Justice Stevens Slows His Hiring .

[elleng]

Source: nyt/ap

-- Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens has hired fewer law clerks than usual, generating speculation that the leader of the court's liberals will retire next year.


Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/09/02/us/AP-US-Supreme-Court-Stevens.html?hp

[DarthDem]

1. This Will Sound Wrong . . .

But it's time. He's been a magnificent justice, but my fear is that Obama does not get a second term for some reason, and Stevens is still on the Court. This is the right time for him to retire and cement his awesome legacy.

[Rebubula]

2. As long as...

...President Obama is in office, I will have NO problem with any SC Justices retiring.

I always fear when a Justice retires during a (R) administration.

[progressoid]

6. If only some of the conservative ones would retire.

Scalia in particular. :grr:

[TheCoxwain]

11. or get a non-fatal heart attack or stroke that makes them retire

[SuperTrouper]

13. I thought the same thing...we'll burn in Hell...nt

[No Elephants]

16. Scalia has indicated a distaste for retirement.

[sofa king]

19. I would prefer to see Scalia busted, tried, convicted, and incarcerated.

He was in bed with Dick Cheney. I guarantee you that sonofabitch is as crooked as a dog's hind legs.

There are only two kinds of conservatives: those too dumb to know any better, and those who exploit those people, the system, and the law. Scalia ain't dumb.

[DebbieCDC]

23. Got that right sofa king

[progressoid]

21. Great.

Just fukin great.

[okieinpain]

32. we will have to pry their cold dead bodies out of the chair. n/t.

[comtec]

3. What bothers me is that he will put in another Sotomayor moderate

and what we desperately need are flaming liberals!!! =<[br />It sounds odd but the hard white wingers are never going to change opinion, and we need a couple hard core liberals to do teh same... in the middle are the moderates who can be swayed by reason.

Another concern is that liberals, every rabid ones, are reasonable, rational people and can be swayed by a reasonable argument... the white wingers in there now aren't rational, and only listen to whomever is paying them off or what's in their class interest.

[dotymed]

4. I AGREE COMTEC

The only difference I have is; let's wait and see haw
Sotomayer votes. This my be what Justice Stevens is doing.
Hopefully, she will surprise us and prove to be progressive.
It certainly would not be the first time that a Justice is
expected to behave in one way and surprises everyone. I think
it is CRAZY to put more "moderate" judges on the
SCOTUS, we already have an uneven balance of conservatives
(too many) who let their politics (and money I'm sure)
influence their decision making. Like the "Bush
Selection" of 2000. Obama should, if Stevens retires,
appoint a known Progressive, and use our congressional
strength to "ram" the appointment through.

[PHIMG]

25. Hopefully Sotomayor can wait

Until Obama's stacked the court before moving left. IF she moves left too early the right wing can point to this to make it harder to get the Obama's subsequent nominees thru confirmation.

[2Design]

5. white wingers - now that is a mouthful and more accurate than right wingers n/t

[No Elephants]

15. Clarence Thomas?

[progressoid]

7. "leader of the court's liberals" Ironically, appointed by a Republican.

[harun]

33. Pikin Justices is a little like a box of choklits, never know whatcha goin to get.

[bat country]

8. Stevens is a wonderful justice

but he can't escape the inevitability of age. We want as much turnover in SCOTUS as possible before midterm elections. It is unlikely that dem numbers in the senate will get significantly larger in 2010.

[Laelth]

9. k&r for the Honorable Justice Stevens.

He has held on for a very, very long time. He deserves a rest.

:patriot:

:dem:

-Laelth

[Renew Deal]

10. This is how the news about Souter broke

People didn't know he didn't hire.

[CK_John]

12. IMO, he will be one of 3 to leave shortly due to age or health, including the CJ. n/t

[SuperTrouper]

14. Interesting point. the next three to retire are Stevens, Ginsberg and

Roberts.

[No Elephants]

17. Not Roberts. Breyer, maybe. If Stevens, Ginsburg and Breyer also get replaced by

law and order corporatists, I am going to demand return of my campaign contributions.

[kiranon]

18. Why include Chief Justice Roberts? He's a young man with a great job.

Doesn't pay well enough? Curious as to your thinking or knowledge. I'd rather he find another position but haven't heard he has any intention of leaving the bench.

[CK_John]

22. He wants to make more money and a history of grand mal seizures. n/t

[Demit]

24. Maybe he misses those times when he & his buddies cooked meals & took pictures of them.

I mean, a lot of guys do that, I'm sure. Far fewer of them go on to get married in their forties then adopt two children.

[Psephos]

27. I do that, and I'm not gay, if that's where you're going

and it's an ugly place to be going.

Good Lord, I don't expect to see gay-baiting on DU.

[Demit]

28. That's not gay-baiting.

It's ridiculing grown men showing off the food they cooked together for the camera. Which might be a little rude, but it's not gay bashing (which is what I think you mean to accuse me of). If you have pictures of your straight self and your buddies tilting plates of food toward the camera, post them here & I'll laugh at you too.

And yes, I get a gay vibe from Roberts. What makes me snark about him is I think he went to such appalling lengths to hide it, whether out of deep shame or colossal ambition—or both, considering that he's a Federalist Society Republican—and that is not a healthy thing, either for his family, or for himself, or for us who have to live with his SC rulings for the next thirty years.

[Psephos]

29. Now you're weaseling.

If you're going to play the innuendo game and use gays as pawns, and then get called out on it, weaseling and trying to imply it's not what you actually meant only makes it worse. It's called the Rule of Holes.

If I were a church-going man, I'd pray nightly that Roberts be the second-next to retire (after Scalia). But this isn't about Roberts. It's about perpetuation of the despicable idea that gayness is somehow degenerate or humiliating, and a useful tar-brush with which to paint one's political opponents.

Even if Roberts has gay elements in his nature (as virtually all men do), B. F. D.

If progressives don't stop this shit, no one will.

[Demit]

31. You have it fixed in your head that I am a bigot, so I don't know if this will do any good, but

I'll try one more time.

If I saw a photo of Barney Frank and his buds posing for the camera happily showing off plates of food, I'd be a little more indulgent—that is, I'd still think it looked silly, but a little silliness in someone you admire so much otherwise is no big thing. And one of the biggest things I admire about Barney Frank is that he is forthright about his sexuality. He knew he would get a raft of shit his whole political life keying off his being gay, but he was strong enough to be honest anyway. Republicans in political life, as has been demonstrated time & again, are not strong enough to face the world as their true selves. They would rather live a lie.

The only thing you can admonish me about is, you can say 'Well, you don't know for a FACT that Roberts is gay', and I'd have to admit that's true. But I'm not the first or the only observer ever to have watched a person in public life and be pretty sure they are denying their sexuality; I'm not the first or only to have wondered about John Roberts. And the thought that it mattered so much to him not to be thought of as gay—that HE thought it is a degenerate and humiliating thing to be—that he would create a family to help him live his lie, so that he could advance in the Republican hierarchy, is what is deeply disgusting to me.

Now, I won't reply again, because I've done my best to explain my thoughts to you. I don't think gayness is degenerate or humiliating. I think John Roberts does.

[bat country]

20. Why would Roberts retire?

He is only 55 and his only medical history is two seizures in a 14 year span (1993 and 2007).

[Arkana]

26. If I were him I'd do it sooner rather than later.

We can appoint someone while we still have a large majority in the Senate.

[mr_liberal]

30. I'd hate to see Stevens go.

He's a great Justice. But if he does, if its soon enough (like sometime next year) it'll give Ginsburg time to retire as well if it looks like Obama cant get re-elected. I hope she'll consider that if its necessary.

I think 3 is all Obama would get anyhow. Theres no other justices that are old enough that they'd likely retire in the next 7 years. Kennedy or Scalia would be next, and they'll probably wait for a republican president, probably sometime after 2016.