1y ago

Clarence Thomas Secretly Participated in Koch Network Donor Events

www.propublica.org Clarence Thomas Secretly Participated in Koch Network Donor Events

Thomas has attended at least two Koch donor summits, putting him in the extraordinary position of having helped a political network that has brought multiple cases before the Supreme Court.

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I still firmly believe the problem is that these justices have lifetime appointments. I understand the logic about keeping them free from political influence, but ironically I think this has gotten to the point where some of them feel invincible and thus free to insert their political biases into their judgments without fear of repercussions.
I think a better system would be for them to serve, say, 20-year terms, after which they cannot be installed in SCOTUS again. That leaves them free of political influence in the same way the Founding Fathers intended, but shortens their stay in power, which will hopefully limit the amount of damage some of them can do and perhaps make them feel less untouchable.
- I don't know if it's the lifetime appointment, or more of a natural reaction to literally being above the law. Lifetime appointments could work fine if you had some means of removing judges who can't even pretend to be impartial.
  I always thought that the supreme Court should have been balanced by consensus a the legal community. Maybe a vote from those actively practicing as lawyers?
  
  if you had some means of removing judges who can't even pretend to be impartial.
  Could you not imagine all the ways today's Republicans would try to abuse that against aby democrats appointed justice that ruled against some of the blatantly unconstitutional craziness they have tried to pull?
  
  Man it's really exhausting having to ask "how would Republicans abuse this?" every time a change is proposed.
  
  I mean, they're already abusing the system we already have. It's just trading out a known abuse for the potential of a unknown abuse. At least in the latter there would be some way for somewhat normal people to influence it.
  Despite what most people the vast majority of lawyers are pretty liberal. There's only a couple of right leaning law schools in the US, they just have an oversized influence because they're basically all the ivy league.
- I don't understand the logic of keeping them free from political influence. It's obvious that lifetime appointments don't do that. The founding fathers weren't perfect and not everything about their vision is perfect or even working. Right now SCotUS justices are picked based on whether they will serve the agenda of the party that's in power when the seat opens up, and half the problem is that a majority in the Senate can hold a seat open until it's someone they like's turn to do the picking. Let's cut the Senate out entirely. 10 year terms, then you're done forever. President picks, then we hold a national election based on popular vote that either says "yes" or "no".
  
  All good in theory but the problem is that you have to get the branch of the government manipulating said system to agree to vote themselves out and thereby reduce their power.
  So it's literally never happening.
  
  *Never will the USA government as it is currently established under the existing constitution and electoral process will these changes be made. It is very possible that the union could fail at any moment and history seems to indicate it's probably not that far from a collapse as a nation.
- Cut that to 8 year terms. That way we'll have Justices who understand modern values.
  
  I'd rather have a mix of modern and old values on SCOTUS. Older generations deserve representation too.
  
  Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying have all 35 year olds. I'm all for 60+ judges being appointed. I'm just saying 8 year terms. Lifetime terms is a vector for corruption, i.e. bribery and blackmail.
  
  Honestly, I don't know for certain what the effective difference would be between 8-year terms vs. 20-year terms, but I could see how having terms that are too short might result in disruptive chaos. It takes lawsuits years to move up through the court system to reach SCOTUS. If justices had 8-year terms, that would likely mean we're appointing at least one new justice every year. I could see that making it very difficult for lawyers, plaintiffs, etc, to make long-term legal plans with SCOTUS in mind, because you never know what the court is actually going to look like when your case finally gets there. Maybe that's not a bad thing, maybe it is; probably has pros and cons to it. I don't think I have the legal experience to really give an informed opinion about what length of term is best for a SCOTUS judge, but I can see there potentially being serious issues with them being too short.

39 comments