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PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   29677 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 18, 2023

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It’s only a major move because we don’t actually live in a rule of law land at that level. Realistically words should have meaning but “living constitutional theory” meant the SC could just do whatever they want and act as a legislative body.

The GOP didn’t do that. The Dems created a whole philosophy that turned the SC into more than it was suppose to be. The GOP didn’t make the SC the supreme legislative body.

We can reach back as far as we want to figure out who the real villain is but, realistically, it's just an escalation of what's been going on forever. The Warren Court was another major episode/era of course, but there have been more.

I just think it'd be foolish to not recognize how angry this move made Democrats and how it may have changed their approach. Many of them called for far more aggression in the aftermath.

This is useful if one recognizes that moves can also make republicans angry and change their approach. Specifically, it is useful in that it shows you that the escalation spiral cannot be halted or controlled by the available levers of social policy, with disaster the likely outcome.

Likewise, it is useful if one does not recognize the above. In that case, it is useful in that it cements a narrative that Republicans are the bad guys, by promoting the unspoken norm that it's only an escalation when Republicans do it.

Neither the Dems nor the GOP did that. The Supreme Court has been supreme since 1803, and it's always been calvinball because it can't not be.

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