scotus
The Supreme Court Just Opened The Door To Regulating Gun Stores Out Of Existence
Chris Rock had a joke a back in the 90's about not bothering with gun control and making bullets cost $5000 each instead. Today, the Supreme Court gave the gun control movement the next best thing by affirming that while there is a second amendment right to own a gun, there's no ...read more
Justice Anthony Kennedy Is (Not) Retiring
Dean Heller, the Republican senator from Nevada, is desperate. He's unpopular, his party is unpopular, and his president is even more unpopular. And he's running for reelection in a state that Trump lost in a year that Democrats are angrier than the Tea Party could possibly ...read more
"State's Rights" Republicans Are Begging SCOTUS To Stop Pennsylvania From Ending Gerrymandering
UPDATE: Literally as I was posting this article, word came down that Justice Alito rejected the plea of the PA GOP to preserve their unconstitutional congressional map. Republicans are running out of legal options to forestall the loss of their precious map. Now we'll see if ...read more
Chief Justice Roberts Called Sociology "Gobbledygook" so a Leading Sociologist Publicly Spanked Him
There are exactly two ways to approach Gil v. Whitford, the gerrymandering case currently before the Supreme Court. One, you can look at the merits of the case and decide whether or not the extreme partisan gerrymandering Republicans have engaged in has, in fact, stripped people ...read more
Trump Celebrates Supreme Court Decision That Wasn't Actually a Decision
Whenever Donald Trump says something about the functioning of our government, it is invariably wrong. Pundits have suggested two ways to look at that. One, it could be that he is "working the room," spinning each story as he presents it to his fans so that he appears in the most ...read more
Demanding A Centrist Justice Presents Little Risk, Huge Rewards For Democrats
With the announcement of a hard right nominee to fill the illegitimately open seat on the Supreme Court, Trump is handing the Democratic Party both an opportunity and a potential time bomb. Neil Gorsuch may not be quite as extreme as Antonin Scalia, but he's well to the right on ...read more
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The Democrats Must Filibuster Every Republican Supreme Court Nomination. Period.
The blocking of Judge Merrick Garland's nomination to the Supreme Court was a calculated risk on the part of Republicans. He's an eminently centrist pick who raised no real objections among Republicans other than "He's not a radical right wing extremist." But the gamble seems to ...read more
John McCain's Threat To Block Clinton's Supreme Court Picks Reveals How Truly Desperate Republicans Are
Back before Antonin Scalia (Satan Rot His Soul), died last year, a lot of anti-Hillary liberals insisted that the Supreme Court didn't matter; that ideological purity was far more important. After he died and Republicans took the unprecedented step of blocking any new Court ...read more
Millions Of Families Dealt Crushing Blow As Supreme Court Rejects Obama's Immigration Appeal
On Monday morning, President Obama was served a blow by the Supreme Court when it rejected the administration's request to rehear a case about his immigration executive orders. The policy in question would have granted millions of immigrants relief from deportation and allowed ...read more
Here's Bad News and Worse News About Bernie Sanders and Gun Control
Everybody knows that Hillary Clinton has been beating up on Bernie Sanders but good over gun control, and Bernie has stubbornly continued to insist that we need a law, not a judge or jury, to decide if gun manufacturers are liable for the damage their products cause. However, an ...read more
Quote of the Day: Donald Trump Wants to be "Thug-In-Chief"
On Sunday morning's edition of This Week, News One Now anchor Roland Martin summed up Republican frontrunner Donald Trump and his campaign of violence and intimidation in as perfect a fashion as has been achieved thus far. In a panel discussion about Trump's campaign manager ...read more
Democrats Are Going Insane Over Bernie Sanders' Completely Reasonable Suggestion
On Thursday night, I tweeted out a clip of Bernie Sanders, without commentary, that showed him making a little bit of news by saying that he supports President Obama's nomination of Chief Judge Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, but if the vacancy persists until after the ...read more
The 'Biden Rule' is Utter Garbage and Here's Why
President Obama‘s nomination of DC Circuit Court Chief JudgeMerrick Garland has escalated the fight to replace deceased Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has taken to citing something called “The Biden Rule” as justification ...read more
The Supreme Court Is Playing Politics With the Affordable Care Act
The Supreme Court announced today its decision to hear the case of King v. Burwell, which challenges the Affordable Care Act's insurance subsidies, claiming that the law doesn't explicitly define the federal government's role in offering premium assistance to roughly five ...read more
John Oliver's Hilarious Supreme Court Reenactment Using Dogs (And a Duck)
Occasionally a discussion arises regarding the airing of Supreme Court cases on live television. John Oliver, on HBO's Last Week Tonight show, noted that perhaps the deliberations would be a little too boring for television audiences, and proposed a solution to the problem. ...read more
George Takei Perfectly Sums Up the Hobby Lobby Ruling
Leave it to George Takei, man of Facebook and Star Trek icon to sum up the astonishing Supreme Court decision that ruled corporations get to make health care decisions for women: The ruling elevates the rights of a FOR-PROFIT CORPORATION over those of its women employees and ...read more
The Supreme Court Just Reminded Us Why It's So Important To Vote
The Supreme Court's Hobby Lobby decision makes it tempting to see its narrow ruling in Harris v. Quinn's as a minor victory on a bad day, but the case that threatened to destroy public unions is as clear an example as any that this is why you must always vote. In a 5-4 decision ...read more
SCOTUS Just Ruled Women Can Be Accosted As They Walk Into Abortion Clinics
On Thursday, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled in McCullen v. Coakley that a Massachusetts law creating a 35-foot "buffer zone" around the entrance to reproductive health clinics is unconstitutional. While the ruling is a resounding victory for free speech, it's also a victory ...read more
The Supreme Court Says, "There's an App For That," in Ruling For Cell Phone Privacy
As much as we like to complain about the U.S. Supreme Court sometimes, believe it or not they do have the ability to nail a case. On Wednesday, SCOTUS handed down a unanimous decision deeming that law enforcement cannot search the data on an arrestee's cell phone without a ...read more
THE MORNING BANTER: Fort Hood Shootings, Supreme Court Decisions, Cuban Twitter, and Red Hot Chili Memoirs
Happy Thursday! Just a few deep breaths and stiff drinks away from Friday! Here's what's happening on the interweb: 1. Fort Hood Shooting: Multiple Injuries, 4 Deaths Reported A shooting at Fort Hood on Wednesday left at least four people dead and injured multiple people. ...read more
To Put It Simply: Supreme Court Decides That Money Will Buy Every Election From Here On Out
Campaign fundraising is a really complicated issue. Or at least, it appears to be very complicated. Somehow, what seems to be a very simple concept -- that money is the dirty part of politics and it probably should have the most oversight and regulation -- has gotten really ...read more
Supreme Court Strikes Down Voting Rights Act Clause
The Supreme Court has struck down a key part of the Civil Rights electoral law designed to protect minority voters. Here's what you need to know: Reports the BBC: By a margin of 5-4, the justices quashed section 4 of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. They ruled that an updated ...read more
Supreme Things.
Oyez, oyez: the first blog post of Juris Dispatch is in session. If you are at work, reading this from your phone on a train, or seeing this in a coffee shop, please rise for the “honorable” Evan Fleischer, who shall hold forth on matters concerning the United States of America ...read more