Monday, June 27, 2022

Howie

 



This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"


Monday, June 27, 2022.  When I was talking to Elaine about one of the topics I'd be covering on Monday, I didn't realize it would end up being the entire snapshot.  But we're calling for the immediate impeachment and removal from the court of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and it is the entire snapshot.


On Friday, the Supreme Court ended ROE V WADE (see "Today is a story of betrayal -- one long betrayal").  Now, it is time to begin considering impeaching Clarence Thomas to remove him from the Supreme Court.  


In May, we noted here that if the House of Representatives were serious about the claims that they were making to the press regarding his second wife Virginia Thomas that they should begin impeachment.  They didn't.  Should they become more serious about those charges, they can certainly add that to list of reasons to impeach.


But there are currently two strong reasons to impeach.  


The first is his concurring opinion in DOBBS V JACKSON WOMEN'S HEALTH ORGANIZATION -- that's the decision overturning ROE.  In that decision, it wasn't enough for him to join the other four justices in overturning ROE.  He had to go further.


He wants to do away with birth control and with LGBTQ rights.  In his concurring opinion, he advocates:  "In future cases, we should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell."


GRISWOLD V CONNECTICUT has been settled law since 1965.  The case made legal the purchase and use of contraceptives.  LAWRENCE V TEXAS was settled in 2003 and it outlawed the government's ability to prosecute people for sodomy.  OBERGEFELL V HODGES was decided in 2015 and it what provides us with marriage equality.


Little Clarence, the mental midget who can't speak and only recently learned how to write an opinion, needs to be removed from the Court -- he is a danger to himself and others.  


As Samuel L. Jackson has noted, Clarence is not objecting LOVING V VIRGINIA.  He might have to leave little Ginni The Insurrectionist if he did since LOVING is what allows interracial couples to marry.  


Overturning OBERGEFELL would break up marriages -- couples now married would, upon the ruling, no longer be married.  Some of those couples have children.  This would impact families.


None of that is a concern to Clarence.  For that reason alone, he's demonstrated he's not competent to sit on the Supreme Court.


The Court -- in fact the entire court system -- is built around protecting families.  Clarence's move is an attack on families, is an attack on the institution of marriage and is an argument against child welfare.  Overturning the other two go to how out of touch with the legal reality of today is: the police do not have the time to snare and arrest people for using birth control or for having anal sex nor do the already overburdened courts have room on the docket for these cases.


He is a clear danger to the judicial system.  He would not have been confirmed had he declared that he did not agree with the basic legal principal known as stare decisis.  Now maybe he wasn't against precedents when he was confirmed.  That's possible.  But he's made clear that he's against them now.


That's why you impeach him.


He is not fit to serve on the Court.  


He does not realize the damage that he would do tearing apart families, nullifying legal relationships.


He doesn't realize it but others do and that's why the Congress needs to step forward and impeach and them remove him.


There are certain basics that al members of the court must agree to for it to function.  In his concurring opinion, he made clear that stare decisis is not legal principal he agrees with.


If you are called to serve on a jury and you want to get out of it, the easiest ways is to indicate -- on paper or in a verbal answer -- that you know and agree with the principle of jury nullification.  That's a custom we bring over from the UK and it allows a jury to say that, yes, the person is guilty but I don't believe the crime matters or I don't think the crime is worth being punished for.


Say "jury nullification" and watch them rush to disqualify you.  That's because our system is built on innocent or guilty.


And our system is also built on stare decisis.  


Without stare decisis, you're just making it up as you go along and that's what Clarence Thomas wants to do and that's why he needs to be immediately impeached.  He is not fit to serve on the Court.


Can you imagine all the damage done if the cases he wants overturned in his concurring verdict were overturned?


He's not fit.  


Maybe he was once (we'll get to that) but he's not now.  He is a danger to the Court.  The longer he is allowed to remain on it, the more at risk the American people are.


He has no rational abilities left.  He is willing to break up the families with children if the parents are same-sex.  He is a danger and he needs to be stopped.  The correct remedy is removal from the Court via impeachment.


This would not be packing the Court.  It would not be about punishing a justice for a verdict. The other ones involved in overturning ROE would remain on the Court.  


I disagree with their finding but they didn't write anything as anti-judicial system as Clarence did.  Clarence must be removed.  He goes against everything our judicial system is built upon.  Hell, we're built on precedent and he's denying precedent when he's denying stare decisis.


He never should have written that concurring opinion and, for all I know, the others who overturned ROE feel the same.  But they weren't stupid enough to put it in writing.


When Clarence put it in writing, he was putting the United States on notice.  He needs to be removed from office.


Now let's get to the second reason to impeach him: Anita Hill.


In 1991, Anita raised the issue of sexual harassment.


As the attacks on Felicia Sonmez -- attacks from the left -- recently made clear, elements of this country still struggle with harassment.  "It was just a joke!"  Isn't that what the pig boys -- and some of the gals who pretend to be men -- said?  Just a joke.  


In isolation, you understand.


Not part of a larger pattern in which a woman got harassed daily.


That is what happened.  

 

Anita Hill had it even worse.  


And when she stood up in 1991 to testify against the harassment she experience from her boss Clarence Thomas, the county wasn't ready for it.  Reporters wanted to giggle over Long John Dong or whatever the porn title was.  They said Anita was a spoil sport.  She and her kind were destroying the work environment.

The Senate had additional witnesses that they refused to call.  I'm looking at you Joe Biden.


We are a different time now where some of us -- not Little Jackie Hinkle who thinks you bring a drunk woman on your YOUTUBE show to try to have sex with her -- are mature enough to address harassment.  


Clarence doesn't get a pass.


No one who harasses gets a pass.


Since his hearing, more has been learned about him.  One of the worst attackers on Anita Hill -- David Brock -- has now admitted he was a cheap liar.  And he was part of an organized effort to attack Anita and to get Clarence on the Court.  


We have learned since that Clarence lied or didn't remember correctly during his testimony.  There are whole books on this issue.


Impeachment exists for many reasons -- one of them is to rectify mistakes.  


Had Clarence been honest in his testimony regarding Anita Hill, he would not have been confirmed -- even in 1991, he would not have been confirmed.


Justice was not served by putting an abuser on the Court.


Justice needs to be addressed.  


It is past time that Clarence Thomas was impeached and removed from the Court.


As outlined above, his testimony in his hearing about his own actions regarding Anita Hill were not accurate.  He was part of an effort to attack Anita's character.  He does not believe in precedent and is making it clear that he will work to overturn other decisions which will negatively impact the lives of individuals and families.  He does not see the role of the court in keeping families together and, in fact, his comments in DOBBS are a declaration of war on the institution of the family as well as the rights of individuals.


Ginni Thomas has been much in the news.  When you tie her alleged actions to Clarence written comments, you have a couple bound and determined to destroy the country. And Clarence has the power to.


He needs to be impeached.


Many people have commented in the last few weeks that this or that nominee lied in their confirmation hearings.  Did they?  I have no idea, I can't peer into their hearts.  But if the Congress wants to make clear that nominees better be honest, they can do that be allowing future nominees to see what happens when you show no respect for basic legal principals, you get removed from the Court.


Impeachment is the only check on a lifetime appointment.  


It's time to move immediately to impeach Clarence Thomas and remove him from the Court.


His actions against Anita Hill should have precluded him from being confirmed and serving. 

He needs to be impeached immediately.


Any woman who's spent the last month fearing what would happen when the Court ruled on DOBBS knows how stressful that was.  That same stress should not be passed on to any other groups.  Not to a woman in need of birth control, not to a same sex couple trying to raise a family, not to an 11-year-old child with two Mommys or two Daddys.  


Congress needs to address this and should do so immediately.  


 



Kat's "Kat's Korner: Jack Johnson finds his way back" went up Sunday as did Isaiah's THE WORLD TODAY JUST NUTS "Geezer Rock."  In addition, the following sites updated:


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