The war on the independent judiciary is launched

[Ddrak]

Actually, Akhbar, he did speak at the event. He pre-recorded his speech and they played the tape.

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mp ... cs/3124094

Dd

[Akhbarali]

Cool, I was only going by their website that announced his replacement by another congressman. Like I said, doesn't change my opinion of the event at all but the fact that DeLay is a fanatic on the order of an Alan Keyes or Roy Moore really isn't news to me.


Akhbar

[Relbeek Einre]

The most powerful man in Congress is a crackpot - sure, I'll buy that.

But he's still the most powerful man in Congress.

[Partha]

Not to mention he's been condemned officially by the Congress at least twice more than both Clintons put together.

[Partha]

Not to mention he's been condemned officially by the Congress at least twice more than both Clintons put together.

[Embar Angylwrath]

What you been smokin' Partha? Congress doesn't doesnt "condemn" anyone.

[Embar Angylwrath]

What you been smokin' Partha? Congress doesn't doesnt "condemn" anyone.

[Embar Angylwrath]

What you been smokin' Partha? Congress doesn't doesnt "condemn" anyone.

[Embar Angylwrath]

What you been smokin' Partha? Congress doesn't doesnt "condemn" anyone.

[Relbeek Einre]

It's some good shit. I'm seein' double.

[Embar Angylwrath]

Twice as much and twice as fast as the liberal schmucks on the board.

Conservatives get things done... liberals point the finger... libertarians call it like it is.

[Chants Evensong]

Libertarians are right-wingers who want to fornicate and smoke pot. (I read something like that on a lefty site -- made me chuckle).

I think DeLay's "threat" inheres in Article III, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution, which reads in relevant part as follows:

The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish.

Congress can, if it wanted to, abolish every federal court in the nation but for the Supreme Court. It would be perfectly legal. Dumb, but legal.

I do not see this symposium as evedence of a newly declared war against an independent judiciary. In fact, I am a bit reluctant to employ militaristic metaphores to describe the ongoing tension between the various branches of goverment, but I suppose they helps frame the issue into something easier to understand.

If it is evidence of a "war" on the independent judiciary, then it is merely one minor "skirmish" related to a 200 year old "war". When FDR packed the Supreme Court in the 1930's, that was an "attack" on that Court's independence. FDR did not like certain decisions the Court made, so he packed it. Here are FDR's own words:

The Court in addition to the proper use of its judicial functions has improperly set itself up as a third house of the Congress - a super-legislature, as one of the justices has called it - reading into the Constitution words and implications which are not there, and which were never intended to be there.

http://www.hpol.org/fdr/chat/

That sounds a lot like what conservatives have been saying since Griswald.

The Symposium linked above just seems like such small potatos to call it a "declaration of war." I also happen to think that it will lead nowhere. It's just a mixture between a Schaivo hangover and other concerns conservatives have had for decades.[/u]