'Goodbye Civil Rights: Amy Coney Barrett's America Is A Terrifying Place; How Bad Will It Be'

[appalachiablue]

'Goodbye civil rights: Amy Coney Barrett's America is a terrifying place.' By Arwa Mahdawi, The Guardian, Oct. 17, 2020. With her confirmation all but inevitable, how bad will Barrett be? It’s hard to say for sure – but it doesn’t look good.




So that’s that then. The confirmation hearings are over and it is almost inevitable that Amy Coney Barrett will be confirmed as a supreme court justice before the November election. Barrett will shift the supreme court from a 5-4 conservative majority to a 6-3 super-majority, a move that could fundamentally reshape America. Goodbye civil rights, hello Gilead.

You’ve got to hand it to the Republicans really; they get things done. They don’t care about being called hypocrites. They don’t care about ignoring Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s dying wish that she not be replaced until after the election. They don’t care about common decency. They don’t care about democracy. They just care about power – and they will do whatever it takes to get it.

So just how bad will Barrett be? Could her confirmation mean the end of Roe v Wade and the federal right to an abortion in America? Is marriage equality in danger? Is it possible she could criminalize birth control? Is America on its way to becoming a Divine Republic? Are we going to look at The Handmaid’s Tale and realize it was a documentary?

It’s hard to say for sure. Barrett said little of substance during the hearings, repeating over and over again that she would follow the law not her personal convictions. Which, it’s worth reiterating, are religious and regressive. People of Praise, the Christian community where Barrett previously served as a “handmaid” (the not-at-all creepy term they used for female leaders), for example, is anti-abortion and expels members for gay sex.

..As the Christian Science Monitor recently noted: “If Judge Barrett is confirmed, it would represent a culmination of decades long efforts by the conservative Christian legal movement to move from the periphery of the legal world into the mainstream.”...

More, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/oct/17/amy-coney-barrett-supreme-court-america

[Proud liberal 80]

1. You are wrong

Didn’t you know she has black kids

[appalachiablue]

2. Oh..that's right!

S/

[dhol82]

3. I am truly fascinated by the fact that she is an originalist

By that measure she should not even be in consideration for the court. You know, being a woman and all that.

[appalachiablue]

4. Troubling and deceptive

[BigmanPigman]

5. We need to "Balance the Courts"...not "stack" them. That term isn't appropriate.

The constitution never said how many justices so the number has fluctuated over the years. There are many options the Dems can and must take if we are to have a democracy. Add more Federal judges, add more justices, write norms down, add states, etc. As James Carville says, "Dems can't be all goody-goody Mr. Nice Guys. That is what got us here. We have to play hard and mean, like the GOP has been. Teddy Roosevelt, FDR and others have in the past and we must get back to that type of thinking and behavior ASAP. No more Kumbaya nonsense!".

[appalachiablue]

6. Balance is more accurate; Carville makes interesting points

And no time to waste.

The US needs leadership change and major structural change for mounting major issues we know.

[BigmanPigman]

8. I know Biden hasn't said that he is for or against

balancing the courts but I wonder if Harris or advisors would help to persuade him. He did say that he'd leave prosecuting tRump up to whoever his AG will be.

[appalachiablue]

9. He can't get into that now so i've read, but must do post- election

[BigmanPigman]

11. Smart move in my opinion.

[Eliot Rosewater]

7. Like barr and pence the mind of a child

[J_William_Ryan]

10. No, Republicans and conservatives don't care about any of that.

In addition, for decades to come, no matter what measures a Democratic Congress might pass and a Democratic president might sign into law – no matter how just and proper those laws might be, no matter how warranted and appropriate, no matter that such laws reflect the will of the people – conservatives need only file suit in Federal court and eventually have those necessary, proper laws invalidated for purely partisan reasons by a five-justice majority of conservative ideologues on the Supreme Court.

But wait, there’s more…

The same is true for laws passed by Democrats at the state level and signed into law by a Democratic governor. Conservatives need only file suit in Federal court and eventually have those necessary, proper state laws and measures invalidated for purely partisan reasons by a five-justice majority of conservative ideologues on the Supreme Court.

So much for conservatives’ advocacy of “states’ rights.”

Indeed, conservatives will become purveyors of ignoring the will of the people, defenders of tyrants in black robes, and champions of legislating from the bench.

The reprehensible right has codified its minority rule.