Ordinarily, U.S. Supreme Court justices avoid television interviews, leaving the cameras for politicians. Justice Antonin Scalia apparently prefers a higher-profile approach.
Fresh off his widely-derided political antics towards the end of the court's last session, Scalia recently appeared on CNN, and just 10 days later, sat down with Chris Wallace on yesterday's edition of "Fox News Sunday."
The two covered a fair amount of ground, including Scalia's argument that there's "no way" the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate should be regarded "as a tax." (Those who can afford coverage but refuse to buy it pay a tax penalty on their tax returns.) They also touched on gun control, and Scalia's belief that firearms protected under the Second Amendment must be "hand-carried." He added, in reference to the law, "It's to keep and bear, so it doesn't apply to cannons."
What about "handheld rocket launchers that can bring down airplanes"? Scalia said it's unclear whether that's protected, and "it will have to be decided." I'll look forward to it.
But of particular interest to me was Scalia's opposition to privacy rights. Unprompted, the justice noted his opposition to reproductive rights, and it led to this exchange:
WALLACE: What about the right to privacy that the court found in known 1965?
SCALIA: There is no right to privacy. No generalized right to privacy.
WALLACE: Well, in the Griswold case, the court said there was.
SCALIA: Indeed it did, and that was -- that was wrong.
In case anyone needs a refresher on Griswold, the Supreme Court, in a 7-to-2 ruling in 1965, struck down a Connecticut law that restricted married couples' access to birth control. The court majority, in a landmark ruling, said such statutes are impermissible -- they violate Americans' right to privacy.
Yesterday's exchange didn't break new ground, but it was a noteworthy reminder that far-right jurists on the high court still have a problem with Griswold, even a half-century later.
For Scalia, if a state wants to restrict married couples' access to contraception, there are no rights afforded by the Constitution that say otherwise. "There is," he said, "no right to privacy."
It's a fanciful dream, but I'd love for this to be an issue in the 2012 presidential race.
Leave a Comment:
David and Disgusted:
Both of you are behaving like perfect examples of why we don't work as a country anymore. Instead of intelligent dialogue we immediately revert to 5th grade school yard behavior and throw logical, respectful debate out the window as fast as we can! No wonder we can't ever get anything done! This blog post was about Scalia and his interviews and mostly about his declaration that the right to privacy doesn't inherently read in the constitution, not about whether or not David can carry a .45. But since we flew off topic into the 2nd amendment...I happen to agree with David (even though for the most part I'm one of those liberals) about my right to keep a handgun if I so choose. I happen to also have training and permission from my state to do so. Whether or not David misunderstood or misinterpreted your original post, Disgusted, is no reason to suddenly leap into the fray with cursing wackjob name calling. I applaud David for holding on to decorum for a couple of responses but then you both just flew into 5th grader rages and it went downhill. When both sides of a debate behave in this manner it is no wonder why each side thinks the other is a "wack job"! Grow up, gentlemen (I am assuming), and behave yourselves as an example to our younger generations to come. Respectful debate is such a lost art these days and it is that lost art that is destroying our country.
I will now step off my soap box. Thank you.
Wow! Every now and then a really egregious example of Personal Virtue comes along. It is impossible to have any sort of respectful debate/discussion/whatever with the aggressively malicious, which basically sums up those on the right.
I agree that at times it is impossible and most times I cannot even fathom what the "Right" is thinking (generalizing, of course). But when we play that same game it makes us every bit as wrong is all I am trying to say. This is a blog...I have no idea what anyone's personal politics really are, aside from the snippets they share here. Who am I to judge? Who are you to judge? Why attack someone personally on their right to believe what they wish? Defend your opinions with respect and intelligence, not by calling them wack jobs...it just makes you look stupid. The more of us that think before we speak and speak intelligently, the more reasonable people will notice and take part. Flinging slurs will do nothing for either side but engage more idiotic behavior.
Why the country doesn't work anymore is because so few people are willing to tell the whack jobs they're whack jobs. You see, these people, when they were in class rooms, or other organizing places in society couldn't continually ram their obnoxiousness into the conversation or interrupt at will. But with the advent of computer and message boards, etc. nothing and nobody shuts them down. You don't see liberals running to the whack job boards disrupting like they do on liberal and progressive ones. They don't deserve to be given their forum here, but they get it, and that should stop.
It's people like you fish that think these tools are to be taken seriously and with respect. They forfeited that a long time ago. Their intention is to disrupt. Maybe you're not really used to what the internet "has to offer" but the rules are different. And it wasn't the liberals that made them different. And it's people like you who are simply unwilling to fight fire with fire. It's people like you who represent the cowardice in liberals that has lead to the impending erasure of the 20th century.
And if you don't like it, I don't give a damn.
One more thing: your naivete makes me sick.
Disgusted...,
It is quite possible that the fishy one is actually a right-wing troll trying to run a guilt trip on haynus libruls. I've been seeing that sort for years.
Yeah, could be. I just checked and Mr. FaintingCouch SensibleDaintyFish only has two posts, both of them being in the defense of the troll-etariat. Then again, he could be just one of our own wallflowers who simply refuses to fight. Either way, I'll handle the wingnuts as contemptuously as they deserve.
He (?) may have gone to another site where he could whine piteously about how he was treated here and get undeserved sympathy.
Possibly. That happens a heck of a lot with the climate deniers claiming they get mistreated on real climate sites. Hilarious, actually. They go to the true climate sites and start a bunch of nonsense, then after getting challenged they get all butthurt and slink off claiming somebody hurt their feelings. The righties are just sickening.
Actually, SHE was busy working outside on her farm and not spending her entire day trolling the Maddow blog boards to see when you would respond and with what. I refuse to engage in this petty type of dialogue. You can't even call it dialogue. Your fight fire with fire sounds so Christian Right is scares me. If you would turn even half of this ridiculous anger toward doing something decent and worthwhile maybe we would get somewhere. If you want to put out any more snarky comments you will have to wait for my response, which may never come, because I have a farm and a business to run and I don't have time to play 5th grade games with you people. I want a better society, not a pissed off entitled one.
Enjoy your day and I hope you see the error of your self righteousness at some point. Geez, doesn't anyone listen to Buddha or the Dalai Lama anymore??
Well, you clearly aren't up on the goings-on on the interwebs. You might want to understand that before you hop right back up there on your Naive High Horse, Ms. BootstrappyMatureAdult. But turning-the-other-cheeky isn't and hasn't gotten it done, and it will not get it done. What it will get done is erasing the 20th century. Things don't work the way they used to. It's a shame, but it's the truth.
Turning the other cheek and being a good little girl won't "get it done", but it obviously makes her feel excrutiatingly virtuous. People (?) like her are absolutely no use in the struggle to keep the right from taking total control of the US. Her invoking Siddhārtha Gautama and the Dalai Lama was a real hoot!
The climax was "...I hope you see the error of your self righteousness at some point." Talk about irony.
Look, maybe she's sincere, and I hope that's the case. But she stepped in where she shouldn't have and took a stance that was both ridiculous and indicated she's not up on the ways of the interwebs now. I remember when I first had to come to grips with the reality of the caustic and toxic nature of the modern American wingnut animal and it's viciousness in achieving it's ideological goals. Wingnuttia values nothing -- not human dignity, not human life, not human suffering -- more than the victory that will come when they destroy in this country what has been learned and built up the hard way. When someone understands that, you understand that it is no longer a debate; it is a war. And if she is sincere, my guess is she would be much more comfortable on heavily moderated sites like the NYT, where the trolls are shut down without a second chance.
But as long as the troll-etariat is allowed to roam free anywhere I'm at, they're going to get more grief than they can dish out. They will know, in no uncertain terms what a good proportion of the rest of the country thinks of them. And that's a good thing because most of them can't fathom that they're hated with the venom that they are. And fish is going to feel uncomfortable if she thinks she can, against me, come to the defense of a well-known troll who I've had experience with and she hasn't. She's going to hear about it.
I don't know who you think you are to sit in judgement of me. I am a 38 year old United States Marine Corps veteran, a sustainable farmer, a mother, and I happen to be a lesbian who lives in Fitzwalkerstan. Unlike you, I do not sit and troll around the interwebs all day and call myself some sort of warrior fighting half fictitious people whose only goal is to goad me into behaving like a wack job myself under the guise of giving it to the Right. I was part of our protest against Walker and the Right from the start. I am an activist farmer and I fight in many, many ways as a woman, a farmer and a lesbian for my rights and the rights of others in my community, my state and my country. I fight with my pen, my dollars, my actions, my vote, my presence, my feet and my voice. I do not sit on my high and mighty keyboard and self righteously announce myself to be at war by attacking even the most deserving of souls. You have never met me, you do not know my story, you do not know anything about me that could possibly give you the right to sit in judgement of me. All I was saying in the first place was how disappointing it is to watch two people who don't know each other go at it like children on a web board. From that you decided to be an attack mob judging me without knowing a thing about me.
I commented because I was interested in the story. I commented because I am so tired of seeing such disgrace displayed on comment boards from all sides that makes me think we've already gone to hell and a hand basket. I did NOT comment so some self righteous computer hack who has nothing better to do all day than sit on comment boards proclaiming to be at war could come along and tell me where I stand in his world. Enjoy your boards and thank you for ruining it for me.
If he's using the argument that "to keep and bear arms" patently applies to those that can be hand-carried, he's way wrong. Following the dictates of that phrase I could conceivably "keep" a cannon in my backyard while "bearing" a rifle to the courthouse. I believe the Second Amendment was designed to allow citizens to have as much fire power as their government, so that in the event it becomes necessary to revolt we are able to do so. We wouldn't be here as a nation had the British out gunned us.
I own guns. I believe that every gun owner should be licensed and take mandatory training. I believe that licensing should be renewed every 5 years. I believe that most of the gun argument is nonsense. The right thinks the left is out to 'get their guns', the left thinks all guns are in the hands of dangerous and careless people. Neither side is correct. Every gun in the country should be registered. Period. ALL sales of firearms should be reported. Period. No one, including President Obama, wants to prevent anyone from protecting their family. This conversation is a symbol of the stupid divide in America about left and right. Try to react with some rationality and respect for reasonable people. Lots of countries have permitted guns, but only in America do we act like wild children and cry "mine, mine, mine" at the slightest hint of self control. Could everyone please grow up?
No right to privacy? My god you mean my Tax returns are not private. You mean I might have to reveal my tax returns if someone ask for them. Wow! That is a conservative revelation.