OK...

I've been ignoring this thread, but finally out of sheer boredom opened it tonight.

Speaking as a confirmed liberal, I have to say that I don't approve of SEVERAL of the Supreme Court's decisions, and do feel that there are any number of people who could do a better job, in my opinion.

However, it's still opinion. As Doug points out quite clearly, ANYONE is qualified to sit as a justice on the Court. Any further refinement is due to bickering between the various parties, and ANY judgement of 'quality' will very likely be quickly lost in the morass of partisan bickering.

Do I like him? No. Do I wish someone more acceptable to my personal beliefs were in his place? Yes. Does this matter one tiny bit in the grand scheme of things beyond thems that are willing to let me buttonhole them endlessly on politics?

No.

He's there. He's not done anything that would disqualify him from being a justice - as there really doesn't appear to be anything that would. All the arguing in the world won't change that.

Personally, I think that while the court has an identifiable 'conservative' bent, and the handling of the 'election' issue would be worth investigating (if there were a mechanism), overall the justices have shown their willingness to apply the Constitution to the cases brought before them.

So, rather than concentrate on the negatives, with 40 minutes to go before 'the 4th', I'll concentrate on a few positives.

Kudos to the court for striking down the use of thermal imaging of a house without a warrant, viewing it as a violation of 'unreasonable search'.

Kudos to the court for upholding the Federal drug policies over the state 'medicinal marijuana' laws, yet not striking them down - in essence telling the states that while they do not have primacy in this issue (i.e., state laws are still subordinate to directly related federal laws), that they just need to convince the Fed to change things. (In my opinion, this could have opened the door for psychos in the states creating any number of bad laws, and using this as a referendum for racial, gender or any other bias discrimination).

Anyone else have something POSITIVE?

M