While the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization will go down in history as a 6-3 decision with only the three Democrat-appointed justices dissenting, Chief Justice John Roberts actually did not support a full reversal of Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. His concurring opinion, which argued that the Court should uphold Mississippi’s ban on abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy without entirely abolishing a constitutional right to abortion, represented a path not taken by the other five conservative members of the Court.
When the Court held oral arguments on the Mississippi law last December, the conservative majority’s determination to redeem Donald Trump’s promise to reverse Roe v. Wade was quite clear. The only ray of hope was the clear discomfort of Chief Justice John Roberts, as New York’s Irin Carmon noted at the time:
“It seemed obvious that only Roberts, who vainly tried to focus on the 15-week line even when everyone else made clear it was all or nothing, cares for such appearances. There had been some pre-argument rumblings that Barrett and Brett Kavanaugh might defect, perhaps forming a bloc with Roberts to find some middle ground as happened the last time the Court considered overturning Roe in 1992’s Planned Parenthood v. Casey. On Wednesday, neither Barrett nor Kavanaugh seemed inclined to disappoint the movement that put them on the Court.”
Still, the Casey precedent offered a shred of hope, since in that 1992 case some hard and imaginative work by Republican-appointed justices determined not to overturn Roe eventually flipped Justice Anthony Kennedy and dealt a devastating blow to the anti-abortion movement. Just prior to the May leak of Justice Samuel Alito’s draft majority opinion (which was very similar in every important respect to the final product), the Wall Street Journal nervously speculated that Roberts might be undermining conservative resolve on the Court, or change sides as he famously did in the Obamacare case.
In the wake of the leak there was some reporting that Roberts was indeed determined not to go whole hog in Dobbs; one theory about the leak was that it had been engineered to freeze the other conservatives (especially Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who during his confirmation hearings had said many things incompatible with a decision to reverse Roe entirely) before the chief justice could lure them to his side.
Now it appears Roberts tried and failed. His concurrence was a not terribly compelling plea for “judicial restraint” that left him alone on the polarized Court he allegedly leads:
“I would take a more measured course. I agree with the Court that the viability line established by Roe and Casey should be discarded under a straightforward stare decisis analysis. That line never made any sense. Our abortion precedents describe the right at issue as a woman’s right to choose to terminate her pregnancy. That right should therefore extend far enough to ensure a reasonable opportunity to choose, but need not extend any further certainly not all the way to viability.”
Roberts’s proposed “reasonable opportunity” standard is apparently of his own invention, and is obviously vague enough to allow him to green-light any abortion ban short of one that outlaws abortion from the moment of fertilization, though he does seem to think arbitrarily drawing a new line at the beginning of the second trimester of pregnancy might work. Roberts’s real motivation appears to be upholding the Court’s reputation for judiciousness, which is indeed about to take a beating:
“The Court’s decision to overrule Roe and Casey is a serious jolt to the legal system — regardless of how you view those cases. A narrower decision rejecting the misguided viability line would be markedly less unsettling, and nothing more is needed to decide this case.”
In his majority opinion (joined by Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, and Amy Coney Barrett, along with Kavanaugh) Alito seems to relish in mocking the unprincipled nature of the chief justice’s temporizing position:
“There are serious problems with this approach, and it is revealing that nothing like it was recommended by either party …
“The concurrence would do exactly what it criticizes Roe for doing: pulling “out of thin air” a test that “[n]o party or amicus asked the Court to adopt …
“The concurrence asserts that the viability line is separable from the constitutional right they recognized, and can therefore be “discarded” without disturbing any past precedent … That is simply incorrect.”
One has to wonder that if Merrick Garland had been allowed to join the Court in 2016, or if Amy Coney Barrett had not been rushed onto the Court in 2020, Robert’s split-the-differences approach eroding but not entirely abolishing the constitutional right to abortion might have carried the day in Dobbs. But that’s like speculating about where we would be had Donald Trump not become president in 2017 after promising conservatives the moon — and an end to Roe.
So what if Iraq HAD WMD and a way to deliver them. . . so did Russia for so many years. So why didn’t they zap us when they had the chance?
Because we have the enormous power to retaliate, that’s why. Therefore, it dosen’t wash that Saddam would’ve delivered WMD to the USA.
WMD was nothing but a pretext from Bush and Co. to grab a significant oil producing country AND scare the heck out of us so he can do what he pleases in the name of national security.
Big John
Sorry, I intended to paste the address, but the site wouldn’t let me . It is:
http://www.electoralvote.com
Bush won Nevada by just under 4% in 2000.
Bush 301,575 49.52%
Gore 279,978 45.98%
What in the world is the MoE for these polls, especially the FL one. I have trouble believing Bush surged that much so fast. I could believe Bush is up, but within or just barely outside the margin. Also, I agree with the general sentiment that if millions of people don’t have TV or electriticity or are generally displaced, polling is worthless for another couple weeks in the sunshine state.
Still, NV is good news, 4 points is probabbly w/i MoE. Kerry needs to do another trip out to Vegas and the Vegas burbs to help the house candidate there (get some $) and raise the spirits of his Nevada campaign.
I would say Kerry needs NH WV and then try to get either FL or OH for good measure; right now, it looks like FL is a better bet than OH.
Looks like Nevadans definitely want the nuclear dump in their state. I’m beginning to think may be we deserve this moron as the president.
and more good news, A judge threw Nader off the ballot yet again.
Anyone know a URL that has a good discussion of why RoboPolls suck?
I got into an extended and heated argument with a local TV station’s news director over his use of Survey USA in the last mayor’s race.
The Poll was off by over 12% in the event and prior to the last polling round, was off by a similar margin from a highly respected normal poll
About what states are needed. If Kerry were to win all the Gore 2000 states, and Bush retain all the Bush 2000 states, then Bush wins 278-260.
Using that as a baseline, if the only change is Kerry winning Ohio, he wins 280-258. If Wisconsin also changes (to Bush), Kerry still wins 270-268. So…Kerry doesn’t need to win both Florida and Ohio, assuming he can hold all of the Gore states, or that he loses no Gore state worth more than 10 electoral votes. [That is, if he gets Ohio, he can lose any one of Minnesota, Iowan, Wisconsin, Maine, Oregon, or New Mexico.]
Florida is worth 27 electoral votes, so if Kerry were to win there, that would add another 7 electoral vote buffer.
And he has the lead in New Hampshire, which also gives him another 4 electoral votes.
So…Going back to Nevada….If Kerry can keep Pennsylania and Michigan and pry away either Florida or Ohio, there’s a good change Nevada won’t matter.
But…if the only changes from 2000 are Kerry getting New Hampshire and Nevada, the election ends up deadlocked at 269, throwing it to the House and Senate to pick President and VP. If the Dems can pry away the Senate, that could well leave us with a Bush/Edwards tandem. That’s not what I’d prefer, but better a half loaf than nothing, so I want Nevada to go Democratic.
The Florida poll must favor northern Florida, since that’s the part that isn’t evacuated/reeling re: the hurricane. It’s also the more GOP-heavy part of the state. It’s a crappy poll.
Florida polls can’t be worth much right now, with the hurricane and all. (If South Florida got evacuated this week, but the Panhandle’s evacuating this week, I’d expect gains for Kerry next week based solely on who will be home to answer their phones.) The NV results are unfortunate, but we don’t need that state to win: we do, I think, need either CO or WI or BOTH FL and OH.
I think this poll is worthless, with all the hurricane stuff the past two weeks, does anyone realistically believe an accurate poll would come out of that mess at least until Ivan blows past.
Never mind. I just checked, and there are no RV figures. I wish to hell they would stop taunting us with figures that are likely imaginary.
What is the percentage of Registered Voters?
Nader is back on the FL ballot. So, it probably is worse for Kerry. And yet, I know we will win. I took a poll in the mirror this morning and Kerry is doing fine. Thank you zanex.
Two things to point out:
(1) all of these polls report likely voters, which isn’t necessarily incorrect, but does employ certain assumptions about voter turnout.
GOTV efforts, obviously, can make a huge difference, and this is an area in which the Dems have been losing ground to the GOP over the last two decades. Hopefully the DNC is developing an effective field machine, gathering corps of volunteers to phone Democratic voters less likely to vote (i.e., those below the median income) as well as undecided voters on election day and offer rides/baked cookies/lemonade etc.
(2) in the FL poll for the SAME RESPONDENTS there is quite a bit of ticket-splitting, as Castor (D) is ahead of Martinez (R) in the Senate 49 to 45.
Now this suggests to me that there remains about 5-6% of voters in FL who are seriously in play.
In general, Kerry needs to make better use of local politicians who are (sometimes) more popular than he is in their states–not merely FL but elsewhere, esp. in swing states that have popular Dem governors, i.e., AZ, WI, MI, PA, NC, etc. I know that some coordinated campaigning has been done, but not nearly enough. And there are some governors (e.g., Mike Easley in NC) who do not seem to want to share the stage with Kerry.