No amount of hypocrisy from the Republican Party is astounding at this point, but their complaint that a judge cannot be an "activist" is more than a little bizarre, since the word "activist" appears nowhere in the constitution, nor does the concept appear that a judge should be inspired by heaven and have absolutely no opinions about any of his or her, um, opinions.
One of the favorite justices on the nutcase right, is "Fat Tony," Antonin Scalia, who, I am ashamed to say, hails from Trenton, New Jersey.
Let's review some of "Fat Tony's" opinions to see if they have a particular viewpoint that reflects "Fat Tony's" biases.
In Romer vs. Evans, "Fat Tony" ruled (in dissent) that gay people, and only gay people, are not subject to anti-discrimination laws, citing an earlier decision by the court (just before "Fat Tony" joined the court) in Bowers vs. Hardwick that the State of Texas had the right to kick down the door and determine what two adults were doing in bed.
Quoth "Fat Tony":
[Amendment 2 is] a modest attempt by seemingly tolerant Coloradans to preserve traditional sexual mores against the efforts of a politically powerful minority to revise those mores through use of the laws. That objective, and the means chosen to achieve it, are [...] unimpeachable under any constitutional doctrine hitherto pronounced
.
In Bush v. Gore, the "not activist" "Fat Tony" decreed that one of the unenumerated powers of the Supreme Court was to make decisions about who and who has not been elected President of the United States. Although such an argument appears nowhere in the Constitution, nor is mentioned in any of the Federalist Papers, and has no precedent in the close elections of Thomas Jefferson, John Quincy Adams, Rutherford B. Hayes, John F. Kennedy or any other figure in American History, "Fat Tony" decided that not only was the person with the lesser amount of votes qualified to assume the Presidency, but that in this case and only this case, Stare Decisis would not apply in case, um, someone tried to apply the ruling to a candidate who was not a Republican.
Activist?
No matter. "Fat Tony" is so activist that he has no respect whatsoever for <me>Stare Decisis," having argued to overturn it in such cases as Roe v. Wade, Miranda v. Arizona (which was partially eroded in Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial Court of Nevada.
One bit of Stare Decisis that I suspect "Fat Tony" has no problem with, I'd guess - and I may be unfair here - is Plessy v. Ferguson - though I don't know.
As a strict original constructionist, I wonder if "Fat Tony" has any problem with the 14th Amendment since clearly Washington, Jefferson, Madison and a host of other guys would have opposed it.
Another non-activist decision of "Fat Tony's" is his recent announcement that the ability to learn to interpret the law is controlled by admissions boards at Ivy League Schools.
Repukes!
Give.
Me.
A.
Break.