Justice Stevens Retiring

[Skiprr]

Ms Kagan's responses during her hearings for Solicitor General are not completely germane to her confirmation (or not) as Supreme Court justice. Those responses basically said that as Solicitor General, she would respect and comply with the law of the land. They should not (IMHO) be extrapolated to assume that as a member of SCOTUS she would vote to continue the same laws/policies, although she did express respect for stare decisis.

Absolutely correct. But as interested parties to the nomination, all we have to go on in trying to understand her views is what we can find about her history. I was just sharing that as such.

I can't find (yet) any indication that she ever argued or presided over a 2A case, or that any of her published works specifically address the Second Amendment. So far today, this is all I've turned up that provides any insight on Kagan's 2A stance. We'll no doubt see an evaluation from the NRA-ILA soon.

[jimlongley]

Seems to me that the same set of questions needs to be asked of her again, as viewed through the lens of scrutiny of a SCOTUS nominee.

[chabouk]

Ms Kagan's responses during her hearings for Solicitor General are not completely germane to her confirmation (or not) as Supreme Court justice.

Correct. The Solicitor General is the "defense attorney" of the government and the law: even if they know the client is guilty as sin, they are obliged to mount a vigorous defense.

[Dragonfighter]

Like Obama himself (prior to election), we just don't know that much about her. She doesn't have a lot of opinions published and little experience presiding. I think he's hoping the vagueries and mercurial history will work again. What a dose!

[03Lightningrocks]

Like Obama himself (prior to election), we just don't know that much about her. She doesn't have a lot of opinions published and little experience presiding. I think he's hoping the vagueries and mercurial history will work again. What a dose!

yep.... about all we knew of Obama before he got elected was that he hated Democracy. We also knew that he believed he knew what was best for all of us even if we disagreed with him. OOPs... we also knew from reading his books that he resents white people. But yeah..... other than that... we didn't know much else about him. Oh yeah... he bowls like a pansy.

[Purplehood]

Everytime that I look at BO I associate him with the movie, "The Manchurian Candidate".

[bdickens]

Hey, if we can have the White House occupied by a usurper with absolutely no relevant experience, why not a Supreme Court justice?

[tallmike]

I read an opinion piece this weekend about Kagan, from the perspective of a Marine officer who went to Harvard while she was the Dean there. It certainly didnt come to the conclusions about her that I expected.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 03940.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Its an interesting read.

[Purplehood]

Hey, if we can have the White House occupied by a usurper with absolutely no relevant experience, why not a Supreme Court justice?

My understanding is that prior to 1980 it was not unusual to find Members of the Supreme Court that had never been a judge. The rationale in their appointment was that they were unbiased and unfettered by any predisposition to rule in any particular manner.

[03Lightningrocks]

Hey, if we can have the White House occupied by a usurper with absolutely no relevant experience, why not a Supreme Court justice?

My understanding is that prior to 1980 it was not unusual to find Members of the Supreme Court that had never been a judge. The rationale in their appointment was that they were unbiased and unfettered by any predisposition to rule in any particular manner.

I find that interesting and admit, I was not aware of this. I agree to the thinking on a certain level. I would tend to buy into the theory that once a judge has ruled on a matter at some point in a career, admitting the ruling was puke and going a different way would be to fight upstream against human nature.