, wrongheaded as it was it wasn’t as far reaching as they seemed to suggest, and talking about “judicial tyranny” when the Florida District Court judge followed the law and applied the accepted rules for issuing a preliminary injunction.

Now, the assault continues. Dana Milbank has a Washington Post article entitled And the Verdict on Justice Kennedy Is: Guilty

Some choice passages:

Phyllis Schlafly, doyenne of American conservatism, said Kennedy’s opinion forbidding capital punishment for juveniles “is a good ground of impeachment.” To cheers and applause from those gathered at a downtown Marriott for a conference on “Confronting the Judicial War on Faith,” Schlafly said that Kennedy had not met the “good behavior” requirement for office and that “Congress ought to talk about impeachment.”

. . .

Not to be outdone, lawyer-author Edwin Vieira told the gathering that Kennedy should be impeached because his philosophy, evidenced in his opinion striking down an anti-sodomy statute, “upholds Marxist, Leninist, satanic principles drawn from foreign law.”

Ominously, Vieira continued by saying his “bottom line” for dealing with the Supreme Court comes from Joseph Stalin. “He had a slogan, and it worked very well for him, whenever he ran into difficulty: ‘no man, no problem,’ ” Vieira said.

The full Stalin quote, for those who don’t recognize it, is “Death solves all problems: no man, no problem.”

Mr. Milbank then recounts the incidents I led with:

A judge in Atlanta and the husband and mother of a judge in Chicago were murdered in recent weeks. After federal courts spurned a request from Congress to revisit the Terri Schiavo case, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) said that “the time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior.” Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) mused about how a perception that judges are making political decisions could lead people to “engage in violence.”

I’ve got no patience for thugs. Maybe we should put them down like the rabid dogs they are. Speaking politically and metaphorically, of course.

On the other hand, I’m probably all wrong and Fafblog has the right of it:

“Kneel before Greer!” says Florida circuit judge George Greer. I am forced to kneel on accounta Congress refuses to set limitations on his kneel-forcin powers.

“Oh you won’t get away with this judges,” says me. “Tom Delay will stop you an save the day!”

“Who is this Tom Delay?” says Judge Greer.

“Oh you’ll find out an when you do!” says me.

“Come to me, Tom Delay!” says Judge Greer. “I defy you! Come and kneel before Greer! GREER!”