Justice Alito says pandemic has resulted in ‘unimaginable’ restrictions on individual liberty https://t.co/qNQkx1IcpM
— Robert Barnes (@scotusreporter) November 13, 2020
The biggest problem with Covid is not the death rate or the shuttering of the economy or even civil liberties. The biggest problem with Covid is the ability to treat the infected. Granted they are a minority of the population, but do we leave them to die because of that?With North Dakota hospitals at 100% capacity, Burgum announces COVID-positive nurses can stay at work | Grand Forks Herald https://t.co/N9GZpePIUZ
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) November 13, 2020
Perhaps our “civil liberties” are imposed upon. But the Constitution is not a mutual suicide pact. Nor does it require we set aside our humanity for some abstract ideal of “freedumb.”
Alito, it should be noted TELECAST his remarks to the Federalist-fascist Society as he works remotely as a Supreme Court Justice and, no doubt, is kept cocooned in his personal life from exposure to Covid-19. On the other hand,if he wants to go get exposed, I'm OK with that. He is one of the most putrid members of that court in my memory.
ReplyDeleteI read his comments as reported at WaPo. They are incredibly stupid and whining. It’s clear he lives in a bubble, and that human beings are just an abstraction. It’s “civil liberties” that have the only reality.
DeleteIt reminds me of one of those Fred Friendly type round table things I heard on TV. Henry Hyde kept talking about legalizing suicide as a violation of "the right to life". Barney Frank asked excatly where Hyde's "right to life" resided if not within the human being who would be choosing to end their life. I've got deep reservations about legalized and, especially, assisted suicide because I'm sure if that happens then economic calculations, the interests of interested parties and those who would take it on themseleves to make the decision for other people will certainly enter into it, but I would say on that issue Barney Franck's question rendered Hyde's claim nonsensical.
DeleteWhenever a fascist like Alito starts talking "civil liberties" he really means the privileges of the privileged. Those cases that Professor Ronald Sullivan brought up during his confirmation hearing, the case of a poor 10-year-old being strip searched for the cops because they suspected her father of being a drug dealer and the rich wife of a rich veterinarian (as I recall), how he said it was perfectly OK to strip search the little girl but an outrage when it was a rich woman is the perfect revelation of who he really is. He is as loathesome as Clarence Thomas or Rehnquist or Scalia were.
Quite right. "Civil liberties for me, but not for thee."
DeleteBurgum is happy to let nurses with COVID treat patients, but refuses to mandate anything like mask wearing to slow down the out of control infection in his state. He and Alito are cut from the same cloth. Alito has decided that with the death of Scalia someone needs to take up the role of crazy old crank on the supreme court. That he feels no need to hide any of his biases is just more evidence that the conservative wing of the court feels untouchable. He railed not only against abortion but contraception, LGBTQ+ rights, the regulatory state, etc. My prediction is in ten years the seminal political moment of 2020 will not be Trump losing the white house, but Barret being installed on the court to cement an ultra conservative majority that then imposed it's world view on the country by judicial fiat.
ReplyDeleteHe is a poor choice of counterpoint, isn't he? I should have looked for a tweet about El Paso, where the Court of Appeals has now suspended enforcement of the County Judge's closure order until further notice, while cases in El Paso rage out of control. Texas overall has a double digit positivity rate again, mostly due to poor El Paso. People must be sacrificed in order for abstractions like money (El Paso) and ideals (Alito) to be preserved. Not sure what we're preserving them for, however. People who can easily avoid getting sick, I guess.
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