By Ruth A. Sheets
I hope everyone was as embarrassed as I was last week when our Supreme Court heard two cases, neither of which should have even come to them. The first about whether Idaho can refuse medical help to women whose pregnancies are in trouble, and the second, whether Donald Trump has immunity for the crimes he committed while president and after.
I was shocked as well as embarrassed by the conservatives' disregard for the truth, dismissal of reality, ignorance of women's rights to life, and pretending Donald Trump needed immunity to carry out his duties as president. The six conservatives are all supposed to be lawyers who know our Constitution, all of it, including the amendments, as well as the laws of our nation. If I were one of their law school professors, I would have been appalled and frustrated at how little they had learned or how badly they had been corrupted over the years.
There have been clues all along that these 5 men and one woman are not worthy of being on our highest court and were only nominated and passed because of their ideological stances or to meet particular political needs of the president in office at the time of the nomination. They regularly rule in favor of very rich individuals and corporations. They have undermined the rights of people of color and women as often as they thought they could get away with it, and they have employed neither a moral compass or any kind of ethics code in their rulings. I hold Chief Justice John Roberts responsible for most of it, but the others jump right in working to dismantle our democracy. When they were being vetted, no discernable effort was made to determine whether each functioned with a moral compass or could discern truth from lies, and reality from rich guy fantasyland, and any Senator who voted for them is also to blame.
Clarence Thomas was credibly accused of sexual harassment but the woman who was his target was maligned rather than holding responsible the man who would be given a life term on our highest court.
Samuel Alito had racist and misogynistic tendencies in previous jobs, but somehow, George W. Bush picked him and set him loose on Americans, just waiting to put women under male control has he saw as the reality back in the 17th century or earlier.
John Roberts had a strong racist position against the Voting Rights Act which he was rather open about, a Voting Rights Act passed several times, mostly unanimously. That Act made it necessary for the states that had done the most to limit voting for people of color required to get permission to make any voting changes. Roberts got the chance to ditch the most important parts of the Voting Rights Act in 2013 and whenever a gerrymandering case comes up that would correct inequities in voting, he will nix it, with rare exceptions. He’s not fond of women’s rights either and proves that regularly too.
Brett Kavanaugh was credibly accused of sexual assault, but somehow, Republicans didn’t see that as a problem at all, even the women on the Judiciary Committee.
Amy Coney Barrett had so little experience as a judge it is clear she got to join the Supremes because she was biddable, willing to go along with whatever Trump and his Justice “friends” commanded. Her cultlike upbringing in a super conservative religious group primed her to be that kind of submissive gal and she rarely steps out of line. She’s also a Christian nationalist which is completely against the Constitution, of course.
In addition to all that, the most recent three Trump justices lied in their Senate hearings. They all said precedent was critical and it would take a lot for them to overturn precedent. Well, actually, not that much, just an Alito manifesto that cited a 17th Century witch-hunter to take away women’s right to choose, leaving it to the states and in nearly half the states, abortion is illegal or severely restricted, supposedly for religious reasons, of course. And you thought we had freedom of religion. So did I.
In the first hearing last week, the state of Idaho claimed that it should not have to treat pregnant women who claimed to need an abortion, until they were near death (or some such nonsense, their argument was really not clear, but it didn’t matter to the conservatives). It was clear to me that the woman’s life, in the conservatives’ eyes would/should be irrelevant. It was not possible to figure out what the justices wanted or what the state’s lawyer in the court wanted either, but one can guess. What will be the next target for further harming women? It is guaranteed there will be one because people who get off on cruelty have to keep going, and these guys will.
When the “Trump immunity hearing” opened, it was clear at least most of the conservative justices were entertaining giving immunity to Donald Trump, whining that if they didn’t, future presidents would be hard put to do their jobs (it’s unclear what they thought those future presidents’ duties would involve that would require immunity). Should one be immune from leading a coup, from stealing documents and sharing them with unauthorized people, imprisoning or even killing an opponent? Would presidential immunity cover putting people in concentration camps, deporting 11 million people who have lived here for decades, calling out the National Guard to attack protesters, undermining our democracy, destroying our foreign relations including letting Israel do whatever it wants to the Palestinians and Putin to do whatever he wants to Ukraine? The last set is not hypothetical because those are things along with a whole lot more, that Donald Trump, candidate has said he plans to do on his first day in office as dictator.
It is hard to believe the conservative justices are not aware of the rantings of Donald Trump, a man with no ideas, and even less of a moral compass than they have. Then, there’s Trump’s dementia and delusions of grandeur. He needs his handlers just to function at all. I admit I was surprised when Justice Barrett spoke up slightly challenging the lawyers who were asking essentially for freedom to let women die rather than let them have a needed abortion. She did ask a mild question about a problem with giving Trump immunity. Being female, her questions were essentially ignored as were those of the other female justices who had far better questions and comments than the men.
The Idaho and Trump lawyers’ presentations were pathetic and just plain wrong-headed, but the points made by the male justices were inept as were their questions. The hearings were very hard to listen to. I kept thinking “this is the 21st century, how are either of these cases being argued now?” We have a 40-year law on the books called EMTALA (the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act). However, politicians in Idaho and other states are arguing that their strict anti-abortion laws and in whatever way they choose to prosecute them supersede federal law. If the Supremes agree with that insanity, it would mean hospitals would be forced to turn away pregnant patients, denying them crucial, life-saving care. Too bad, gals, a bunch of old white “Christian” men don’t care if you live or die, just that you keep that fetus inside your body for the right length of time, you know, the time those ignorant men decide for you. After that, you’re on your own until you get pregnant again. Oh yes, don’t ask for any help raising that baby even if it has extreme disabilities because it must be your fault.
Our congress needs to wake up and begin serious SC reforms before they drag us out of our democracy into something none of us should want to contemplate. They are working on it. Their delaying tactics to keep Donald Trump from being tried for inciting insurrection and stealing documents proves they care nothing for this nation and keeping us safe from a power-crazy sociopathic liar, cheat, and dictator wannabee. I have to wonder, what do they get from it those rogue justices?
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