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Subscribe to RSSLittle known outside the elite world of Supreme Court lawyers only a few weeks ago, Donald Verrilli has become famous -- or notorious, depending on one’s point of view -- for his oral arguments before the high court in the health care cases last month and in the Arizona illegal immigration case this week.
Observers have panned Verrili’s performances and point to comments by some of the justices showing impatience with how he made the Obama administration’s case.
Art Lien / AFP - Getty Images
This courtroom sketch by Art Lien shows Solicitor General Donald Verrilli, right, speaking to Justice Antonin Scalia on March 26, 2012 as he argues his case before the Supreme Court in Washington, DC.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor told Verrilli during Wednesday’s oral argument, “General, I'm terribly confused by your answer. Okay? And I don't know that you're focusing in on what I believe my colleagues are trying to get to.”
"Obama's Lawyer Chokes Again" the Drudge Report headlined Wednesday, while in The Daily Beast, Arizona journalist Terry Greene Sterling, called Verrilli’s performance “a humiliating slap-down of the U.S. solicitor general … Verrilli lost focus and failed to drive home key points.”
“There have been a lot of attacks on the left on Verrilli,” said University of Wisconsin political scientist Ryan Owens, co-author of The Solicitor General and the United States Supreme Court: Executive Branch Influence and Judicial Decisions, an empirical study of the performance of solicitors general.
“There’s some grumbling that he hasn’t performed ably,” Owens said. “If he loses this Arizona case, then you might start to see calls” for Obama to find a new solicitor general.
“It seems to me, though, that the president is in a kind of complicated political position here. Let’s assume that the court strikes down the individual mandate and assume that the court sides with Arizona,” Owens said. “If he replaces Verrilli, it makes it difficult to make the Supreme Court look like it is activist -- and it seems he’s going to try to do that as he runs for re-election. Instead it looks as though Verrilli sort of lost the case.”
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The solicitor general’s job is to decide when the United States should appeal a case it has lost in a lower court and when it should file an amicus brief in a case in which it is not a party. The solicitor general doesn’t personally argue every Supreme Court case involving the federal government -- he has a staff of lawyers who argue many of them -- but he does often argue the highest profile ones.
Among those who have served as solicitor general, five have gone on to become justices of the Supreme Court: William Howard Taft, Robert Jackson, Thurgood Marshall, Stanley Reed and Elena Kagan.
Some high court observers think the current denigration of Verrilli is unwarranted.
As demonstrators stood outside the Supreme Court protesting the 2010 Arizona law known as SB 1070, the justices at the high court appeared sympathetic to the provision that allows police in Arizona to check the immigration status of anyone suspected of being in the U.S. illegally. NBC's Pete Williams reports.
The criticism “has been overstated and at times unfair,” said Elizabeth Wydra, chief counsel of the Constitutional Accountability Center, a liberal legal think tank. “His arguments, along with the briefs filed in the health care and Arizona cases give the justices every argument they need to side with General Verrilli in both cases. While I wish he would have emphasized the Constitution's text and history more, because those sources are so strongly on the Administration's side in both cases, that is a strategic judgment call more than a criticism."
Andrew Pincus, a partner in the Mayer Brown law firm who has argued 23 cases before the Supreme Court and is co-director of Yale Law School’s Supreme Court Advocacy Clinic, said the criticism was “completely unfair and completely inaccurate.”
He said, “In order to assess whether someone is doing a good job in a Supreme Court oral argument, you have to understand what a Supreme Court argument is: It’s not a speech; it doesn’t have to be flowery, it’s not pretty. The whole notion is to provide answers to the concerns that animate the justices’ questions – and do so in a way the advances your cause both with that justice and with court as a whole.”
He added, “I’ve read some people who say, Gee, the solicitor general didn’t make some of the arguments that were suggested by some of the questions by justices who appeared to be favorably inclined in the health care argument.”
But he said, “My guess is if I were him, I would have done exactly what he did -- because a lot of the arguments that were being suggested would alienate other justices whose votes are probably critical to the outcome of the (Affordable Care Act) case.”
Many accounts of Wednesday’s Arizona argument mentioned the awkward moment when Sotomayor told Verrilli, “Putting aside your argument that this -- that a systematic cooperation is wrong -- you can see it's not selling very well -- why don't you try to come up with something else?”
Related: As immigration case goes before high court, what it means for 2012
But Pincus said, “It’s quite typical that justices say, ‘your argument isn’t convincing me.’ It may be the only argument that’s available. And it may be an argument that’s not necessarily directed to the justice who’s asking the question, but is directed to some other justices who may have a different perspective.”
He added that statements the solicitor general makes in oral argument “are quoted back to the government later in the Supreme Court, in lower courts. You can’t just say, ‘I’ll say anything to win this case.’”
In sum, Pincus said, “No one could ever know if the (oral) argument is why you win or not – and in 99.9 percent of the cases, it almost certainly isn’t.”
Owens agrees with that assessment up a to a point: “While the quality of oral argument is not the primary driver of justices’ decisions, a strong performance can increases a party’s odds of success -- so in this particular (Arizona) case it’s quite possible that a stronger argument by the solicitor general might have persuaded Justice Kennedy or Chief Justice Roberts. It’s too early to tell where those justices are going to come down. It’s quite possible that Verrilli’s argument, as weak as it seems to have been, maybe it did win the day,”
The Supreme Court enters its final day of hearings on the president's health care law on Wednesday, and the Morning Joe panel discusses the controversial individual mandate, the Solicitor General Donald Verrilli's flawed arguments, and why observers can't read too much into oral arguments.
Pincus said it’s a mistake to imagine that a virtuoso performance by the solicitor general – as in Hollywood movies where a lawyer saves his client from the death penalty – will tip a case in the government’s favor.
“It’s not like you’re going to walk into the courtroom and come up with a new legal argument that no one has thought of before and really wow them. Eighty-five percent of your presentation is the written product (the legal briefs),” he said. “In fact the court would be quite surprised and it would be an admission of weakness in your case and not having thought it through, for you to stand up and say, ‘Throw out everything I’ve said in the written briefs. I’ve now got a great new idea!’ It’s the writing of the briefs that frames the legal argument in the case.”
While in Congress and the news media outside the Supreme Court, the burning issue in the Arizona immigration case was whether the Arizona law was on its face invalid because it would require racial profiling, that’s not the argument the Obama administration chose to make.
Instead it argued that the state was treading on the federal responsibility to regulate immigration.
Roberts made that quite clear in his very first question to Verrilli as soon as he stood up to begin on Wednesday: “No part of your argument has to do with racial or ethnic profiling, does it? I saw none of that in your brief.” Verrilli replied, “That's correct.”
If the Arizona is allowed to stand and is enforced, the racial profiling issue may be decided in some future case.
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The Supremes are going to revoke Obama's attempts to usurp the rights of the People and State's Rights.
As they should.
Ya right...evidentally you missed their decision on strip searches regardless if there was probable cause or not.
It seems likely that the core of the Arizona law is going to be allowed to stand. This will be a huge slap in the face to the Obama administration. I also have a strong feeling that the individual mandate, and with it the rest of Obamacare, is going to go down as well. The majority of the court did not seem to buy the administration's arguments in either of these cases. I think that the Arizona law should stand because it does not infringe on the federal government's right to set immigration policy as the administration tried to argue. All it really does it make it a state crime to violate an existing federal law. Since there are already federally run programs to train state and local police on the enforcement of these same federal laws, I do not see how the court would strike down the AZ law. As for the health care law, I think the court recognized the danger in allowing the federal government to force individuals to do business with private corporations and will strike down the mandate for that reason. Verrilli did not seem to give the majority of the justices any good reason to support the administration position in either case.
yes and a Supreme Court also ruled in the famous Dred Scott decision also and then there is the Lockner Court.... so don't assume the court has any clue what it is doing? And then of course we have New Haven eminent domain and Citizen's United....enough said!
The Supremes are going to revoke Obama's attempts to usurp the rights of the People and State's Rights.
I think you are making assumptions about both the Constitution and Federal law that are flat out wrong.
This article is not about anything except the Solicitor General's "performence" in arguing this one case in front of the Supreme Court. It is not about whether you like Obama or even whether you agree with the Supreme Court. I have a couple of points that seem to have been missed.
1) Long before this both sides presented length written arguments and rebuttals to the other sides' arguments. This is the primary thing that the Supreme Court is considering. If it isn't in the written brief, it does not exist except in the minds of the Justices and they aren't telling. The Justices have been poring over these briefs, and have their own staffs of legal experts and researchers poring over them.
2) Oral arguments are a chance for the Justices to ask questions, to try to score or emphasize points that are important to them individually, and to try to a much lesser degree to convince one another. Historically, what they have said or how the lawyers arguing the cases have presented do not seem to have swayed Justices very much at all. In fact the last time I can find that court historians think that a lawyer swayed even a single vote was Thurgood Marshal arguing Murray versus Pearson in front of the 7-2 court that had established "separate but equal." Everyone said that he performed dismally and that his arguments fell on deaf ears. But court clerks said long after that several of the Justices wept at the thought that separate but equal was going to fall.
3) The Justices don't want cameras in the Court because they well know that they would be considered by the public to be dismissive, flippant, and rude to both the lawyers and one another, constaltly interrupting the lawyers and one another and making snide remarks and almost constant stage whispering. They allow sound recordings because they are vain, but also because they realize that rolling eyes don't show on a sound recording and that even though the same snideness and rudeness would be there, the public would be unsure of who said it.
4) While the Republicans are gleefully anticipating that the Court will strike down all or part of AHCA and will uphold at least parts of the Arizona immigration law, they see it as a huge slap at Obama. My observations there are a) it speaks much more about Congress than Obama, since the mandate was a Republican idea inserted by Republicans. This could end up putting the GOP in a serious put up or shut up position that they do not want to be in. b) Striking down AHCA would put health care back on the political agenda at exactly the worst time for Romney, given his history on the subject. This would seriously undercut Romney's ability to stay on message which is already pretty doubtful (etch-a-sketch?) This issue alone could cost him the election. and c) Upholding the Arizona immigration law would almost certainly force the entire Latino vote into the Democratic camp for the next 40+ years. Latinos who are American citizens have not been famous for bloc-voting except for Cubanos in Miami/Dade. This would turn them into solid bloc-voters because they simply see it as harrassment of them as Americans. This could well cost Romney much of the midwest and destroy a number of GOP House candidates and a couple of GOP Senate candidates.
Most polls show that about 60+% of likely voters see this as Republican led obstructionism and are not in favor of it. The GOP right wing simply cannot continue to take 30% positions and expect to win any more national elections. If you define swing states properly (as the states by which a candidate wins by the narrowest margin that puts him over the necessary wining electoral votes) then Obama is solidly ahead and states like Arizona are seeing themselves relegated from being swing states to being irrelevant states.
And Arizona still ended up with Daylight Savings Tims despite spending more money on opposing DST than on child welfare services for the whole state for the same period of time.
Dear FactoftheMatter: As an attorney, allow me to inform you that the Supreme Court essentially destroyed your rights AND state's rights in Citizens v United by giving platinum citizenship to corporations while declaring money to be the equivalent of free speech.
The Affordable Care Act is already helping over 4 million adult children stay on their parents' insurance to age 26, and providing free preventive care to seniors.
We are the ONLY developed nation in the world that hasn't adopted some form of national health care system before now, along with being the only one allowing for-profit health care across the board. And our health care is the most expensive in the world, for very poor return--we're 38th in health care competence.
ObamaCare is entirely within precedent long-established under the Commerce Clause.
Verrilli had no response to Scalia's question comparing the personal mandate to broccoli, but here's one: the comparison is illogical because the federal government is not paying for half the broccoli consumed in the USA, nor does it have any interest in controlling the price of broccoli, because broccoli prices are stabile. On the contrary, the fed already pays for fully half of all health care, every person will use the health care system at some point, & therefore the government has a profound interest in controlling prices that have soared uncontrollably in recent years.
True conservatives do not assert that people who voluntarily refuse to buy health insurance should get a free ride. But the notion people have some 'right' NOT to buy means exactly that, because hospitals are required to treat everybody. And no conservative Christian should argue let's leave the freeloaders to die, because that conflicts outright with the message of Jesus Christ: "Whatsoever you do for the least of my brethren, you do for Me." Conservatives/evangelicals cannot have it both ways.
What you may see as a 'right not to buy' is more accurately merely a current privilege to freeload--one that must be revoked. There remains, then, only two choices: get everybody into the insurance pool so everybody is covered at lower cost, or deny care to non-buyers. The latter costs us our humanity.
As for Arizona's anti-immigration law, I hope the Supreme Court upholds it--that will guarantee Obama's victory in November and a fully Democratic Congress for him to work with, defeating the "Just say NO" anti-Obama tactics instituted by the Republican Party before the man was even inaugurated in January, 2008.
What's odd about people like you: you hate Washington & government, but you unthinkingly support the most intransigent & change-resistant Washington insiders in existence, for example, Boehner & McConnell, who've made themselves very wealthy through lifetime careers of self-service rather than service to the people who vote for them. You have been duped into voting against your own best interests, time after time after time.
Along comes a good man, far smarter and better educated than most of our Presidents, a Washington outsider who experienced a poor childhood and struggled against prejudice to achieve great things, who supports the middle class more than anybody else in Washington, who understands that without strong government the bullies just take from the rest--and you despise him because of the color of his skin.
Dee, I had to get just one line in before I realized you might be misstating your credentials. Citizens United didn't in any way reduce my rights, and money has for a very long time been equated as speech. Even Vallejo, the granddaddy of the modern campaign finance opinions, saw it as money. Thanks for wasting my time with your post.
One of the outstanding arguments here is: Sure, Obama's administration may have the LEGAL RIGHT to enforce Immigration, BUT.......if they're NOT doing it, then the STATES do have the RIGHT to help the Government ENFORCE Immigration Law.
The STATES are NOT USURPING the Government's RIGHT to enforce Immigration Law, they are merely HELPING the Government in the ENFORCEMENT of Immigration Law.
Clearly, the Obama administration DOES NOT want to HEAR about Illegal Immigration. They'd just as soon BURY their heads in the sand, for a good KICK in the rear.
This is ONE reason I'm NOT voting for Obama this year in November.
Ralph, there is an interesting outcome of this case should it go the way of Mr. Obama. No one is denying that the feds have the power to establish immigration policy. But you make a good point...what to do when the feds then do not enforce those laws? If Mr. Obama wins this case then it would further signal to the federal government that it has supremacy (we all already know this) of policy, but in making policy it can then choose to not follow it, and can prevent states from helping execute the stated policy or law. There is a word used to describe this kind of government: Despotic.
Imagine that. We elected a president who supports a despotic outcome. Our nation is in danger. Our constitution is upside-down.
Dee as an attorney your every word is blah, blah, blah drink more koolaid
The only difference between a dead skunk in the road and a dead attorney in the road is the skunk has skid marks in front of it.
Keep talking the prejudice crap maybe that will help your case but I think the entire world knows the great divider is half white so your case is half wrong.
Nobody is pointing out the obvious: The SCOTUS will decide if:
1. healthcare is a right or a priviledge.
2. whether health insurance companies have the 'right' to overcharge you.
3. whether insurance companies have the 'right' to deny healthcare coverage when they feel like it.
4. whether a state can choose to ignore any federal law when they (the state) doesn't like it's enforcement (or lack thereof).
These are real issues, and if Obamacare is struck down - the federal government should cancel all healthcare for government employees. Let congress and the SCOTUS buy insurance on the market if they can (with their pre-conditions like cancer, smoking, overweight, etc). Perhaps this would cause their attitude to change?
And if the AZ law is sanctioned by the SCOTUS, Obama should pull all the border patrol out of AZ - and let the state fund it all.
@ Dee & Chris. You should be careful...you guys are spinning so much you are bound to get dizzy.
He has appeared much more unprepared and focused than one would imagine he would be. When you have the liberal judges carrying the argument (healthcare) and liberal judges telling you where you should be focusing (immigration), you really have to wonder why they have him in front of the court. Surely there are better people out there.
Dee: You made a very fine argument and I respect your knowledge as a lawyer. However, when you say that conservatives despise President Obama for the color of his skin, you are dead wrong. We conservatives (most of us) don't look at people like the liberals do. We look at each person as a person and not as a member of a subgroup. We do not like the President's policies; the man, many of us admire. Personally, in 2008 I weeped with pride that we as a nation, it seemed, had left race behind us and elected our FIRST black president.
The reason we get blamed for being racist is because we don't believe a subgroup should be treated any different that the rest of the population. This is a basic conservative belief. A belief that has caused us to be labeled as a intolerant, hateful people. We are tired of being labeled this way. We believe ALL are equal under the law. We love our fellow man and want only what is best for all of them. We give to charities, not only because of the tax implications but because of this love and concern for our fellow man.
We believe that every person in this country has the ability to achieve and want them to be successful. We believe that the poor in this country are poor, in part, because of the efforts of the left to "take care" of them giving the poor little motivation to be self sufficient. We support you in helping those who ARE unable to help themselves.
I know you, and other liberals, have strong feelings to the contrary and will list a litany of perceived hateful behaviors of the right.
Know that our intentions are NOT that of hate, but of genuine concern and love for out fellow countrymen and women.
The "good Christians" will applaud any law that berates the "brown tide."
How long until the old white bigots die off, so that we can start making decisions that are good for the country?
Could it be that none of your points exists, and that is why they aren't being pointed out?
The USSC isn't there to determine if health care is a right or a priviledge. Their job is to decide if Obamacare comports with the Constitution and the limitations on federal power.
And it isn't there to decide if you can be charged more than you want to pay for something. But if a case ever got to it where a private contract was not being honored this way then it might surprise you how they would rule.
And no one has ever argued that insurers can deny you health care anytime they want. They are obligated by the contract you have with them just as much as you are. See above answer.
You fourth point is equally dumb. Arizona isn't arguing they can ignore the federal law, or supercede it. They are arguing they have a power to enforce it as well, as with most every other federal law. I can't think of any federal laws which states have not in the past helped to enforce.
Your last point is the scariest of all. If you don't get your judicial way you would instead find other ways to punish the state of Arizona for following the law, while excusing the president for not. I don't know how many other people like you exist in the USA, but even one is too many. I think you've forgotten, assuming you ever knew it at all, what the constitution means, let alone says.
AtticusFlinched
You sound like my grandfather (rest in peace). He used to make racist comments and jokes, then spend twenty minutes explaining why he was not a bigot.
If you love America so much, how can you possibly give the police the authority to decide who *might* be here illegally?
Go back to your church and stroke your ego that you, as a good Christian, have the authority to judge others.
We can do it: Wow! You don't see which side the hate is coming from?
Well, Atticus Finch was one of my favorite characters of all time.
But you sir, would have made Atticus barf.
People like you are the problem Harper Lee was trying to expose. People who try to use ignorance as an excuse for racist policy.
I want you to know that the reason I picked this Atticus as a handle because he did the right thing defending a Black man. I have very strong feelings that what the left has done to the black family is one of the biggest sins of all time and I feel that I need to try to defend them. Multigenerational welfare has done more harm than good the to poor. The poor remain poor generation after generation.
Atticus, I believe, would be discerning enough to realize that a crime is being perpetrate on a great people of potential whose future potential is being smashed by well intended but clueless people.
Atticus,
Ok, I get it. But America is a mixed political system. Pure capitalism is a cruel, heartless system more appropriate for animals than humans.
When I hear, "poor people are incented to stay poor because of left policies" I cringe. The crash of 2008 was the blame of capitlists, that chose to exploit their unregulated "freedom."
When I hear, "illegals" it dehumanizes the discussion. It has the smack of, "God Loves America" and that is bull. Do you think Jesus likes Americans more than Mexicans?
Our country is great in much part to immigration -- both illegal and legal. Our country needs to evolve and adapt. Immigration has been the spark of evolution and adaption in the past.
Holding a dogmatic, cold eye, and saying "treat everyone the same" favors those with historic advantage, and closes the door to evolution and improvement.
And, change is clearly what America needs to survive.
Your points are valid.
I have different thoughts on immigration than my conservative friends. I believe it makes zero sense to deport families that have established themselves in the country. I favor intact families. However, If they stole an identity of another American, or broke any other law it needs to be dealt with as per the law. Bottom line I favor amnesty if we can firs secure the border.
I don't see how the crash is related to the problem of multigenerational poverty. Welfare paments have not dropped but have risen so the poor are generally unaffected by this economy.
I further believe that it is capitalism that has allowed us to live at such high standards as we do today. There have been some evil things perpetrated in the name of capitalism. Most capitalism is good and a few bad eggs have spoiled it. It does not mean we need to crush it.
Atticus,
My point is that dogma is bad.
"Pure capitalism," without regulation, resultes in a hideous lifestyle for all but the rich.
"Pure enforcement of immigration," results in a country that is left behind.
What a load of crap. It isn't pure capitalism that is a cruel heartless system, it is pure socialism. This has been proven throughout history time and again.
Illegal is illegal, period. It's a pathetic misdirect to bring in God or Mexicans, it's illegals no matter what their origin. Why don't I and my entire family come over and crash at your place, eat your food, drink you wine, and use your tools, your car, etc.? You don't claim God like you more than me right? Stupid.
We can do it: Very few believe we no zero regulation. I am a small business owner and belong to a group with others in my field. We discuss this and none of us believe in zero regulation. We do hate the regulations that halt are progress that were written several years ago and has no reason to be there.
We do not have pure capitalism. The financial crisis was caused by the greed of the banking industry AND politicians who felt that housing should be extend to those who previously were unable to qualify in the name of fairness. So it kind of baffles me that people on the left only see half of the equation when putting blame on the crash.
Hi we can do it,
As an atheist I don't have any Christian beliefs to stroke, but I do have a question for you. If the police aren't who finds and deports illegals, then who should? Or are you saying you favor a completely open border (it would obviously be open only on our side of it) and no immigration policies whatsoever?
I ask because the Arizona law mandates that any person suspected of being here illegally be turned over to the federal government for a determination of what will be done. So I guess I don't get your point at all.
Sorry for the poor english. I was being talked to by the most beautiful woman on earth. My wife.
Hey Atticus,
The left uses this canard that the right opposes all regulation, when almost no one opposes all regulation, in order to justify what amounts to complete and total regulation if they get their way. The argument about the financial/economic collapse is just one case in point. The left claims that the free market let us down--and to be frank you buy into this a bit with your agreement that greedy bankers played their part in the problem--but we had nothing even remotely similar to a free market leading up to the 2007/2008 collapse.
The repeal of Glass-Steagal, the left would claim, rendered the market completely free of regulation. There were still thousands of regulations on the RE markets, the lending business, the security business, and more, and thousands of regulators out there ostensibly "protecting" us. The problem, and here I disagree with you both, wasn't greedy bankers or politicians, the problem was us, the voters.
No one should ever expect that someone in business doesn't want to maximize their profits. The left calls this greed, but it is normal and should be expected at all times. And no one should ever expect politicians to do anything other than that which most surely gets them elected, or re-elected. What was that? They catered to voters demands for more and more and more free stuff. In this case it applied to buying real estate.
So you had politicians enacting policies, and regulators enforcing them, which encouraged people to buy a home (tax deductions, credits, low down, then no down, full value loans, and so on) which culminated with Fannie and Freddie, among others, buying up risky paper just to keep the bubble from popping. Every one of these actions distorted the free market and induced all the actors in the market to operate more irrationally. Whether it was to buy a house you could not afford, or to pay more for it than you otherwise would, or to lend money to someone who was too high a risk, the entire structure was designed to subvert the market. The market was regulated to behave this way, and we have no one to blame but ourselves. We elected the people to do what we wanted, and they did.
Atticus, what a lucky man you are! And, what a lucky woman you have.
It has been a pleasure to debate with you.
To be honest, I mostly blog to point out hypocrisy of the right.
It seems, you do something similar, to point the out hyprocisy of the left.
You are far more informed and thoughtful than most right wing bloggers I encounter. And I wanted to extend my feelings of respect for you, and for your opinions.
May America prosper.
May the world prosper.
Rich-281385
Hi we can do it,
As an atheist I don't have any Christian beliefs to stroke, but I do have a question for you. If the police aren't who finds and deports illegals, then who should
Hi Rich,
I actually favor a guest worker program, that is easy to satisfy. I believe Bush II favored the same concept.
Make it very easy to cross the border and work, legally.
Make the punishment for crossing illegally, stiff.
But, I don't think our "men in blue" in the police force should be tasked with trying to figure out who the bad guys are.
Who should find the bad guys? Well, if we have a reasonable guest worker program, I think the local Latino residents will point the police to the bad guys.
I live in Florida. The latinos are not afraid to tell the police who the bad guys are. We solved this problem decades ago, by creating an environment that makes all citizens, including legal immitgrants, comfortable with the police.
Arizona, does not encourage the Latino legal population to participate with the law. Arizona is alienating all of the Latinos.
I would agree that the legal brief is the key to whether the case is won or lost, and the 'oral arguments' are more of a 'window dressing', bbut it is an opportunity to address parts of the legal brief that may need clarification, and in this regard, the government did a poor job - but then, maybe that's all they had to work with.
It was a tough case for the Obama Administration to make anyway because the Supreme Court had previously ruled (9-0 I think) that state police officials had a right to enforce federal immigration laws, and this is not much different from the previous case - in fact, the previous case said that state police officials don't even need 'reasonable suspicion' to ask someone about their immigration status - they could walk up to anyone on a sidewalk (not in a traffic stop, etc.) and request proof of legal residency - yes - that is the law. I wouldn't be surprised by an overwhelming rejection of Obama's case.
It's interesting that both of the 'key cases' for the Obama Administration (Obamacare & Immigration) are actually issues of 'States Rights', wherein the federal government was attempting to usurp the powers of states to make these decisions - basically having an all-powerful federal government dictate vast control over our lives and freedoms (not surprising for a 'big government' advocate like Obama).
The criticism is trumped up by unhonorable people including some justices. Nothing different from what we have witnessed the last 3 yrs. Bunch of phony theatrics by phony americans. Or in short...republicans.
Hi We can do it,
I have to be frank and say that is a remarkable reply given the facts we face in the USA, including your state. I ask that you uncollapse OilmanMD's thread and see what I wrote there long ago now about guest worker programs and other things as well. But this idea that the government at the state level, through its local law enforcement agencies, should not enforce the companion laws to federal law is a weird concept to me given that your state, Florida, does much the same thing in various contexts.
Florida has a large illegal alien problem, like many other states, and it doesn't appear that your claim that people, including legal immigrants, are making the kind of impact you imply exists. But there is a larger problem with this idea, not that I don't think citizens and legal immigrants shouldn't contact the police when they have information (I do), but it is at best a very haphazard way to locate and catch illegals if for no other reason than few people, other than other illegals, know that one is an illegal alien in the USA. Most people don't spend a lot of time boasting they are here illegally, they just want to work and get on with life for the most part. Some want to commit other crimes, drugs and prostitution and so on, but they are the exception that the police should be after regardless of their immigration status anyhow.
No, I'd prefer that when cops pull someone over, or in whatever way they intersect with the person legally, that they demand identification (like they always have regardless of who you are or where you are from), and if someone raises a concern that they check with the feds to see what their status is. It's a complex problem we have with illegals and we shouldn't exclude any method to help solve it. Of course this all means that the feds will have to do a better job than they have become accustomed to performing, which is one of their objections to the AZ law--they felt the information requests would overwhelm their resources. Well, do a better job is my reply.
You have been duped into voting against your own best interests, time after time after time.
I'm a Democrat...and I voted for Obama.
I was saying earlier that Steven B here is wrong...so I agree with you.
Don't understand where you got that I was a GOP?
Sorry, but this is one of the most racist and bigoted posts I have read on here in a LONG time. You are doing the same thing to christians and whites that you accuse them of doing to blacks, but you just don't see your own bigotry, do you?
Chris-749391 - your statement "And Arizona still ended up with Daylight Savings Tims despite spending more money on opposing DST than on child welfare services for the whole state for the same period of time" makes anything else you have to say suspect.
Arizona does not observe Daylight Savings Time and never has.
The probable SG score card: 0 wins, 2 losses, 0 ties.
Let's keep him representing your administration Mr. President!
Ever wonder why this country is so screwed up? Lawyers wanting to charge as many billable hours as possible.
Legalese has replaced good old common sense, all because of greedy lawyers!
What is the most dominant occupation of the politicians? Go figure! Why does it take years to settle a
case? Money for the lawyers! Cigarette company settlement? Who got the money?
Dear AndyDude: Actually, politicians ought to be lawyers, because their job is to MAKE LAWS. We should mandate that all Congressional members be lawyers!-- because those who aren't can't even understand the laws being written--and all laws in Congress for the past 30 years have been written, not by Congress, but by private lawyers hired by corporations!
Most folks know the famous line from Shakespeare, "First of all, let's kill all the lawyers." What they don't know is the context--the play's line is spoken by two conspirators who are attempting to destroy their government and smash the protections provided by lawyers to ordinary people.
You're exactly wrong. The Republican Party has aligned with corporate interests to deny your access to the courts at every imaginable turn. Corporate lawyers have denied every privilege of employees to negotiate any terms of their employment or working conditions, gains made in the 1930s it will take at least half a century to regain.
The problem really is, the best & brightest of lawyers are paid exorbitant salaries & perks and scooped up by corporations. Government lawyers make very little by comparison.
I know. I am a retired deputy district attorney.
If you are a retired DA, given your reasoning abilities, I think society is safer. First, our founders believed that laws should be comprehendable by the most average citizen, and also believed that should there be so many laws that oen could not possibly know them all, then government itself could easily become despotic.
But second, and more importantly given your post, your claim that all laws for the past 30 years have been written by private lawyers hired by corporations is simply laughable. Not because it is provably wrong. But because you use this claim to them lambaste Republicans, apparently not knowing that in the past 30 years Democrats have held the Congressional majority for more years than less.
I think the Peter Principle has been proved today. Thank you.
President Barack Obama ON 20 MAY 2010 ordered 1,200 extra National Guard troops to boost security along the U.S.-Mexico border INCLUDING ARIZONA,President Obama own inisiatives to request another $500 million for tightening the border protection and law enforcement activities under him many illegal are DEPORTED to any standard sitting Republican President or Republican,Governor,Congress has ever done before him.
Now The Governor Jan Brewer and his Tea-Party starts to pre-empting Republican plans to try to force arizona votes on such a deployment on with its New SB1070?, pre-emptive logic,with the same FED ,but only a rasicist provision,which against the Consituation as added to clause,as what the fed law with against for? What are these Re-bug trying prove the B.S to ? But that’s the rub isn’t it,it may be their responsibility, but they’re not fulfilling that responsibility to anyone’s satisfaction, especially the state of Arizona.
Consequently, Arizona has felt the need, based in public safety and budget concerns, to take matters into its own hands.? President already added more than 20,000 Border Patrol agents are deployed now, mostly along the nation's southern border. There are 344 U.S. National Guard troops also working along the border.
Pearce, the architect of Arizona’s law testified along with three Democrats including disgraced former U.S. Sen. Dennis DeConcini, a Tucson lobbyist on behalf of for-profit prisons who retired in the wake of the Keating Five Savings and Loan scandal from which the equally tainted John McCain was able to rally. DeConcini oddly “apologized to the Latino community for Arizona’s actions ?.
The preemption doctrine has been established in Supreme Court decisions, and some legal experts have said such a federal argument likely would persuade a judge to declare the law unconstitutional. But lawyers who helped draft the Arizona legislation have expressed doubt that a preemption argument would prevail. TO PRESIDENT OBAMA, If this GOP governor wants to do it and show their trademark of pandering and lies with "NO PLAN".
Please dont Spent this Money on ARIZONA, use the Tax's Payer money for deserving "OTHER STATES".Please Pull all, your good EFFORTS out of Arizona. Let them LEARN by being backward state as always.
Please retrive,Dont reload!
And the old joke:
Q: What do you call 1,000 lawyers on the ocean floor?
A: A good start!
"If the Arizona is allowed to stand and is enforced, the racial profiling issue may be decided in some future case."
Yes...it will be decided in the next election when LEGAL Latinos finally get pissed off enough exercise their right to vote. The GOP (Gestapos on Parade) are on fire so go ahead Teathugs and keep fanning the flames!!! LOL!
Oilman,
What I never hear from you leftists is what to do, other than imprison or seriously fine employers, about illegal immigration. Why not? Certainly patriotic leftists in America, assuming that is not an oxymoron, don't want illegals to stream across our borders. Without a doubt you don't want them taken advantage of by whoever employs them because of their illegal status. You shouldn't want them to have babies here who automatically become citizens, and then as babies can petition the courts for mom and dad to stay. So, other than a political edge, what do you want?
When the vast majority of illegals in the southern states are Mexicans it wouldn't be much of a shock that Mexicans would be the most often apprehended illegal aliens in those areas, but this isn't exactly racism on display, is it? Why don't we do something meaningful, and first stop with the pathetic pandering to racial minorities. Republicans might do it too, but Democrats have elevated it to an art form.
Then, once we speak to one another as adults, how about we increase fines, and make prison a possibility for serial violators, but why don't we also either refuse social services to illegals or we reimburse with federal dollars the states affected by these costs? Emergency care to stabilize an illegal? I'm okay with that. Then it's onto a plane or bus to go back home. A fence is fine, but it's symbolic more than real, but if we are going to have a fence let's have a big gate in it so we can allow guest workers.
It's true that most jobs illegals do Americans born here don't want to, or won't, do themselves. So let in all the guest workers we need. And we could do something really helpful here...we could tie the number of guest worker visas to the number of illegals that still stream across our border. This would induce Mexico to want to help stop this trafficking too. I mean, we could reduce illegals, reduce states costs for them, improve our relations with foreign nations, provide the labor Americans won't perform, and more, but we just need to stop doing what you do, which is to care about nothing but political gain.
btw, for what it's worth, what an amazingly paternalistic and condescending view of legal latinos you possess. I mean to think that just because one is latino, in your mind, also means they must not want to do anything to stop illegal immigration? Which other racial minorities do you view as part of your plantation?
Rich - Great points all - you should know (or maybe you don't) that on this site, logical, well-thought out statements such as yours that poke holes in the left's "theories" do not sit well! I expect you to make broad generalizations about "Teabaggers" "Rethuglicans" and name calling - you'll definitely fit in better;-)
Rich,
What you often hear is what is blamed upon the GOP legislators, and not as you brought up, what the Progressive Party will do.
The nature of Progressives is to attack, attack, and attack. Their solution is to continue to tax, increase taxes, and distribute the funds to those who vote for them. Fiscal responsibility is a foreign thought to them.
My neighbor down the road, a 6th generation CA American of Mexican family is always angry when it is assumed he speaks Spanish - when he doesn't.
andydude - well said.
This whole thing stinks. Obama continues to spend taxpayers money on his personal whims. This case, OBooBoo Care, selective non enforcement of existing laws and so many others, it is disgusting.
That's what happens when you put lawyers in office, they continue to steal but with bigger bank accounts.
Wake up America, quit allowing these people to remain as parasites. BHO in 3 short years has created a larger debt than all of previous presidents combined.
You voted for change, but I don't think this is what you expected. Vote him and his cronies out in Nov.
I agree Mr. Obama has been a horrible president, with just a few exceptions that, frankly, weren't acts of political courage but were instead what you'd expect any president, even Carter, to have done. That said, let's not overstate the case. Mr. Obama has seen debt rise by over 40% in his first three years. It is if he is re-elected in November that our debt will more than double under his watch.
Republicans deserve some blame here too, but the real culprit? Voters. Most voters STILL, after all that has happened, want more free stuff. And so you see Obama trying to buy the votes of various minorities and/or special interest groups, like students with loan debt. It will only be when voters stop wanting free stuff from the government that the likes of Mr. Obama, even if he were elected, would be unable to riddle our heirs with debt so that he could buy votes today.
Dear Rich: Voters can be blamed for failing to educate themselves beyond 30-second sound bites on TV. But the failures are really those of corporate interests. We are no longer even a representative democracy; we have become an oligarchy run by a very small handful of multinational corporations with nothing but self-interest in America.
Republicans decided together to deny Obama on every point, even to blocking over 200 presidential appointments the Constitution gives them no right to stop or prevent--their Constitutional role is merely to advise. Completely hampered, Obama cannot be blamed for much of anything.
You're right people want free stuff. They want to be treated when they get sick or are injured, but they don't want to buy into health insurance. The ones that do buy health care want the freeloaders to be left untreated & die. We are losing even our most basic, essential humanity.
The most invidious problem? Go find a book by Marshall McLuhan titled Understanding Media. Everything happening now he predicted in 1970, in this book. TV owns us, and corporations own & control everything we watch. TV has made us all addictive personalities, and we buy wholesale everything we see because TV turns off the brain. We have become impassive receptors.
Half the people in this country have IQs of 87 or less--and 80 is considered retarded. Most people watch 6 to 8 hours of TV a day. Brainwashed vegetables
We've reached a point where we are disgusted by the notion of being smartly educated--it's "arrogant, what a snob!" in Rick Santorum's words. We're cutting back education at every level, guaranteeing we'll have a nation of mindless slaves soon.
All this while we must compete in a global market. "What fools we mortals be!"
I'm interested where you got the average IQ of 87. Was it from the Book "The Learning Curve"? I had A LOT of problems with that book.
Dee,
When people, left or right, want to control other people's behaviors they never fail to resort to the claim that some entity has us under their thumb, or that we must stop doing X, or must start doing Y, else we will forever be ruined. Your argument that the TV controls us misses for two main points. First, it doesn't control many, but for those it does control it does great damage. Second, the vast majority of televised material either directly supports the modern liberal ideology, or it indirectly validates it by condemning all contrary perspectives.
Why would you oppose the vast majority of the media when it has been a faithful supporter of the liberal ideology of which you subscribe? Bizarre. Your point about education is wrong as well.
There hasn't been any cuts in education other than cuts in standards. Today we spend, on average, about $130,000 to educate a person just through 12th grade, and this is not taking into account the future value of a dollar. This is an amount of money we will not, for most students who get a job, recover in federal or state income taxes they will pay, if for no other reason a significant majority of Americans with a job don't pay federal or state income taxes, or the amount is very low. So low in fact that they would have to live and work for far more than 100 years just to pay back the cost of educating them.
Does this mean we should end public education? No. But we should end the federal involvement in it. Here's why. I can't speak for all states, but in my state, California, less than 50% of the money budgeted for education from all sources actually gets to the classroom. The majority is in administration, pensions, and other things, like facilities, and the feds are a major cause of these costs. Rather than criticize, as you do, any effort to cut costs, why don't you instead look for ways to get a better product delivered for a lower price?
Whether it's competititon, or maybe setting up some schools so that parents are the Shareholders, teachers are the Board of Directors, and principals are the CEO, or maybe we could do other things more granular. Like rather than have kids of roughly the same age in a room to learn together, we instead put kids of the same ABILITY in a room to learn together? The point is that we are getting ROBBED at these prices for this product, and just stamping your feet and putting your fingers in your ears while you shout "Nyah Nyah Nyah!" isn't going to solve the problem. Why don't you give your own ideas about how to fix it? And please, make more money the last solution.
Dee Turner
With this one sentence you have blown your credibility right out the window.
A simple internet search shows that the average IQ in the US is 98, ranked 18th in the world and the average time watching TV is 2.7hrs.
I think Dee is completely a fraud. The role of Congress is to advise AND CONSENT to Presidential appointments. The President specifically is required to seek the approval of Congress for his appointement to prevent unilateral cronyism in the Federal government.
Any lawyer would know this...even a bad one.
Jck335, congratulations. You have written a wonderful piece that , along with horrible grammar, and a multitude of mis-spellings, says absolutely nothing. I was so amazed i read it twice. other than your obvious attempt to show hatred for those pesky republicans, you wasted a lot of time to say what one sentence could have said. " I don't know anything, nor do I know how to say it".
The oral arguments are not the problem that the conservative justices on the Court have. While the Courts of Appeal have been split on upholding the health care law, more Appeal Court judges overall have voted to uphold the law than have voted to strike it down. Some of those voting to uphold the law have solid conservative credentials, such as Judge Laurence Silberman, Senior Judge of the D.C. Court of Appeals (appointed by President Reagan in 1985). Another judge who voted to uphold the law was Solicitor General for a Republican President (can't remember which one). The court can't just throw out the health care law with some half-baked legal opinion (as it did in the Bush/Gore Florida "hanging chads" case). The Court's legacy is on the line here, along with that of Chief Justice John Roberts (and you can bet the ranch that Roberts knows it). Whatever the Court decides, it's got to do a first class, professional job on the opinion. It won't be easy.
I don't agree. Not that I think it will be easy, but the part about the court deciding the case based upon some hoped-for view of them by posterity. And I'm not sure why you think the court can't throw out a law which itself is formed based upon a half-baked constitutional theory itself. I think, instead, that the trouble for conservatives is that support for Raich, which was not long ago at all, implies there is a federal role to play in private, non-commercial, activity. The twist here is the liberal conflation of activity with non-activity.
There are other zany liberal claims here too, like the Militia Act of 1792, where liberals (they are always prepared to misstate a fact in support of their cause) say the law required all men who could be a part of the militia to buy a firearm. No one was forced, but the law did require those people to provide a firearm, and its accoutrements. Luckily for the new Americans most every male at the time who could be enlisted into the militia already owned a firearm of the proper size.
Or the even more bizarre claim that since ship owners had to provide a medicine chest aboard ships sailing outside our territorial waters, or, once in foreign port, to pay for a doctor to treat a sailor ill for no cause of his own. Um, yeah. Except Congress specifically excluded domestic port treatment or medicine chest possession on ships too small, or only sailing in our territorial waters. No one has ever claimed that Congress can't regulate commerce with foreign nations, but many among the left see these two laws as proof Congress has the authority to compel you to buy a product yourself, from another private firm, which firm is in nearly every instance not allowed to do business outside its own state. All because the Constitution gives the power of regulating commerce AMONG THE VARIOUS STATES to Congress.
When, pray tell, will leftists learn to read in context? Or, more importantly, when will the USSC put a stop to this predicted and inexorable push by the government for more power than the Constitution granted them? Maybe, one like me can hope, it will be in June.
Rich: Half-baked constitutional theory? The Commerce Clause has been evaluated, discussed & upheld in literally thousands of federal cases, forming established law over more than 200 years. ObamaCare falls well within that body of federal judicial precedent.
Rather, the Court itself is on shaky ground and knows it from its holding in Citizens v United. Judicial jurisdiction is limited to the issues raised by the parties. In Citizens, the sole issue addressed by both sides was interpretation of a very narrow statute.
By jumping to a 1st Amendment issue & overturning all judicial precedent re: jurisdiction on its head, claiming corporations have citizenship and money is free speech--the Justices set themselves up as a third federal legislature without any checks and balances.
This is a treasonous disavowal of the Constitution they took an oath to uphold, a critical tearing of the Constitution's Separation of Powers. The Legislature, Executive Branch, and Judiciary are supposed to be separate and equal.
Huh? No one said that teh commerce clause isn't well-developed. I would argue it long ago was distorted beyond what the power was written to allow Congress to employ, but that wasn't my point. The point is that the idea the government, to regulate non-commerce, could compel one to engage in commerce since one might, one day, engage in commerce anyhow, is half-baked.
Double huh? Citizens United was fought over a statute that violated the First Amendment. There was, otherwise, no constitutional issue. Are you suggesting that Congress can pass any law it wants, regardless of what the Constitution holds, and the USSC should be unable to find that law unconstitutional simply because their action is effected through statute? Talk about overturning precedent!
In a larger sense though, this idea that stare decisis should in all cases rule the day is a bizzare jurisprudential theory. To reach this end one has to conclude that imperfect humans, forming an imperfect institution (like the USSC), must conclude that actions that precede the present question were all arrived at perfectly. The reverse is not true either. We should respect previous opinions, but not because they are perfect. We should because the law should provide a sense of rational stability, and if it were to fluctuate with the temporal whims of which ever ideological majority can get 5 votes on an issue we'd end up with something between anarchy and despotic oligarchy.
Citizens did not put the court on shaky ground, it put it on solid ground. Corporation have always been treated as citizens, the question was NOT "are corporations citizens" but "since they are citizens do they not have free speech rights like all other citizens". Clearly the latter is the only valid decision.
The court should only act on the question brought before it, going off on a tangent is nothing less than judicial activism. They courts are not there to make law, they are there to determine constitutionality.
The court will strike down the individual mandate and likely the whole bill. Democrats purposely left out a severance clause so it should fall in it's entirety. Even if it doesn't, everybody, including Obama, knows it is unworkable without the mandate.
Dee is a fraud. Her ramblings are not those of a retired lawyer but a partisan rhetoric hack spoon fed on Democratic Underground pablum.
He can't defend the undefendable
Bingo! Verrilli is not a bad lawyer. He's extraordinarily smart. He's just got some dogs for cases to argue.
"The oral arguments are not the problem that the conservative justices on the Court have."
It's not just the "conservative justices" that are having a problem. Sotomayor was appointed by Obama.
NO CREDIBLE LEGAL ANALYST HAS GIVEN THIS MORON "PRAISE". He was absolutely humiliated and embarrassed the Obama Admin in questioning by the Justices! The Obama Administration position is simply preposterous.
It's a right wing court (5 to 4) and that's how they will rule regardless of the oral arguments.
Define what you mean by "right wing".
And name three "right wing" judgements by Justice Kennedy. I bet you cannot.
All the president has to do is take these cases out of Mr. Verrilli's hands and put them into the hands of an appointed litigator.
Of course, the left is going to be dissatisfied with Mr. Verrilli's performance. Do you really expect the right to criticize him? How absurd!
And, Mr. Verrilli's performance on the health care case was poor. But, when one considers the poor quality of the legislation, one can understand why.
The blame for the pitiful job writing the ACA law belongs to President Obama, Sen. Harry Reid and then Speaker Nancy Pelosi. They're the ones who came up with this stinker.
Actually, most of ObamaCare was written by health insurance lobbyists.
Nevertheless, we are the sole developed nation in the world without some national system of healthcare, with a for-profit industry draining the sick and injured dry for an extremely low, 38th ranked competence of care. We pay the most and get the least, and this President has been the only one to pass any health care bill when all have tried, including Nixon.
On the other hand, they went into it with a built-in excuse. So if the guy pulls a rabbit out, the administration takes the credit, if he bombs, he's under the bus.
Dee Turner: We are also the sole developed nation with OUR CONSTITUTION. If you want socialized medicine, do it right and get the Constitution changed. Don't rent seek politicians to try to interpret the Constitution your way. Do you really want to be France? (How many French troops does it take to defend Paris? No one knows, it's never been tried).
I agree. To those that think Obama care is better than nothing at all, I say Screw you" There's lots of things that are worse than nothing at all. To pay more and get less is worse. That's what I get. Thank, Obama. Thanks for letting the health insurance companies write a bill that put no limit on how much they could charge. Thanks for letting them start the increases before any benefit began. Thanks for nothing!
That low rating lie was debunked years ago anyway. We are #1 in cancer survival and #1 in heart disease survival, the two most pressing health problems in the world.
When the king of Saudi Arabia needs health care where does he go? Here! He has the money to go anywhere, but he chooses our system because it is the BEST, not 38th. When the prime minister of Nova Scotia comes here instead of using the Canadian system, that speaks volumes.
It's a relection of Obama's entire administration---INCOMPETENT!
This article is hilarious!!!!
MSNBC doing *everything* it can to defend this incompetent administration.
The Solicitor General was tasked to defend two indefensible positions, a near-impossible task, so maybe he isn't all that bad...
The Attorney General on the other hand... a complete and utter disaster.
Spot freaking ON!
Verrilli had the impossible task of arguing what is unconstitutional is constitutional. Of course he's going to come off like a buffoon... he is arguing on behalf of a buffoonish and lawless administration. Verrilli did the best that anyone could have done.
Wow. Have you ever read a single federal case involving a holding re: the Commerce Clause?
Buffoonish? Lawless? Ahem, I think you mean to refer to George W. Bush. Verrilli was a deer stunned by headlights, nothing more.
You do the office of the presidency a disservice in muttering inflammatory words with no facts to justify them. It brings down the whole nature of civil discourse.
Dee, you aren't a serious person, are you? I mean, in one post you refute the claim of buffoonish and lawless by saying it must be Bush 43 the writer meant, and then in the next paragraph you say that such inflammatory words do a disservice to the office of the presidency and brings down the whole nature of civil discourse.
How is anyone to take your post serious? Refute the original claim...fine. But to repeat the claim? And THEN chastise the author of it for bringing down civil discourse? C'mon, really? Someone, anyone, on the left, who is also mentally an adult, please join this conversation.
Obama doe the office of the presidency a disservice by serving.
Of course he's going to lose the Arizona case. The right-wing still has a majority and they vote along party lines. Frankly, with this bunch of shills on the court, it doesn't really matter what kind of lawyer you have. They just need to have the same political viewpoint and they win!
Man, you know you are in trouble when you begin to argue that Sotomayor, Ginsburg, and Breyer are right wing shills. Um, you might want to read about the hearing more--those three liberals seemed pretty non-plussed by Mr. Verrilli's arguments before them.
MSNBC is at least consistent. Everyone they quote that says Virelli did a good job is a leftie shill. I watched as much of the arguments as I could stomache. Virelli stumbled and stammered again and again as the Justices failed to buy the childish drivel he was trying to peddle as LAW. The man has no more business being the Solicitor General than I would have, and I have never studied "the law".
But I HAVE studied the Law of The Land, which is the CONSTITUTION that Mr. Virelli appears to have only a passing and not fond aquaintence with. According to that venerable document, Mr. Obama and pretty much everything his Administration have done is unlawful.
We can only hope and pray that enough Justices still honoor the Constitution to slap this petty little man down, and his petty little tyrant boss too. In three years r. Obama and his commie mentors and pals (google it if you doubt) have done more damage to our Nation and our Culture than anybody else since the Founding.
Powder Dry, looks like we may be needing it. Food Storage, a good idea even when everything is fine.
Pray like everything depends on God, then go and Work like everything depends on YOU! (Faith, wothout WORKS, being dead {James2:14-24)
Veterans and Current Military: Your OATH never expires. Be prepared to defend the Constitution again, probably soon.
Dear Paines' Ghost: Clearly you have not read the Constitution and its concomitant body of judicial precedent, amounting to thousands of cases in federal courts over more than 200 years, or you would not be castigating this administration as unlawful.
Nor do you understand the meaning of communism. Objectively, President Obama stands well to the right of center and is by no means a communist.
The devil can quote Scripture to his own use.
Paine's Ghost,
I am a Vietnam combat veteran and I know more than a few of us are ready to honor that oath. We will defend the country and the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic. That certainly includes you and all of those like you who think you have a right to take up arms against a President elected by a clear majority of our fellow citizens.
Cal, get over yourself.
Dee, Obama is only center right to someone to the left of Hitler, Mao, or Stalin. He is a Marxist by any measure.
So Phil, you're o.k. with right wing bluster from those who advocate using guns to undo our democracy, but object to any liberal who is willing to use them to defend it. Interesting!
By the way, if Obama is a Marxist why is it that the Stock Market has doubled since he was inaugurated? In case you don't know it, that't the voting booth of capitalists, and they are clearly not putting their money in their mattresses. Could it be that you don't know what the hell you're talking about?
Cal....Obama is responsible for the Dow??? It reached 14000 Plus during Bushs' Presidency. No one gave him credit. Poverty has increased substantially under Obama. As have unemployment among African Americans, Food Stamp Usage, Welfare Funding, and several other NEGATIVE living standards during Obamas' rule. Does he get credit for those issues?? OK ... Agreed. Got any more little tidbits of info to share this morning?? Oh..I forgot to mention that Unemployment Benefits have been extended to unprecedented lengths under Obamas' watch...I thing some of us have had to endure almost 2 years under the Great Uniter. And , by the way, stoking the fire of racism is coming from , i believe, the liberal side. Such as Sharpton, Jackson, Cummings, Waters, and OBaamaa.
It seems to me that the skill of the Solicitor General doesn't make much of a difference since almost every key SCOTUS decision falls along ideological lines and is a 5-4 vote to the right of the political spectrum.
Eat your heart out.
The 5 repbulican supreme court justices will be the catalyst for the destruction of the constitution and the coming civil war. Have these 5 justices ever read the constitution or is that not part of the qualifications.
It was the liberal court before it that ruled government could take your property and give to a fat cat so it could collect more taxes. THAT is pissing on the constitution. The conservatives on the court are trying to undo years of damage by a fascist liberal court.
Liberals believe it is a "living" document, one that can be bent to any cause they deem righteous. Conservatives believe it is a timeless document, on of the greatest ever written for what it stands for.
beware of Gary the Great. Cyber civil warrior. LOL
Gary .... Idiocy from the left has become fodder for laughter.
I like this guy.....lets keep Verilli and we can redo abortion and prop 8 all in a single year for a 4 quarter sweep!!!!
Sigh* If you could get pregnant, dear, abortion would be free on demand.
We can dismiss the arguments in favor of the Az Law in 4 easy steps:
1) The author of the bill has admitted that the basic intent of the law is to block the demographic trend that is increasing the percentage of non-white Americans. Translation - It is legalized ethnic profiling and harassment of minorities.
2) All the data shows that the Obama administration has increased the rate of deportations and that the "voluntary deportation" Mr. Romney called for is in fact occurring. Translation - The argument that the state has to act because the federal government has not is totally bogus.
3) The Constitution clearly allocates responsiblity for all issues regarding citizenship and naturalization to the national government. Translation - All you constitutional purists can't back this blatant violation without being hypocritical.
4) And finally, if the state is only enforcing federal immigration law as is claimed, why was it necessary to pass a state law? Couldn't you just instruct the cops to enforce the existing law, or is it just an excuse to exercise racism?
Thank you for that La Raza propaganda. Get ready to be disappointed. As for #3. congress has plainly spoken and the executive, in this case Obama, doesn't like the law and is malfeasing. Romney will fix that. As for #2 I can show you five hundred illegal aliens less than one mile from my front door, so Obama's enforcement is not happening here. Chicago illegals say they have no fear of deportation. They have never seen anyone deported.
Cal, the AZ law is actually less racist than the federal one. The AZ version prohibits profiling, the federal law does not.
Cal is not winning ANY points today....Must have forgotten his Liberal Bible.
Verrilli is not the problem. "You can't make a purse out of a sow's ear," the saying goes. Nobody could have defended this rediculus contention of Obama and Holder that they can force illegal aliens on any state. What would we need with states if the people were under the dictatorship of Obama? Having never been in harm's way or worked a day in his life this silver spooned charmer thinks he can give my sovernty away? I don't think so.
Silver spooned charmer? Where do you guys get your information? You should know that the President was born to a single mother, raised in modest circumstances by middle class grandparents and went to college with student loans that he finished paying off only 8 years ago. Compare that to George W. Bush and Mitt Romney, both born to extremely wealthy families, but who you never accused of silver spooning. Go figure....
Total BS Cal.
Oh Phil, you're looking in the mirror again.
I'm sorry but I'm going to just ignore you from now on. It's not because you don't agree with me. I have lots of friends and relatives who are quite conservative and we have great give and take. I enjoy an intellectual duel, but it's not that much fun when your opponent is unarmed.
Cal....I agree....Obama is NOT totally a silver spooned charmer.....he is also a silver tongued pimp from Chicago lurking around every Greyhound Bus Station waiting for his next victim to step off. Look at this guys' past, and look at his comments as a Community Organizer working with that despicable ACORN organization.
I don't think the Republicans need to worry about backlash if the AZ law is upheld. I live in AZ and all working latinos I know are in favor of it. They see all the strains that illegals put on our society, the strains on the hospitals, the courts, the education system and the prisons. They know their family's quality of life is suffering from it. They know the government isn't doing its job. So don't believe everything MSN and the media is telling you. And don't believe there are only 12 million here in the U.S., it's more than double that.
I give the man credit for trying to defend the indefensible. Obama and company are radical jokes. None other than his staunchest sycophants expected the govt to win either of those cases.
Dave, so true. I have many Hispanic friends in New Mexico and they will tell you that they are many more times likely to be displaced in the workplace by an illegal than you or I. Romney wants to put America back to work and stop illegal employers from using illegals. That will cut down on unemployment insurance costs, forclosures, and make it easier for people to put their American Citizen children through college without borrowing into insolvency. Uncollected taxes by illegal employers is equil to the deficit.
My name Jose Jiminez. I wade Rio Grande. I do sheet rock work. Move furniture. Sort garbage. Do gardening. Deliver pizza. Am leaving Arizona. Got new job selling crack in LA.
Good..the land of fruits and nuts can use a few more good men. Just remember to vote for Romney.
The fact that the Federal Government is suing a State simply for enforcing this Nations laws says it all. The Founding Fathers would be amazed and saddened that the Nation and its laws are being usurped by the very people entrusted to uphold them. And the fact the liberals applaud the disdain their leaders of THEIR party have for this Nations laws is why I will never vote Democrat. Criminals helping criminals....
Lock and load. The New Civil War is coming. SCOTUS will uphold the Arizona law and most of the rest of the states will emulate it. NY, california and Illinois will be inundated with the self deporting illegal aliensand will attempt to secede and become part of Mexico. Romney will get his chance to do an Abraham Lincoln.