Legal experts believe SCOTUS will uphold the Affordable Care Act

March 26, 2012

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

A survey of legal experts finds they believe that the U.S. Supreme Court will follow precedent and uphold the Affordable Care Act.

National Journal surveyed former Supreme Court clerks and lawyers who have argued cases before the high court about the health care law, and the Legal Insiders Expect Supreme Court to Uphold Health Care Law:

The survey asked former Supreme Court clerks and lawyers who have argued cases before the Court to assess the probability, on a scale from zero to 100 percent, that the Justices would strike down the law’s mandates on individuals to purchase health insurance or its provisions expanding eligibility for Medicaid to millions of more uninsured adults.

Overall, those surveyed felt there was only a 35 percent probability that the Court would strike down the law’s individual mandate as unconstitutional. Attorneys who had clerked for one of the Court’s four conservative Justices and those who had clerked for Justice Anthony Kennedy, who is considered the key swing vote on the issue, forecast a somewhat higher probability that the law would be struck down than those who had clerked for the four liberal justices.

But all three groups of former clerks-even those who had worked for the Court’s conservative block-said the odds that the Justices would uphold the mandate was well above 50 percent. Lawyers who have argued before the Court said there was a 36 percent probability the Justices would strike down the mandate, about the same as the clerks overall.

“I don’t think this case will be nearly as close a case as conventional wisdom now has it,” one respondent noted in an open-ended comment. “I think the Court will uphold the statute by a lopsided majority.”

The survey was sponsored by two centrist groups: American Action Forum, a center-right Republican advocacy group and the Blue Dog Research Forum, a center-left Democratic advocacy group. It was conducted by Purple Insights, the research division of Purple Strategies, a bipartisan political consulting firm.

To conduct the poll, Purple Insights last week directed e-mails, and follow-up phone calls at a group of former clerks and attorneys who have argued before the court. In the end, 43 former clerks and 23 attorneys responded to the on-line poll. “From a methodology standpoint, this was a very hard to population to reach…some of the most elite attorneys in the country,” said Doug Usher, who conducted the survey for Purple Insights. “We were pleased with their participation rate and we think the results will add to the discussion.”

Given that level of participation, the results are more suggestive than conclusive. But they may reflect a gap between a political community, where the dominant expectation is that the Court’s five Republican-appointed Justices will unify to strike down the law, and a legal community operating on different assumptions.

(Repost) Recusal! More than just an ‘appearance’ of impropriety

March 26, 2012

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The U.S. Supreme Court today begins oral arguments on the Affordable Care Act. But an issue the mainstream media is largely ignoring is the serious conflict of interest that Justice Clarence Thomas has in this matter. Justice Thomas should have recused himself from participating in these cases, but did not. And this is a serious breach of judicial ethics.

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Yesterday the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari in three appeals challenging the Affordable Care Act. In all of the reporting I have read on this matter, what I have not seen is any indication that Justice Clarence Thomas recused himself from hearing and deciding the case based upon his wife Virginia "Ginny" Thomas' extensive poliitcal activities with the Tea Party organization Liberty Central that she founded which very publicly opposed the Affordable Care Act.

I posted about this back when "Ginny" Thomas may have had one glass of wine too many and drunk dialed Anita Hill to ask her to apologize to her husband. Remember that? And the evil billionaire bastard Koch brothers make a cameo appearance as well. What was really going on with the Anita Hill sideshow:

On Tuesday evening, the New York Times published a story about the Billionaire Kock brothers (aka the "Kochtopus"), who are trying to buy themselves a Congress this election thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court decsion in Citizens United v. FEC, planning to host a meeting in January for the plutocratic "two percenters" and their newly purchased Congress. Koch Industries and Network of Republican Donors Plan Ahead. 21 paragraphs into this disturbing story of political corruption is this passage:

To encourage new participants, Mr. Koch offers to waive the $1,500 registration fee. And he notes that previous guests have included Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas of the Supreme Court, Gov. Haley Barbour and Gov. Bobby Jindal, Senators Jim DeMint and Tom Coburn, and Representatives Mike Pence, Tom Price and Paul D. Ryan.

Would that have been before or after the Citizens United v. FEC decision in January 2010? Was the decision a quid pro quo for Justices Scalia and Thomas patronizing the Koch brothers biannual shindig for the plutocatic "two percenters"? Was the Citizens United ruling and how it could most benefit the Koch brothers and other far-right corporate funded 501(c)(4) non-profit political organizations ever discussed at this meeting? There are some serious ethical questions raised by Supreme Court Justices ruling favorably for their friends and associates who have business before the court, especially on something as controversial as Citizens United.

Justice Thomas' ethical lapses are not limited to his friends the Koch brothers. As I told you in March of this year, shortly after the Citizens United decision, Thomas' wife, Virginia "Ginny" Thomas, formed a 501(c)(4) nonprofit political organization. Wife of Justice Clarence Thomas launches a Tea Party organization. (3/15/2010).

Supreme Court Justices and their spouses traditionally are not politically active nor actively involved in anything remotely controversial that could bring disrepute upon the Court or give cause for the public to question the impartiality and fairness of the Justice or the Court.

Apparenlty Justice Clarence Thomas and his wife Ginny are not happy with this longstanding tradition and feel it is appropriate for them to politicize the U.S. Supreme Court. I posted that legal experts were critical of Mrs. Thomas' ethically challenged decision to establish a 501(c)(4) nonprofit political organization, i.e., Tea Party, at the time. Wife of Justice Clarence Thomas is violating law. (3/19/10).

I recently posted about Justice Thomas' conflict of interest with his wife's political activities in DNC goes on the offensive against foreign-funded "U.S." Chamber of Commerce:

It turns out Justice Clarence Thomas has a serious conflict of interest as the Citizens United decision directly benefitted his wife's 501(c)(4) conservative political action committee. Thomas should have recused himself. Activism of Thomas’s Wife Could Raise Judicial Issues:

[Virginia] Thomas is the founder and head of a new nonprofit group, Liberty Central, dedicated to opposing what she characterizes as the leftist “tyranny” of President Obama and Democrats in Congress and to “protecting the core founding principles” of the nation.

It is the most partisan role ever for a spouse of a justice on the nation’s highest court, and Mrs. Thomas is just getting started. “Liberty Central will be bigger than the Tea Party movement,” she told Fox News in April, at a Tea Party rally in Atlanta.

But to some people who study judicial ethics, Mrs. Thomas’s activism is raising knotty questions, in particular about her acceptance of large, unidentified contributions for Liberty Central. She began the group in late 2009 with two gifts of $500,000 and $50,000, and because it is a 501(c)(4) nonprofit group, named for the applicable section of the federal tax code, she does not have to publicly disclose any contributors. Such tax-exempt groups are supposed to make sure that less than half of their activities are political.