I'm sure by now many of you have seen the news reports about our own Scalia who just gave an interview to the Radio Television Suisse - where, of course, he embarrassed himself and our nation, as expected.
I could not find the transcript of that interview, so this is my reflection on the news reports of it, specifically, this one from CNN's: http://www.cnn.com/...
All the news reports made Scalia's torture remarks the centerpiece - and I, too, was aghast when I read them. But here I want to talk about something else that the news reports missed out completely - see below.
But before I get to that, I still want to post a quick note of my thoughts about his thoughts on torture: Scalia really seems to FIRMLY BELEIVE that torture actually yields credible, important results that non-torture interrogation methods don't or can't. So, he seems to believe in something that not only defies common sense, but was also discredited by innumerable studies and personal accounts of the tortured over hundreds if not thousands of years of human history!
OK, so common sense and common knowledge do not sit well with our Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. But we kinda knew this already.
But what disturbed me the most in this interview was simply seeing how this man reasons: he reasons like a four-year old. And then delivers his "deep thoughts" in such a condescending manner as if to say "I know I reason like a 4 year old, and I am PROUD of it!"
See for yourselves, and see if you agree with me:
1. from the same CNN article:
"he [Scalia] brushed off questions about whether Supreme Court decisions opening the door for outside groups to spend unlimited sums of money on elections have hurt the country, saying that 'the amount of money that is spent on all elections -- state, local and federal -- in the United States, is less than what women spend on cosmetics for a year, OK?' "
Umm, whaaaa???? what is the point here exactly? And since when "what women spend on cosmetics for a year" became a measuring stick of the health of a democracy? and if the election spending is below the "women's makeup" spending - does that mean it's not hurting democracy? What if women stop buying makeup altogether - will then the $2.5 bln spent in a presidential election year (2012) become detrimental to democracy? Or, what if women buy nothing but makeup, and the makeup $$$ surpass the Pentagon budget of almost $1T - would that mean it's OK to spend about the same amount, but a bit less, on presidential elections? Or... Ugghhh! My head is spinning already!
2. Further down in the same CNN article:
"Scalia said he doesn't agree with the notion that outspending the other side is the key to winning elections. He said if people really believe 'the masses are so ignorant that they are swayed by television ads,' then 'let's have a king. Right? Let's have a king. "
When I read this, I was like: darn, where did I hear this before? Why does this sound so familiar? And then I remembered... You remember this one too!
From http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
"Fluke eventually spoke to a Democratic hearing, and talked about the need for birth control for both reproductive and broader medical reasons. She mentioned in particular a friend of hers who needed contraception to prevent the growth of cysts"
To which Limbaugh replies:
"Susan Fluke [sic] who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex -- what does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex. She's having so much sex she can't afford the contraception. She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex."
To me, this rings like the same logic of reasoning:
* "she spoke of birth control - therefore, she's a slut" - Rush Limbaugh, RWNJ radio host, 2/29/12
* "if people really believe 'the masses are so ignorant that they are swayed by television ads,' then 'let's have a king'. Right? Let's have a king." - Antonin Scalia, Supreme Court Justice, 12/12/14
This is what bothered me the most about this interview, that a US Supreme Court Justice thinks and speaks like a rock-bottom-feeder radio shock jock, and is proud of it.
And that the news media did not even catch on this in their reporting.