[None of the quoted snippits in this post were written by me; they’re all from essays or posts I thought were interesting, found on other websites.]
- The Gimp Parade on John Roberts and Disability Rights: In 2001, Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick presented a clear and pithy summary of the arguments before the Court, where thanks to Roberts it was concluded that the loss of a job due to severe work-related repetitive stress injury does not qualify someone for coverage under the ADA. Despite carpal tunnel syndrome and tendonitis resulting in “lumps the size of a hen’s egg in [her] wrists, and [her] hands and fingers… curled up like animal claws,” the Court ruled that plaintiff Ella Williams was not disabled because of Robert’s legal arguments: “She can brush her teeth, wash, bathe, do laundry and cook breakfast. She can take care of personal chores around the house. [Her wrist injury] is only a problem at work.”
- Jack Balkin on Justice Roberts and abortion: …Replacing Justice Sandra Day O’Connor with Roberts is likely to mean the Supreme Court will uphold many more laws restricting abortion. The list of such laws is endless, ranging from partial birth abortion bans to limits on abortions for minors. Courts now enjoin new abortion laws as soon as they are passed if they burden some women’s right to abortion. But next term the court will decide whether to change that rule. If it does, states could pass stringent restrictions on abortion; these could remain on the books for years until lawsuits knock away the most blatantly unconstitutional features. That is not the same as overturning Roe v. Wade, but its practical effect is very similar. (Via Dispatches).
- Ed at Dispatches From The Culture Wars on the Supreme Court confirmation process: Not only do I want to know the answers to those questions, I think nominees have an obligation to answer them in front of the entire nation. They are asking to be given a lifetime appointment to the nation’s highest court where their decisions will have more of an impact on our lives and our liberty than virtually any other body in the world. Our liberty is in their hands and they have an obligation to tell us what they intend to do with it before we give that power to them. I don’t want to hear that the nominee is kind, decent, trustworthy, thrifty and brave. I want to hear what they would do with their almost unbridled power to interpret the Constitution because that document is the backbone of American liberty. And any Senator who does not ask such questions shouldn’t be in office. The problem is not that the Senate explores a nominee’s ideology, it’s that they generally do so dishonestly and badly and only in the service of their own political interests.
- Russel Sadler: The Northwest timber industry and its industrial foresters have never forgiven Dr. Jerry Franklin for methodically dismantling their cherished orthodoxy. Until the 1980s, industrial foresters were taught that old growth forests were “dead, dying and decadent.” Old growth forests were “biological deserts” that had to be cut down before they burned down and replaced by “healthy, vigorous young forests.”
- Sara Butler, reviewing the book Taking Sex Differences Seriously: One doesn’t have to be a believer in feminist ideology to be a little skeptical of a theory that automatically gives men a certain degree of freedom from nature that women do not have. According to this line of thought, sexual chastity does not come naturally to men, so we shouldn’t be all that surprised when they fail. Women, however, are supposed to have nature on their side; if they still insist on being sexually active, even promiscuous, they must be really awful…much more depraved then their male counterparts who behave the same way.
- The Mighty Middle on Democrats: This is where you’ve brought us. Roe is going down. The Holy Fucking Grail is going down. Get used to it. Saladin is taking Jerusalem back from you. The other side won, you lost, and you know why you lost? Because you are deeply stupid people. Your favorite perjorative for Mr. Bush: stupid. And yet, he’s the one in charge, despite everything, despite the fact that he is one of the worst presidents in American history, he’s in the driver’s seat and you are standing on the fucking curb holding a sign that says “Will Organize For Food.” You’re sitting in your war rooms writing up your talking points, passing you memos back and forth and all of it is like some Twilight Zone episode where you’re dead and don’t know it. Cue Rod Serling: Consider the Democrats.
Shyamalan on Politics: “I see dead people.” “No, those are Democrats.”
- Brutal Women on the latest Star Wars flick: In fact, every scene Padme is in, she’s sitting on a couch or standing at a window or standing on the balcony staring blankly at something, pregnant, (because everyone knows pregnant women live like invalids) waiting for the scene to start. Waiting for Anakin or some Jedi to come in and break up her staring-at-the-wall reverie. Natalie Portman checked out of this movie a long time ago. And who can blame her? It was utterly obvious from the writing that she was only there as a peice of scenery. Her hair and clothes changed drastically with every scene; she was a walking, talking set peice.
- Mark Grabor on conservative judicial activism: President Bush demonstrate his usual capacity for double-speak last night when he praised Judge John Roberts as a jurist who would “not legislate from the bench.” As note on this blog and more extensively in Keck, THE MOST ACTIVIST SUPREME COURT IN HISTORY (mandatory reading during the confirmation hearings), the Rehnquist Court does nothing but “legislate from the bench” with Justices Thomas and Scalia being the most active judicial legislators. Consider the numerous areas in which they impose or would impose limits on state and federal officials…
“She can brush her teeth, wash, bathe, do laundry and cook breakfast. She can take care of personal chores around the house. [Her wrist injury] is only a problem at work.”
The definition of “disability” requires more than an “impairment,” as the article says. It also has to be an impairment of a “major life activity”, which the regulations interpret to mean inability to perform manual tasks.
The specific issue was “can she perform manual tasks?” The quotation indicated that she can. While the article makes it sound like Roberts was trying to minimize her plight, he was really doing what he had to do protect his client — list manual tasks that she could do.
In any event, whether you agree with Roberts/Toyota or not, or whether you want to expand the definition of disability to include any impairment, whether or not it significantly impacts a major life activity, this is certainly no evidence that Roberts doesn’t care about the rights of the disabled.
Primarily because the decision in his favor was unanimous.
All we can gather from that is that Roberts in not further left than Stevens and Ginsberg.
Yes, I would like to know what a nominee might think about various matters that might come before the court.
. . . the dance that takes place around what judges actually think and how they might do their jobs has a certain absurdity. Senators voting on judges are like voters being told to vote for the best person, but without knowing what that person thinks right now. MORE
Oh Bellamy, we can gather far more than that, and saying otherwise is to insult the intelligence of everyone that bothers to look at him with more than a fleeting glance.
The man is intentionally non-transparent, which speaks of integrity and disregard for the reality of what a SCOTUS position is. If one cannot allow their life scrutiny for a position that is as powerful and important as the SCOTUS, how can anyone offer any reciprocal trust that they are on the same page with us?
The man has outright lied, if not been dangerously forgetful about past memberships and committee positions in the notorious ‘Federalist Society’, has interned for Rehnquist and has married a woman whom was the vice-president of the infamous anti-choice activist group ‘Feminists for Life’. The list goes on and on about what could be inferred, and the continued assault on the intelligence of people who demand more than just a casual rubber stamping is not only insulting, but is an act of extreme disregard and disloyalty to our country.
Kim,
With respect to this one decision on disability, I think that Richard is correct. Having watched the process of application for disability, what Roberts did is both standard and following the rules of disability.
What you say may be true of Roberts, overall. But what Richard says with regards to this one decision is also true.
I hope that when I am nominated for anything, the views of my boss and wife are not attributed by association to me. They are both weird.
Roberts has also said he attended Federalist Society events, but doesn’t remember paying dues. I’m not sure how that gets to be a scandal. The Federalist Society is a group for Republican lawyers, and if the goal is to fight nominations until we get one who is not a Republican lawyer, it’s going to be a looooong fight.
Richard – Roberts’ wife is a major activist in the “I am a feminist and anti-choice” camp, one of the most dangerous groups opposing abortion. I grew up Southern Baptist, and one of the most common arguments I heard from the women around me railing about overturning Roe was “abortion hurts women, a real feminist would stand up against them.”
So yes, his wife’s policies may not influence him… but let me ask you this: if you were a black man, would you be disturbed by a nominee to the SCOTUS whose wife was a member of the Ku Klux Klan?
In re RotS – actually a bunch of Padme-doing-political-stuff (like conspiring with Senators Organa and Mothma to found what would become the Rebellion) were written and apparently filmed, but cut out in favor of more blowing-stuff-up scenage. (Mon Mothma’s role was entirely cut out, even though it was in there early enough that she got an action figure.)
They are rumored to be on the DVD forthcoming among the “extras”.
Gary Farber went thru and pointed them up in the script leaks, and they make a huge difference even on paper.
(personally I find plotting, intrigue and character development more interesting than More Blowing Shit Up, which I find frustrating when it replaces the above, but maybe that’s just me. Oh wait, Batman Begins and both Spider-man movies were extremely popular, despite them all being long on the character development and plot, short on the action by Bruckheimer standards…so maybe it’s *not* just me.)
Jake;
I should have been more specific to what I was addressing. The line I specifically was addressing was:
… which is hardly defensible.
Richard Bellamy;
He served on committee’s in the Federalist Society – it’s ridiculous to speculate he just didn’t remember.
And as for his wife – as Bellatrys said, while it doesn’t automatically condemn him, it hardly is a vote of confidence or something that should be ignored, and in fact does absolutely indicate that he more than meant what he said when arguing against RvW.
While it may be suitable for you to ignore that we’re surrounded by a veritable flock of quacking ducks, the cacaphony is not something I for one can ignore.
Kim, that wasn’t actually me, we should credit Unapologetic Atheist, although I certainly do agree with UA! (actually I have a lot to say about Roberts and Mrs. Roberts, only it’s so much that it feels like I’m going to go critical before being able to get it all out. I get the FFL newsletter, being an anti-abortion pro-choice Christian liberal (see herefor our manifesto, and subsequent denunciation by Jerry Falwell – also, blogger Fr. Jake writes for them!) and I keep meaning to write to them to ask them about a couple of serious problems with their claims, but forgetting to.)
Ahh, my apologies, I did in fact attribute the notion wrongly (though rightly it seems, too!).
My apologies to both you and UA for the confusion!
in the notorious ‘Federalist Society’
Notorious? The Federalist Society is a group of people with a quite conservative legal philosophy. That philosophy is neither alien to American society nor an unpopular one. It is a philosophy radically at odds with your own – however, neither your philosophy, nor that of the Federalists, is “notorious”. They are simply opposing legitimate viewpoints.
I grew up Southern Baptist, and one of the most common arguments I heard from the women around me railing about overturning Roe was “abortion hurts women, a real feminist would stand up against them.”
So your objection to Mrs. Roberts is that she is the kind of person who lives out her principles? (Although she’s Catholic, there are a lot of areas of agreement between her and her Baptists sisters.)
If you believe that abortion hurts women, and you also believe in women’s rights (broadly defined – legal emancipation, suffrage, and so on), then becoming a pro-life feminist would seem to be sensible.
Again, it is alien to your own espoused beliefs – beliefs which you, yourself, live out. Should Mrs. Roberts refrain from making that choice?
this is certainly no evidence that Roberts doesn’t care about the rights of the disabled…Primarily because the decision in his favor was unanimous.
Oooh, look at the pretty ball going over the fence.
I didn’t know that the decision was unanimous. That means that anyone saying that Roberts’ argument makes him anti-disabled is saying that Ginsburg and every other liberal on the Court are equally anti-disabled. (Unless they didn’t know, either, of course. In which case they might be embarassed, or might have to acknowledge that Roberts’ argument was reasonable.)
There’s a big problem with us ordinary mortals attempting to parse court decisions to figure out a nominee. That problem is that most of us really don’t know how. Oh, some cases make it obvious, but sometimes the questions involved are arcane. I am pro death-penalty; I can readily conceive of a wide variety of cases where I would end up ruling against the death penalty if I were a judge. I’m violently pro-gun; yet I could easily see ruling to uphold some kinds of gun-control laws or some restrictions on the 2nd amendment. I could easily see myself being counsel for the side “against” my viewpoint, as well.
These things just don’t mean very much to us chickens. We don’t know enough about the cases to know why a nominee voted or ruled or argued the way they did. Maybe the nominee hates the handicapped; maybe the handicapped person in front of him had no case. Who the heck knows?
I certainly don’t, and I’m pretty darn smart.
You know, Robert, for a person whom has made no bones about using words that might place overt personal overtones on different subject matters, you’re really in no position to offer such critiques. But hey, that’s never stopped you before. Carry on.
What an interesting play on words.
The reason I quoted it was because I thought it was interesting that the law was so anti-disabled. A legal standard that says that someone who can successfully brush their teeth and cook breakfast for themselves cannot be disabled is idiotic; the ability to manage a one-time task for yourself, in your apartment, when you can set things up however you want and take the time you need, has no bearing on the ability to work on an assembly line.
The Toyota decision is classest as much as it’s anti-disabled; a bunch of wealthy people who don’t have to do any physical labor to keep a roof over their heads, ruled that the inability to do physical labor to keep a roof over one’s head is not a major life activity.
It was also a clear case of legislating from the bench; the Congress that passed the ADA did not intend it to be limited to the “wheelchair bound” (to use O’Connor’s phrase). Congress clearly intended the ability to work to be a major life activity when they wrote the ADA (and explicitly said so, in the langauge of the legislation). The narrowing of the ADA was based on the pro-business views of the Court (and Clinton’s nominees are as reliably pro-business as any of the Court’s right-wingers), not on anything Congress intended.
Yes, you are right. My mother actually grew up Catholic, and there are essentially no differences I can detect between their views-on-womens-reproductive-systems standpoints. I personally stand firmly against both groups’ views. I do not believe that a woman is her uterus first, and a woman second. I do not believe that I have the right to tell a woman she must EVER carry any man’s DNA, nor do I believe in the rights of an unwanted fetus to compete against me and my fellow world citizens for additional resources on this already-overpopulated planet. Humanity needs to get a grip and evolve beyond the “oh but babies are so cute, we need more of them” mentality before we drown in humans. We already almost are– the world population has doubled since i was born.
First, I do not think that womens’ rights should be broadly defined the way you put it. I think women have the absolute and utter right to self-determination of the uses of their own body– that includes freedom from slavery, even to their own uterus (well their own uterus combined with YOUR religious-based ideas about the purpose of a “womb”). Prohibiting well-done abortions from women is what hurts women. We have seen this in recent history, it’s not like this is a guess. The only part of abortion that really hurts women in my observations is the Religious Wrongers who tell the women who have to make the decision to get one that they are awful human beings for not subverting their own life for the purpose of bring even MORE unnecessary life into this biosphere. By having an abortion, a woman is demonstrating that she has more than her own selfish biological impulses in mind, and so I consider women able to make such tough motherhood decisions absolute heroes. Men, on the other hand, are notorious for failing to make good fatherhood decisions. I’ll keep trusting women.
Secondly, I think Mrs. Roberts should do exactly what she is doing, and has a right to her opinion… but to suggest that her ideas of the past decades do not influence her husband is certainly to cheapen the closeness of their marriage and to imply that he does not listen to his wife’s opinon– another disqualifier for him in my eyes. So win or lose on that question, either way, Roberts is an inadmissible candidate on those grounds. Mrs Roberts would be as well– but what in your deluded mind gives you the idea that I think people should not pursue their convictions?
What I am concerned with is a potential “sleeper” jurist who will seem too squeaky-clean to prohibit a Justiceship, who then allies with the obviously-upcoming Bush pick (who will be much harsher, Scalia-esque) to attack something that a significan portion of my fellow Americans consider absolutely essential to their rights as American citizens. I am unwilling to compromise even an inch on this… Democrats have been compromising inch by inch on almost every front against ever-more-rabid Conservatives who have a right to live as they wish (don’t want an abortion? Great, don’t get one!), but who think that they must enforce their own ways upon us.
I stand with my fellow progressives against you all.
Atheist: Do you really think women sit in the Planned Parenthood lobby, secure in the knowledge that they’re doing their part to prevent the scarring of the Earth? Don’t make me laugh!! Women get abortions largely because raising a child at the point would be untenable. And that is actually a good reason to have one. I speak as a man who believes life does begin at conception, yet feels abortion at any point is the business of the woman involved, alone, period.
How do you know what women think when they sit in Planned Parenthood?
what in your deluded mind gives you the idea that I think people should not pursue their convictions?
Your tone. Perhaps I am misreading you. If so, I apologize.
I imagine that women, being on the whole a fairly diverse bunch, would have a fairly diverse set of reasons for what they’re doing.
Kim and Nick: Grow up. Of course I’m not privy to the thoughts of every single woman out there who gets an abortion, but common sense—not to mention anecdotes from numerous women I’ve known and loved who’ve gotten an abortion—lead me to conclude that the typical reason for undergoing one isn’t concern for Mother Gaia, but the very real prospect that an unwanted child will be a catastrophe for the woman in question.
Atheist: Why don’t you just go the whole route and endorse eugenics? After all, if it was good enough for Margaret Sanger, it should be good enough for you. BTW, from where I’m sitting, men and women are about par in making sorry-ass parenting decisions. Why so many progressives insist on replicating the tired idea that Mom knows best and Dad should just pay child support and be happy he gets visitation is beyond me.
Grow up? I’ve openly shared my experience of abortion, pregnancy and birth with this board repeatedly, in hopes of offering a perspective from the actual trenches, and have every right to raise such an inquiry. It’s consistent with the talking over the heads of women that occurs on the anti-choice side of the aisle.
So while I applaud you for your pro-choice stance, I will very much call you out on your speaking for what women think, rather than posing a question to women (and their are several) on this blog whom have had these experiences to offer insight.
If you’re interested in what goes through a woman’s head while waiting in the office reception, I’d be glad to enlighten, but I’ll thank you not to disregard myself, or the other women whom have bravely told their stories here.
The point is (since you seem to have missed it) that we have enough people, and that many women are bright enough to recognize that it is no longer imperative to our society that they function as breeders. It’s dubious to even try to argue that it was ever necessary. Nowdays, it can certainly be argued that it’s BETTER for women not to breed when they don’t wish to. Regardless, it’s never ever a good thing to make women breed when they don’t want to, in a world that already has PLENTY of breeders.
When I denounce the convictions of people like Mrs.Roberts, I am not denouncing her for having convictions, I am denouncing her for her conviction that she has the right to ignore the convictions of others and bring her views to rest squarely upon their bodies… and worse, to criminalize them for wanting to not be mothers. That is far more appalling to me than denying the 6.5 billionth baby the “right” to join us all, over the objections of the owner of the womb which he inhabits, by ending its life before it can even breathe.
And, as has been thoroughly pointed out, the reasons women might want to not be pregnant anymore are multitudinous, and all are equally valid.
DP, normally I’m pretty happy to see you here, but WTF ? That was way over the top. :( Kim didn’t deserve that shit, and neither do the other mothers who post here. Not to mention some of the Dads who we don’t hear from much. I’m about 99.9% sure that Kim –for example, since I actually know her IRL– didn’t drag her spouse kicking and screaming to the sacrificial altar of fatherhood. If I’m wrong, I’m sure he’ll stop in and let us all know. :/
Incidentally, one doesn’t have to be a hemp-socks-sportin’, frizz-haired, tofu-munchin’, banjo-strummin’ hippie to note that one of the reasons that motherhood may well be “untenable” (a step up from the usual “inconvenient” sneers popular with pro-lifers, at least) is because of economic and environmental issues that do affect individual women ? It need not have anything to do with Gaia. It could simply be, “I can’t adequately feed this future kid without selling my Dodge. If I sell my Dodge, I can’t get to my job, which I need to feed this future kid.”
If you want to adress that issue, generalizations about “Mother knows best” and dumb jokes about reflections on Gaia in the clinic aren’t really gonna’ cut it. The economic and environmental whipsaw that traps a lot of working folk in this country in places they’d rather not be in is a good deal bigger than that which can be encompassed in phrases like “Grow up.”
P.S.– Actually, I don’t have a banjo. The rest is all there, though.
“abortion hurts women, a real feminist would stand up against them.”
And forced pregnancy doesn’t hurt women?
Let’s see . . . which is worse? Something that could hurt women, which those women choose (and therefore can avoid) or something that could hurt women, which they are forced to have?
And then there’s the fact that pregnancy (specifically childbirth) KILLS many times more women than abortion.
And then there’s the fact that banning abortion does not get rid of abortion, it just significantly lowers the quality of the abortions available. That is, abortions hurt women much more when abortion is illegal.
Illegal abortions hurt women–any REAL feminist would support the availability of safer ones.
Pregnancies hurt some women–any REAL feminist would make sure pregnancy only happens by choice, and only continues by choice. The woman’s choice, that is.
And, presumably, yes, abortions hurt some women. Any REAL feminist would make sure abortion only happened when it’s the woman’s choice–oh, wait, DUH, it already only happens when it’s the woman’s choice.
Note to ALL pro-lifers–I consider a forced pregnancy to be much worse than an abortion. Don’t you try to limit me to the option I consider more hurtful, ESPECIALLY under the guise of doing me a “favor.”
And SUPPORT BIRTH CONTROL and COMPREHENSIVE SEX-ED, for crying out loud! Or else you’re not pro-life, you’re anti-women.
Oh, that’s put me in my place.
The point I was trying to make, apparently not clearly enough, is that there’s enough diversity among women to make the “typical” reason for having an abortion pretty much irrelevant. An individual woman makes an individual choice for reasons that make sense to her, and that is all the rest of us need to know.
alsis: You are right; I went over the top and I apologize. These fine posters did not deserve vitriol from me, any more than I deserve to be chided for etnertaining what I still think was reasonable speculation. I’m particularly sorry to have disappointed you.