So the two dissenting. It’s obvious they have no care for the actual rule of law unless it helps Republicans. Shouldn’t people that have no hint of neutrality be removed from the bench?
It’ll be interesting to see who pays for his legal fees once he’s no longer POTUS.
Timex
4872
No, they were confirmed.
The point where you should weigh neutrality takes place prior to confirmation.
About that, and I’ll go to the Ken White well yet again:
Since when has he ever bothered to begin with?
I sort of tend to agree. At least from a mid-July perspective things look like a “It’s the pandemic, stupid” sort of thing for the election in November.
I don’t say it’s horse trading, but it really seems like horse trading. The liberal wing get some conservatives on board with siding with Vance in return for punting on the question of Congressional subpoenas. Both decisions have the probable effect of pushing any revelations about Trump’s taxes until well after the election. Vance has to keep what he gets secret since it is a grand jury proceeding, and remanding the Congressional subpoena back for more consideration runs out the clock, as you suggested. So Roberts gets to uphold a principle while at the same time protecting a Republican President, while the liberal justices get to uphold the principle while getting a mild win in one case and a deferral rather than dismissal of the other.
Presidential temperament, but he can grow into the office.
(Alternative: WAAH. 😱)
Timex
4879
I know the trump tax thing is gonna get folks worked up, but I think McGirt is a much bigger deal.
So, here’s a map of the indian reservations which are, apparently, still in effect (despite Oklahoma saying they weren’t).
So, basically the entire eastern half of Oklahoma.
The fact that these are now tribal lands though, has some…immense implications.
But I’m just gonna point out one:
Do American Indians and Alaska Natives pay taxes?
Yes. They pay the same taxes as other citizens with the following exceptions:
- Federal income taxes are not levied on income from trust lands held for them by the U.S.
- State income taxes are not paid on income earned on a federal Indian reservation.
- State sales taxes are not paid by Indians on transactions made on a federal Indian reservation.
- Local property taxes are not paid on reservation or trust land.
That, alone, seems like it’s going to be huge. It seems like half of Oklahoma doesn’t need to pay taxes to anyone other than the Tribes.
Must be nice to be a career criminal with an army of lawyers who constantly kick the can down the road. Much like a mob boss, strangely.
I agree that Alito has been a trainwreck, but I don’t see how Popehat considers him worse than Thomas. Thomas has been an absolute travesty, and that’s not even counting HOW he came to the bench to begin with.
I wonder if it means they can set up a tribal government? That would be interesting if it was limited to members of the tribe.
My grandparents, long gone, retired to Tahlequah, which was and may still be the head of the Cherokee Nation. It’s where the Trail of Tears ended I believe. I still have family there.
I think (but I don’t know, you’d have to ask Ken himself) that he bases that thinking off Thomas being essentially a bland, rubber stamp to the conservative wing of the court who never actually does anything except be evil in that sort of bland, vile, passive way.
Alito, on the other hand, goes out of his way to write terrible opinions and just generally be actively trying to be the devil incarnate.
Thrag
4884
This is a good summary of today. it was always at best going to go back to the lower courts. The nail biter was if the conservative wing of the supreme court was going to abandon checks and balances completely.
This is why I’m relatively relaxed about Alito being replaced by Trump. Although it’s possible to conceive of a worse jurist in principle, I struggle to think of a single decision where that would have made a difference to the actual vote.
I guess I’m sort of a cautious agree? Sending the question of the Congressional subpoena back to the district court to more thoroughly consider separation of powers issues implies quite strongly that the Court will toss out the subpoena if the lower court does not do that for them. Given that the Court has previously upheld the power of Congress to subpoena the President, balking at this subpoena suggests that they’ll eventually rule on some standard which reduces the scope of Congressional subpoena powers, which strikes me as a bad thing.
Reading Thomas’s dissent in Mazars, he seems to be arguing that Congress has no power to subpoena the documents of private citizens? Am I reading this right?
