Conservatives who have unrealistic ideals about the past want to revert America back to a nation where brutality was a norm and infringing on the rights of another was seen as commonplace. This is where their attacks on history lessons about marginalized groups connects with their revanchist judicial mission.
under originalist reasoning, women have few if any rights. The only constitutional right of women, as women, is to vote. All else is statutory. In the most recent gun case, about the right of an abuser to have a gun, the argument is actually being made is that it was OK to harm a woman back in the day.
Originalism without an inquiry about WHY a current problem wasn't addressed by the founders is empty rhetoric, performative politics--and sadly the danger is that the Extremes are in a position to make performative politics the actual law of the land.
Why didn't the founders consider a botched execution by injection to be cruel and unusual? The answer is only "duh."
I would only add that using the term "Conservative" to describe this group of people is a distortion of the term; they are not acting out of any principles of a conservative philosophy, but rather out of a narrowly construed vision of self-interest, basically a continuous power-grab.
9 days in a cell at all for eating one’s m & m, let alone without plumbing -- and Trump still gets to strut around foisting criminal chaos on the Country... there aren’t 2 justice systems -- there is no justice and then a modicum of justice for others
"...the theory of deterrence as the reason for capital punishment — that the potential of being put to death will stop people from doing crime..." Except that it never has or else we wouldn't have such crimes after all of these years. Too many men use violence to solve their problems but violence doesn't solve any problems. The death penalty is revenge which may be momentarily satisfying but it doesn't solve any problem. The violence on Jan. 6, in Ukraine, in Israel and in Gaza will not solve problems.
We realize this is not a realistic path forward, right? At the root is a longing for monoculture, with different flavors be it religious or ethnic. We need to start calling these people racist or at the least ignorant. They reject both evidence and testimony from fellow Americans that show a flawed justice system, yet it remains one of the best both historically and worldwide.
Conservatives are increasingly asserting themselves due to the rapid changes brought by the internet. They are aggrieved and angry, personally, with all this change going on. So, they have been increasingly open to authoritarianism as a solution. The appearance of a monoculture has to be enforced at the end of a gun.
Great analysis, except the Court didn’t go back to the Founders’ meaning of the Second Amendment, they stripped it of its specific purpose - limiting Federal regulation of State Militias - and made it a pro-gun manufacturers wet dream. A return to the original meaning would allow gun laws to be judged on criteria other than the Second, such as public safety, and free local, state and federal legislatures to craft legislation responsive to the public, not the gun manufacturers’ lobby.
The cruelty *IS* the point for modern conservatives.
Their policies are designed, intentionally, to inflict maximum pain. From killing school lunch programs for underfed children (and in some states then turning around and voting themselves subsidized lunches) to voting against expansions of Medicare to repealing laws against dangerous child labor to arguing children should be executed. The cruelty is the goal.
The role money plays in our criminal justice system is a crime in itself. For profit prisons n decent defense being financially out of reach for so many, say. Rich criminals don't do a lot of hard time n conservatives have no care for folks that do.
Disclosure: I have made some glib, horrible comments regarding capital punishment in the past which I deeply regret.
Yeah. It’s the “and unusual” part they I figured provided an opening for the sadists if they wished to try to use it.
Doesn’t matter how cruel the punishment is, as long as we keep doing it, as long as we have regular weekly disembowelments, then it’s not “unusual”. So the 8th Amendment doesn’t rule it out.
I sure hope that movements like weakening the 8th Amendment one will finally wake up the Democratic Party that the fascist GOP will not play nice, does not believe in Democracy except as a tool to manipulate gullible liberals, and that they better read some history about Mussolini's or Hitler's rise to power because that history is repeating itself in the USA right now.
I hold educators responsible for some of this mess because most Americans graduate clueless that the USA once tolerated a vibrant Nazi movement right here in our homeland while Hitler was taking over Europe. The Nazi's successfully kept the USA out of WWII for years - until Pearl Harbor. Celebrity pilot Charles Lindberg celebrated Hitler and the Nazi's. So did a famous Detroit radio evangelist, Father Charles Coughlin. Jan 6th apparently did not make Americans "woke" to the danger our domestic fascist Republican party presents. People like Governor's Abbot and DeSantis have actively been working to un-woke America as a distraction from their insurrectionist goals. Texas and Florida are getting more fascist by the day. I live in Florida.
Finally, re #8, the US government has been violating that amendment since WWII. The USA still maintains an off-shore concentration and torture camp in Guantanamo Cuba. But, of course, prisoner abuse by America is common both domestically and in the 85 nations in which we have occupying forces. Keep in mind that one US governor, Ron DeSantis, worked full-time to advise senior US military officers on how to conduct "legal" torture - while he stood by and watched.
I've always felt that people who promote this type of thing; cruel and unusual punishment, should experience some of it, so
they can get an up close
and personal feeling of what
it's like, before they jump
up and down in favor of it.
Imagine Clarence Thomas
in a "dry cell" for nine days.
But he says he likes being with common people & relishes their simple life,...
Sadistic and barbaric is what I call these conservatives.
Conservatives who have unrealistic ideals about the past want to revert America back to a nation where brutality was a norm and infringing on the rights of another was seen as commonplace. This is where their attacks on history lessons about marginalized groups connects with their revanchist judicial mission.
Back to a time, when white men were undisputed masters, women had no vote, and blacks had no rights.
Blacks and indigenous and often immigrants too.
Not sure what your point is. But “indigenous” means the earliest known inhabitants of an area, so calling them “immigrants” doesn’t make sense.
And many blacks were brought here against their will. I wouldn’t refer to kidnap victims who had no choice as immigrants.
under originalist reasoning, women have few if any rights. The only constitutional right of women, as women, is to vote. All else is statutory. In the most recent gun case, about the right of an abuser to have a gun, the argument is actually being made is that it was OK to harm a woman back in the day.
Vox has an excellent article on this. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/the-supreme-court-confronts-its-own-failure-in-an-appalling-case-about-guns/ar-AA1iKLuo?ocid=winp1taskbar&cvid=3ddb15b8f1a8495de55eb50d5c191d2f&ei=10
Originalism without an inquiry about WHY a current problem wasn't addressed by the founders is empty rhetoric, performative politics--and sadly the danger is that the Extremes are in a position to make performative politics the actual law of the land.
Why didn't the founders consider a botched execution by injection to be cruel and unusual? The answer is only "duh."
I would only add that using the term "Conservative" to describe this group of people is a distortion of the term; they are not acting out of any principles of a conservative philosophy, but rather out of a narrowly construed vision of self-interest, basically a continuous power-grab.
9 days in a cell at all for eating one’s m & m, let alone without plumbing -- and Trump still gets to strut around foisting criminal chaos on the Country... there aren’t 2 justice systems -- there is no justice and then a modicum of justice for others
Waiting to die by the state, never knowing if you’ll get a reprieve is torture.
The antics of today's conservatives are cruel and USUAL.
"...the theory of deterrence as the reason for capital punishment — that the potential of being put to death will stop people from doing crime..." Except that it never has or else we wouldn't have such crimes after all of these years. Too many men use violence to solve their problems but violence doesn't solve any problems. The death penalty is revenge which may be momentarily satisfying but it doesn't solve any problem. The violence on Jan. 6, in Ukraine, in Israel and in Gaza will not solve problems.
The.
Cruelty.
Is.
The.
Point.
We realize this is not a realistic path forward, right? At the root is a longing for monoculture, with different flavors be it religious or ethnic. We need to start calling these people racist or at the least ignorant. They reject both evidence and testimony from fellow Americans that show a flawed justice system, yet it remains one of the best both historically and worldwide.
Conservatives are increasingly asserting themselves due to the rapid changes brought by the internet. They are aggrieved and angry, personally, with all this change going on. So, they have been increasingly open to authoritarianism as a solution. The appearance of a monoculture has to be enforced at the end of a gun.
These people are extremely dangerous.
This.
Great analysis, except the Court didn’t go back to the Founders’ meaning of the Second Amendment, they stripped it of its specific purpose - limiting Federal regulation of State Militias - and made it a pro-gun manufacturers wet dream. A return to the original meaning would allow gun laws to be judged on criteria other than the Second, such as public safety, and free local, state and federal legislatures to craft legislation responsive to the public, not the gun manufacturers’ lobby.
The cruelty *IS* the point for modern conservatives.
Their policies are designed, intentionally, to inflict maximum pain. From killing school lunch programs for underfed children (and in some states then turning around and voting themselves subsidized lunches) to voting against expansions of Medicare to repealing laws against dangerous child labor to arguing children should be executed. The cruelty is the goal.
The role money plays in our criminal justice system is a crime in itself. For profit prisons n decent defense being financially out of reach for so many, say. Rich criminals don't do a lot of hard time n conservatives have no care for folks that do.
Disclosure: I have made some glib, horrible comments regarding capital punishment in the past which I deeply regret.
They are fine with “cruel.” They just don’t like it to be “unusual.”
Yeah. It’s the “and unusual” part they I figured provided an opening for the sadists if they wished to try to use it.
Doesn’t matter how cruel the punishment is, as long as we keep doing it, as long as we have regular weekly disembowelments, then it’s not “unusual”. So the 8th Amendment doesn’t rule it out.
Right?
It might confuse the children. 🙄
I sure hope that movements like weakening the 8th Amendment one will finally wake up the Democratic Party that the fascist GOP will not play nice, does not believe in Democracy except as a tool to manipulate gullible liberals, and that they better read some history about Mussolini's or Hitler's rise to power because that history is repeating itself in the USA right now.
I hold educators responsible for some of this mess because most Americans graduate clueless that the USA once tolerated a vibrant Nazi movement right here in our homeland while Hitler was taking over Europe. The Nazi's successfully kept the USA out of WWII for years - until Pearl Harbor. Celebrity pilot Charles Lindberg celebrated Hitler and the Nazi's. So did a famous Detroit radio evangelist, Father Charles Coughlin. Jan 6th apparently did not make Americans "woke" to the danger our domestic fascist Republican party presents. People like Governor's Abbot and DeSantis have actively been working to un-woke America as a distraction from their insurrectionist goals. Texas and Florida are getting more fascist by the day. I live in Florida.
Finally, re #8, the US government has been violating that amendment since WWII. The USA still maintains an off-shore concentration and torture camp in Guantanamo Cuba. But, of course, prisoner abuse by America is common both domestically and in the 85 nations in which we have occupying forces. Keep in mind that one US governor, Ron DeSantis, worked full-time to advise senior US military officers on how to conduct "legal" torture - while he stood by and watched.