Talking Roe.
About The Author

BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
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Recent Posts
- Day 28: Democracy Dies In Darkness
- Day 26: People Discover That American Fascists Like German Fascists
- Day 25: The Fascist Regime Comes for the Federal Prosecutors
- Day 23: The Fascist Regime and House Budget Committee Are Coming for Medicaid
- Day 22: The Fascist Regime Destabilizes the Jordanian Monarchy
and his “did the best I could” tomorrow. I would shove it down his fucking throat
Fuck you dickhead, I’ll never marry another one of you fuckers ever again if you sit on that fucking court! All’s fair in love and war and that is a big big biggy to trust anybody with when they are working out their infancy issues in relationship and hating their mothers! I’m gonna lose my mind, must shampoo
Alito Theme for the Day — don’t worry, I agree with Justice O’Connor (pay no attention to the fact that she never agrees with me.)
whoa!! we’re talking about the old days when women were under the DOMINION of their husband. What happened to those good old days?
or the lies his social circle tells. This trade off of personhood that he does with “women” allows him to feel guilty about certain things about himself that he dislikes and wishes that he could purge. He controls his acting out of those things with the guilt.
1985 memo outlining strategy to overturn Roe. DiFi wants to know why he wanted to do that, when Roe already had 30 confirmations (or precedents).
Alito: denies wanting to overturn Roe, but then explains he was only advocating that position.
DiFi moving back to FISA.
Good question by DiFi — Why does he say that a warrant is “generally” required as opposed to “always” required.
Alito said this morning that the Exec ‘generally’ needs a warrant. I noticed that too.
DiFi is wondering why he said ‘generally’?
time of war, war on terror, things of that nature.
DiFi kept going to his comparison of women to minors in Casey…stronger than expected caught a few minutes on the radio
He keeps trying to avoid her questions
Now up: Wingnut Jeff Sessions of Alabama.
Shorter Sessions: Liberals are mean and unfair.
Sessions: The meanies are picking on you Tommy, and it’s not fair…
She had better blast this guy. She is the only woman there speaking for us and I want her to slam him big time. If she allows this nomination to go to the Senate I will pull my vote for her. I mean that too!
Sessions: Judge Alito, please prove to us that you passed your highschool civics course and tell us how our judicial system is set up.
Refer to your 10th grade social studies book, chapter 7 for his complete answer.
Jeff Sessions also has no desire to clear up anything in his mind, and is going to spend his 30 minutes telling Alito what a great guy he is.
Oh wait? Sessions: please explain how cases come to you and what you should you do before you listen to a case and decide on it?
to leave a short post in an old thread when a new one gets started.
I was refreshing on the old thread for about ten minutes before I checked and found the new thread.
On the small cspan screen, Sessions looks like Derek Jacobi with a southern accent.
I’m confused, could you explain this ‘court’ thing to me. It sounds real complicated. Now ‘oral arguments’ – that’s when the lawyers talk isn’t it?
Alito loves this part, explaining how his job works. It’s way hard work, no way he could have an opinion on bush v. Gore without all the required fussing.
Oh boy, now Sessions wants to move onto Chapter 8. Please explain to us Judge Alito what makes something a FEDERAL crime versus a STATE crime.
Come on Sessions ask the big question!: “Who do you want to sit beside on the bench?”
Sessions: You’re not a total brown nose are you? No. Here’s an example where you disagreed with Reagan on strategy (although not necessarily on the goal).
Sessions: Can you live on the salary of a Supreme Court Judge.
??????
“Do you like to duck hunt?”
Sessions: sometimes liberals have a point when they say that conservatives can be activists too.
I’m sure Alito’s extremely grateful for Sessions’ articulating his judicial philosophy for him.
I’m even more convinced than I was during the Roberts hearings that Sessions is utterly out of his mind.
That is a condition to being a Republican…lol!
No doubt. Here’s Orrin discussing policies of torture: nukes in NYC.
Sessions has clearly never been examined by contraband.
I surely love this emphasis on examination by a ‘female officer’, as if this somehow makes a difference.
Shows ya how my mind works.
O, here’s Orrin (NPR followup): Alito is doing fabulously well, despite the deficiencies in his upbringign. He’s been very forthcoming.
2 females…
Yeah- one was ten yeats old jerkwad. I have a 9 1/2 year old and that doesn’t fly AT ALL.
Got to go. Thank You, Everyone for blogging the proceedings!
I’m mostly listening so that I can do other work at the same time, so I haven’t seen much of the TV portion. But Alito seems to be getting more confidence as the day goes on. Of course, other than to DiFI, he didn’t have much to answer this afternoon.
Well, here’s Russ.
Russ is up.
Is he hot, ladies?
Is he wearing a pants suit?
he has a suit, but I can’t tell if he is wearing pants.
Russ: does the president have the authority the constitution authority as commander-in-chief to check in our underwear drawer without a warrant?
Feingold frames the FISA question. Alito understands that it involves interpretation of FISA and the Authorization for the use of military force as well as constitutional issues. He then punts.
russ repeats the question.
Alito: states the obvious. He leaves open the possibility that the FISA laws are not constitutional.
Russ: you told leahy that disputes (like FISA/NSA) are often settled by others than the court. Who should decide them.
Alito: some disputes should not be solved by the judiciary. Baker v. Carr Brennan listed what are judiciable dispute. (This is a non-answer).
this is bullshit. there is no way the court can’t hear the NSA case.
Russ: I understand you have had practice sessions for these hearings. Did you talk about FISA?
Alito: I don’t remember.
Pretty recent to have a memory lapse…
to call bullshit on this guy?
His someheimers is kicking in again.
Russ: who was present at these sessions where you discussed FISA?
color bumper sticker weight 150 pounds?
to negate the shipping costs. Just ignore it and order, and thank you sooooo much for supporting BMT!
for Abrams tanks in Iraq.
Russ: answer the fucking question.
Where is he going with this?
Pin him down Russ.
A: I studied for the test, but nobody gave me the answers beforehand.
about the murder boards.
Russ: does it strike you as inappropriate that members of the Justice Dept. advised you on how to answer questions about FISA?
Alito: they didn’t do that.
he positively remembers now that they didn’t ask or coach him about FISA? Rewind the tape 30 seconds, splice them together, run it on The Daily Show.
I’m glad all the Letters to the Editor I wrote focused only on Alito’s lying. I didn’t realize how much more material he’d generate at the hearings, though.
Aha — this is where he was going.
Russ/Alito: Alito claims repeatedly that he wasn’t coached as to his responses in the ‘practice sesssions’ — though this wasn’t the question.
The impermeable calm is shattered. His tone definitely got a bit shakey there.
I call BS, in any case.
discussion of absolute immunity from civil suits for government officials when carrying out their official duties.
actually, this is an interesting conversation they are having.
It’s a great conversation. How DOES the judiciary evaluate whether the executive is giving correct facts in a case.
Russ moving onto the Vanguard case.
Russ: lambasting the GOP Senators for poo-poohing ethical questions.
Good lecture of his peers.
Someheimers again- he can’t remember whether he put any companies on his standng recusal list.
He’s squirming.
Beautiful smackdown from Russ re GOP senators’ attempts to insulate themselves & the nominee from questions regarding ethics (Vanguard).
Go, man, go.
Did Russ just nail him in a LIE!!!
Alito keeps changing his story about Vanguard…
don’t you have class tonight?
I don’t start again till next week. This week is my “last hurrah!”
Russ wants to know why he keeps coming up with various explanations.
Orrin needs to help him out here.
Russ calls these after-the-fact justifications.
Russ is the only one with balls and man are they BIG!!
Lindsay Graham promises to beat a dead horse.
Watch out, he’s a good trial attorney.
Best line:
Graham: if we come before you judge and claim we can’t remember Abramoff, you will believe us.
anyone for any period for as long as the “war on terror” goes on – which I’m sure in his view is forever.
I’m not completely clear why Graham is pursuing this line of questioning. Maybe he thinks that treating Alito as a hostile witness will help in the long run.
this must be bringing back bad memories of law school for Alito — I almost feel sorry for him.
The facts of the case Mr. Alito!
I don’t get it yet either.
At this point Alito seems exhausted.
Graham seems to be running the clock out, though. Like all the Repugs, he is talking for over half the time — they were well trained. That’s why the Dems, for the most part, screwed up. They went on and on rather than let Alito kill himself.
The way you do it in court is you let the guy talk, even if the guy thinks he’s helping himself. Then you pop the question. If the guy gives a short anwer, because he doesn’t really want to answer the question, the shortness of it alone stands out. And if he talks and talks because he has been conditioned to do it, he usually says something silly.
——-
I have one question, though. Feingold seems to be the only who has a head on their shoulder — why aren’t more dems supporting this guy? The people over at Kos are overwhelmingly for Clark — for reasons I can’t understand. Feingold may not be perfect, but at least he has some guts.
Imo, the folks at Kos are simply looking at ‘electability’ issues.
I can’t believe I have to leave for a 5:00 meeting in the middle of this. Oh well.
Thanks for participating in keeping the office dwellers informed Mary. Great job and great snark!!
I’m sure you can catch it all later.
Just back to my desk . . .
Did you hear that line from Alito about the internment of Japanese-Americans? He called it a grave injustice (which, of course, it was).
But I couldn’t help think of Michelle Malkin — she supports this turkey — what would she say now?
He’s hamminger Alito on his views on abortion.
Anyone know just how long they are going today?
new thread up.