"I don’t know how many times we need to keep saying this: The Judiciary Committee has unanimously recommended to me that there be no hearing. I’ve said repeatedly and I’m now confident that my conference agrees that this decision ought to be made by the next president, whoever is elected,"
- Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Feb 23, 2016"Once the political season is underway and it is, action on a Supreme Court nomination must be put off until after the election campaign is over," Biden said.
It sounds like we have bipartisan agreement.
Your friend McConnell is not going to work with Trump either. Marco Rubio apparently misses over 80% of his senate committee meetings and he is the establishment candidate. Not doing their job is very typical of these republicans. SEND THEM ALL HOME!!!
Normally at this point in the election cycle the GOP would be gearing up for attacks on their anticipated Democratic rival for the White House. But party leaders are so distraught at the idea of the blustery businessman heading the ticket, that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has taken to advising candidates to keep their distance from Trump.
According to the New York Times, McConnell is assuring Senate candidates running for reelection that they should feel free to run ads against Trump if they feel he is hurting their own campaigns. According to senators attending private lunches with the Majority Leader, McConnell is taking the approach that Trump will lose badly in the general election and that senators should sell themselves as a bulwark against a Hillary Clinton presidency.
_______________________________________________________________________
Good luck with that.
1.) “Your friend McConnell is not going to work with Trump either” – your assumption with no basis in fact.
2.) “Marco Rubio apparently misses over 80% of his senate committee meetings” – Obama missed almost all his committee meetings while Senator.
The American People know very well that the Obama and Hillary Clinton have failed at every level of government, refuse to work with The Republicans and their lives have continued to get worse since 2008.
This is why American People took control of The House of Representatives and The Senate away from the democrats.
This is why voter turnout at every caucus and primary is way up for Republicans and significantly down for democrats.
This is why our next President will be a Republican.
I don't think you have a very healthy attitude for someone attached to the government udder. Out of habit you are probably very happy with dysfunctional government employees like Rubio.
An extra problem is that Chris Christie is so tarnishing Rubio he will be easy to beat in the general if it gets that far which is not likely.
Voter turnout is up because of Trump alone not the party.
________________________________________________________________________
I stopped working for the federal government in 1977 when my enlistment ended.
Try again.
To me how you described your "organization" meeting with other NGOs, the CDC and WHO is this was a either a meeting about a grant proposal, a general funding meeting or a seminar for already funded agencies. The funding for you and other agencies would typically be the government. Hence you are a government employee replete with all the bad habits.
_________________________________________________________________________
Not even close.
I work for a humanitarian organization which, in this case, works with NGOs, the CDC and WHO on bio-medical outbreaks.
We are privately funded and are not controlled by any federal government agency. We do however often advise and assist them. Trust me, they need the help.
Just from your posts here I'd give you a score of a 0 out of a 100 in any capability and on statistics you are in the negatives. Who could you possibly be advising on anything?
It could be that you are funded by a foundation that in itself for certain programs is funded by the government. Nevertheless, just being part of the network fosters exposure and the inertia created by bureaucracy is contagious.
Based on how vague his answers are, I believe that he does none of those things that he describes. He has claimed that he is an executive for some company, but that is as vague of a job description as you can give. Given his propensity for lying, I have come to the conclusion that he works at a Burger King.
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years. Will be interesting to see if it will be a trend in Scalia's absence.
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years. Will be interesting to see if it will be a trend in Scalia's absence.
__________________________________________________________________________
Your racism is showing again son.
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years. Will be interesting to see if it will be a trend in Scalia's absence.
__________________________________________________________________________
Your racism is showing again son.
You are a liar and a fool, son.
"I don’t know how many times we need to keep saying this: The Judiciary Committee has unanimously recommended to me that there be no hearing. I’ve said repeatedly and I’m now confident that my conference agrees that this decision ought to be made by the next president, whoever is elected,"
- Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Feb 23, 2016"Once the political season is underway and it is, action on a Supreme Court nomination must be put off until after the election campaign is over," Biden said.
It sounds like we have bipartisan agreement.
Your friend McConnell is not going to work with Trump either. Marco Rubio apparently misses over 80% of his senate committee meetings and he is the establishment candidate. Not doing their job is very typical of these republicans. SEND THEM ALL HOME!!!
Normally at this point in the election cycle the GOP would be gearing up for attacks on their anticipated Democratic rival for the White House. But party leaders are so distraught at the idea of the blustery businessman heading the ticket, that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has taken to advising candidates to keep their distance from Trump.
According to the New York Times, McConnell is assuring Senate candidates running for reelection that they should feel free to run ads against Trump if they feel he is hurting their own campaigns. According to senators attending private lunches with the Majority Leader, McConnell is taking the approach that Trump will lose badly in the general election and that senators should sell themselves as a bulwark against a Hillary Clinton presidency.
_______________________________________________________________________
Good luck with that.
1.) “Your friend McConnell is not going to work with Trump either” – your assumption with no basis in fact.
2.) “Marco Rubio apparently misses over 80% of his senate committee meetings” – Obama missed almost all his committee meetings while Senator.
The American People know very well that the Obama and Hillary Clinton have failed at every level of government, refuse to work with The Republicans and their lives have continued to get worse since 2008.
This is why American People took control of The House of Representatives and The Senate away from the democrats.
This is why voter turnout at every caucus and primary is way up for Republicans and significantly down for democrats.
This is why our next President will be a Republican.
I don't think you have a very healthy attitude for someone attached to the government udder. Out of habit you are probably very happy with dysfunctional government employees like Rubio.
An extra problem is that Chris Christie is so tarnishing Rubio he will be easy to beat in the general if it gets that far which is not likely.
Voter turnout is up because of Trump alone not the party.
________________________________________________________________________
I stopped working for the federal government in 1977 when my enlistment ended.
Try again.
To me how you described your "organization" meeting with other NGOs, the CDC and WHO is this was a either a meeting about a grant proposal, a general funding meeting or a seminar for already funded agencies. The funding for you and other agencies would typically be the government. Hence you are a government employee replete with all the bad habits.
_________________________________________________________________________
Not even close.
I work for a humanitarian organization which, in this case, works with NGOs, the CDC and WHO on bio-medical outbreaks.
We are privately funded and are not controlled by any federal government agency. We do however often advise and assist them. Trust me, they need the help.
Just from your posts here I'd give you a score of a 0 out of a 100 in any capability and on statistics you are in the negatives. Who could you possibly be advising on anything?
It could be that you are funded by a foundation that in itself for certain programs is funded by the government. Nevertheless, just being part of the network fosters exposure and the inertia created by bureaucracy is contagious.
Based on how vague his answers are, I believe that he does none of those things that he describes. He has claimed that he is an executive for some company, but that is as vague of a job description as you can give. Given his propensity for lying, I have come to the conclusion that he works at a Burger King.
He won't answer this but I would say a Starbucks might be a possibility. It just strikes me that he has some experience serving liberals coffee.
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years. Will be interesting to see if it will be a trend in Scalia's absence.
__________________________________________________________________________
Your racism is showing again son.
You are a liar and a fool, son.
________________________________________________________________________
If someone disagrees with Obama on policy, the liberals call them a racist.
Using your same pattern your criticism of Justice Thomas makes you a racist.
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years. Will be interesting to see if it will be a trend in Scalia's absence.
__________________________________________________________________________
Your racism is showing again son.
You are a liar and a fool, son.
________________________________________________________________________
If someone disagrees with Obama on policy, the liberals call them a racist.
Using your same pattern your criticism of Justice Thomas makes you a racist.
I did not disagree with or criticize Thomas in any way.
Once again, you are lying.
[Edited on 3/1/2016 by gondicar]
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years.
That's a statement of fact, not a criticism.
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years. Will be interesting to see if it will be a trend in Scalia's absence.
__________________________________________________________________________
Your racism is showing again son.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/clarence-thomas-breaks-his-10-year-silence-on-the-bench/article/2584524
http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/US-Supreme-Court-Thomas-Speaks/2016/02/29/id/716628/
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/02/29/justice-thomas-asks-questions-in-court-1st-time-in-10-years.html
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/02/29/clarence-thomas-speaks-from-bench-for/
Racists, one and all huh?
If someone disagrees with Obama on policy, the liberals call them a racist.
Using your same pattern your criticism of Justice Thomas makes you a racist.
There is no racism in Gondicar's statement. It's a fact. A truth. I know you are unfamiliar with the truth but calling that statement racist is idiotic.
If you want criticism of Justice Thomas it is easy to find. In fact, you will find plenty of criticism of Justice Thomas from black civil rights leaders. Does that make them racist?
Moron.
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years. Will be interesting to see if it will be a trend in Scalia's absence.
__________________________________________________________________________
Your racism is showing again son.
You are a liar and a fool, son.
________________________________________________________________________
If someone disagrees with Obama on policy, the liberals call them a racist.
Using your same pattern your criticism of Justice Thomas makes you a racist.I did not disagree with or criticize Thomas in any way.
Once again, you are lying.
[Edited on 3/1/2016 by gondicar]
________________________________________________________________________
Liar.
You posted it as a shot at Justice Thomas.
If someone disagrees with Obama on policy, the liberals call them a racist.
Using your same pattern your criticism of Justice Thomas makes you a racist.There is no racism in Gondicar's statement. It's a fact. A truth. I know you are unfamiliar with the truth but calling that statement racist is idiotic.
If you want criticism of Justice Thomas it is easy to find. In fact, you will find plenty of criticism of Justice Thomas from black civil rights leaders. Does that make them racist?
Moron.
________________________________________________________________________
Yes, the black hate groups do not like Justice Thomas because he is a conservative. That is the business of the grievance industry; how they make money. Wow, that has never happened before has it?
Then how is disagreeing with Obama racist?
Then how is disagreeing with Obama racist?
I disagree with many of Obama's positions. I'm not racist. However many racists have pure and unadulterated hatred for Obama. They can't stand the fact that they aren't as accomplished and successful as a black man. I think it's hilarious that so many losers call Obama a failure when clearly he is one of the most successful Americans to ever live.
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years. Will be interesting to see if it will be a trend in Scalia's absence.
__________________________________________________________________________
Your racism is showing again son.
You are a liar and a fool, son.
________________________________________________________________________
If someone disagrees with Obama on policy, the liberals call them a racist.
Using your same pattern your criticism of Justice Thomas makes you a racist.I did not disagree with or criticize Thomas in any way.
Once again, you are lying.
[Edited on 3/1/2016 by gondicar]
________________________________________________________________________
Liar.
You posted it as a shot at Justice Thomas.
This may be hard for your feeble mind to accept, but its not always about taking shots at someone or something.
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years. Will be interesting to see if it will be a trend in Scalia's absence.
__________________________________________________________________________
Your racism is showing again son.
You are a liar and a fool, son.
________________________________________________________________________
If someone disagrees with Obama on policy, the liberals call them a racist.
Using your same pattern your criticism of Justice Thomas makes you a racist.I did not disagree with or criticize Thomas in any way.
Once again, you are lying.
[Edited on 3/1/2016 by gondicar]
________________________________________________________________________
Liar.
You posted it as a shot at Justice Thomas.This may be hard for your feeble mind to accept, but its not always about taking shots at someone or something.
________________________________________________________________________
So says a racist.
Nothing there yet again.
Here's some criticism of Scalia. Is this guy racist?
Antonin Scalia’s death during secret junket points to new ethical violations
By John Burton
20 February 2016Antonin Scalia died as he lived, indulging behind closed doors in the largess of the very wealthy, who could depend on the right-wing associate justice to defend their interests in the United States Supreme Court.
The nauseating praise for Scalia as a towering judicial figure is exposed as all the more dishonest and absurd by the still emerging circumstances of his passing.
On Friday, February 12, the start of the Supreme Court’s annual week-long President’s Day recess, Scalia took a chartered jet from Washington, D.C., accompanied by an unidentified lawyer friend, to the exclusive Cibolo Creek Ranch in the Chinati Mountains of West Texas, near the Mexican border. US marshals assigned as Scalia’s bodyguards were told not to make the trip.
John B. Poindexter, a former commanding officer in Vietnam who now controls a Houston manufacturing empire with multiple subsidiaries, taking in total annual revenues of close to $1 billion and employing 5,000 people, bought the 30,000-acre property in 1988. He renovated its three adobe forts, which date back to 1857, turning them into plush accommodations for a high-end resort.
Among the guests seeking seclusion in the lap of luxury at Cibolo Creek Ranch that have been identified by the press are Mick Jagger, Bruce Willis, a variety of businesspeople and “European royalty.”
According to its web site, among the resort’s most popular activities is the guided tour of its scenic desert terrain in a Humvee, the same vehicle used by the United States military in its occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq.
Guests can hunt pheasants and chukars along with bigger game such as deer, elk, buffalo and mountain lions. Retired Supreme Court Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor once told Houston lawyer Mark Lanier that Scalia “will do anything if you take him hunting.”
After landing at the ranch’s private airfield, Scalia enjoyed an outing with some other guests, followed by dinner. Weary from traveling, Scalia retired alone to the 1,100-square-foot “El Presidente Grand Suite” shortly before 10. The advertised rate for “El Presidente,” which includes a private fire pit on the veranda overlooking Cibolo Lake, is $700 per night, inclusive of meals and one bottle of wine per stay.
The next morning, after Scalia did not join the other guests for breakfast, Poindexter and Scalia’s lawyer friend found his cold, lifeless body in bed.
A local justice of the peace contacted by telephone pronounced Scalia dead of natural causes, freeing his body to be shipped back to Washington without a coroner’s investigation or autopsy.
This episode pulls back the curtain a bit on how big financial interests have been pulling the strings in the Supreme Court.
Poindexter confirmed to the Washington Post that Scalia was not going to pay for his stay at Cibolo Creek Ranch. “He was an invited guest, along with a friend, just like 35 others,” Poindexter said. According to media sources, Poindexter hosts gatherings two or three times a year.
Last year, James Hinga, a 76-year-old machinist for MIC Group, one of Poindexter’s companies, filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking review of a lower-court decision that summarily dismissed his claim that he was fired based on pretexts because of his age. Scalia participated in the October 5, 2015 decision denying review, thus ending the case in Poindexter’s favor. Scalia’s acceptance of gifts worth several thousands of dollars so soon after ruling in a party’s favor is a clear violation of judicial ethics.
Other significant ethical questions remain unanswered a full week later. Poindexter maintains that he did not pay for Scalia’s chartered jet. There is no indication yet whose pocket that money came from, but one can be assured that it did not come from Scalia’s own.
Similarly, it is not yet known whether Scalia’s companion, or any of the 35 other Cibolo Creek Ranch guests, similarly had matters pending before the Supreme Court, because none of these witnesses to the circumstances of Scalia’s death have been identified.
This silence itself suggests that Poindexter and the others may have something to hide. At minimum, given the central role Houston plays in the United States energy industry, it is likely that some of Poindexter’s guests benefited from the Supreme Court’s extraordinary five-to-four order the preceding Tuesday that halted implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency’s “Clean Power Plan,” which would have shifted some energy production from fossil fuels to renewable sources such as wind and solar.
This is not the only time Scalia has been caught hobnobbing during private hunting junkets with people who had vested interests in his actions as a Supreme Court justice. He was, in addition to being an arch reactionary who consistently ruled in opposition to democratic rights, a thoroughly corrupt individual who flaunted his corruption.
In a notorious incident 12 years ago, Scalia accepted an invitation from a Louisiana oilman to spend several days hunting ducks with about a dozen others at a private camp in the Bijou. The Los Angeles Times discovered that Scalia’s companion on the trip was Vice President Dick Cheney.
Cheney at the time was the lead defendant in a case brought by the Sierra Club that was then under review in the Supreme Court, making Scalia’s outing a clear violation of the principle that sitting judges must avoid even “the appearance of impropriety.”
Asked for a comment, Scalia sent the newspaper a flippant response, noting that the “hunting was lousy,” but “I did come back with a few ducks, which tasted swell.”
Scalia later issued a belligerent and disingenuous 21-page memorandum to explain why he refused to remove himself from the case. After attacking the press for raising the issue, Scalia asserted that because the hunting took place “in two- or three-man blinds,” referring to the camouflaged hideaways used by bird hunters, and because “I never hunted in the same blind with the vice president,” no one could conclude Scalia’s “impartiality might reasonably be questioned.”
The Supreme Court later ruled for Cheney by a vote of 7-2.
Scalia’s practice of slipping away from Washington, unannounced, all expenses paid, to socialize for days in private, intimate settings with selected people who have business either before or affected by the Supreme Court epitomizes how justice in the United States is dispensed. It highlights the role of a social layer that is profoundly hostile to democratic principles and feels itself in no way bound by traditional political methods or legal prescriptions.
In related news, Justice Clarence Thomas asked a question during oral arguments today for the first time in 10 years. Will be interesting to see if it will be a trend in Scalia's absence.
__________________________________________________________________________
Your racism is showing again son.
You are a liar and a fool, son.
________________________________________________________________________
If someone disagrees with Obama on policy, the liberals call them a racist.
Using your same pattern your criticism of Justice Thomas makes you a racist.I did not disagree with or criticize Thomas in any way.
Once again, you are lying.
[Edited on 3/1/2016 by gondicar]
________________________________________________________________________
Liar.
You posted it as a shot at Justice Thomas.This may be hard for your feeble mind to accept, but its not always about taking shots at someone or something.
________________________________________________________________________
So says a racist.
Nothing there yet again.
That was a really good answer. Thanks for proving his point. 😛
Another article on the hunting trip:
TODAY 12:00 AM
The Company Scalia Kept
BY JEFFREY TOOBIN
Justice Antonin Scalia died last month while on a hunting trip in Texas. He was participating in an outing organized by the International Order of St. Hubertus, a members-only hunting society that dates to the seventeenth century. The owner of the Cibolo Creek Ranch, the thirty-thousand-acre resort where the hunt took place, is John Poindexter, who told the Washington Post that he covered room and board for his thirty-five guests, including Scalia. (They reportedly paid for their own travel.) Because Poindexter runs an industrial company that had a case before the Supreme Court last year (the Justices declined to hear it), some have raised questions about the propriety of Scalia’s visit.
I see nothing wrong with Scalia’s attendance at the event. Supreme Court Justices are allowed to accept travel and accommodations from individuals and organizations as long as they disclose any reimbursements greater than three hundred and thirty-five dollars. All of the Justices make these kinds of trips, usually to law schools and Bar Associations, and it’s good that they do. Appearances before law students or legal groups help demystify the Supreme Court, and the law should encourage this kind of outreach, not discourage it. Unlike other federal judges, the Justices are not formally bound by federal ethics rules, an exemption that some in Congress have tried to change in recent years. But the Justices have generally acted in accord with the federal guidelines, which prohibit any kind of gifts from individuals with pending cases. I’ve rarely found reason to complain about the ethics (as opposed to the decisions) of the Justices. Likewise in Scalia’s case. If a friend of Scalia wanted to host the Justice for a hunting trip, that also seems unproblematic to me. Justices are allowed to have friends, and they’re allowed to enjoy the hospitality of those friends.
Still, the visits—and the friends—can be revealing. Scalia travelled to the Texas hunting trip on a private plane with a friend named C. Allen Foster, a seventy-four-year-old lawyer in D.C. Foster has a varied law practice, specializing in the law of construction, but also representing several right-leaning clients. He represented the Republican Party in redistricting cases and the company formerly known as Blackwater in a case arising out of the death of four of its contractors during the American occupation of Iraq. (Foster did not reply to an e-mail or return a phone call.)
Foster is a hunting enthusiast, as was Justice Scalia. The lawyer described his passion a couple of years ago in an autobiographical portrait for the fiftieth reunion of the Princeton Class of 1963. Like many such essays, Foster’s begins in a jocular vein—“You’re only as old as your current wife,” he writes. But then he goes on to say that while he spent his professional career practicing law, “I’ve also been pursuing my passion—killing things. I’m sure many of you have become mamby-pamby girly men and think that killing things is oh, so redneck and lower class. Well, you’ll be delighted to know that I generally go killing things with Continental royalty and English nobility, and we look down on the rednecks just like you do.” (According to the Web site of the Order of St. Hubertus, the current grand master is His Imperial Highness Istvan von Habsburg-Lothringen, the archduke of Austria.)
Foster went on, “I am pleased to report that I’ve killed lots of elephants, lions, buffalo, leopards, kudu, deer and the last legally shot black rhinoceros, together with more than 150,000 birds of various species. When the last duck comes flying over with a sign around his neck ‘I am the last duck,’ I will shoot it.” Concluding with a political observation, Foster writes, “It also won’t surprise you that I still rail against liberals, the academic kleptocracy, Washington bureaucrats and feminazis.”
In the days since Scalia’s death, his long friendship with Ruth Bader Ginsburg, his ideological opposite on the Supreme Court, has been widely noted. But when it came to a hunting buddy, at least, it seems as though Scalia preferred someone whose politics were about as far from Justice Ginsburg’s as they could be.
Here's some criticism of Scalia. Is this guy racist?
Antonin Scalia’s death during secret junket points to new ethical violations
By John Burton
20 February 2016Antonin Scalia died as he lived, indulging behind closed doors in the largess of the very wealthy, who could depend on the right-wing associate justice to defend their interests in the United States Supreme Court.
The nauseating praise for Scalia as a towering judicial figure is exposed as all the more dishonest and absurd by the still emerging circumstances of his passing.
On Friday, February 12, the start of the Supreme Court’s annual week-long President’s Day recess, Scalia took a chartered jet from Washington, D.C., accompanied by an unidentified lawyer friend, to the exclusive Cibolo Creek Ranch in the Chinati Mountains of West Texas, near the Mexican border. US marshals assigned as Scalia’s bodyguards were told not to make the trip.
John B. Poindexter, a former commanding officer in Vietnam who now controls a Houston manufacturing empire with multiple subsidiaries, taking in total annual revenues of close to $1 billion and employing 5,000 people, bought the 30,000-acre property in 1988. He renovated its three adobe forts, which date back to 1857, turning them into plush accommodations for a high-end resort.
Among the guests seeking seclusion in the lap of luxury at Cibolo Creek Ranch that have been identified by the press are Mick Jagger, Bruce Willis, a variety of businesspeople and “European royalty.”
According to its web site, among the resort’s most popular activities is the guided tour of its scenic desert terrain in a Humvee, the same vehicle used by the United States military in its occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq.
Guests can hunt pheasants and chukars along with bigger game such as deer, elk, buffalo and mountain lions. Retired Supreme Court Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor once told Houston lawyer Mark Lanier that Scalia “will do anything if you take him hunting.”
After landing at the ranch’s private airfield, Scalia enjoyed an outing with some other guests, followed by dinner. Weary from traveling, Scalia retired alone to the 1,100-square-foot “El Presidente Grand Suite” shortly before 10. The advertised rate for “El Presidente,” which includes a private fire pit on the veranda overlooking Cibolo Lake, is $700 per night, inclusive of meals and one bottle of wine per stay.
The next morning, after Scalia did not join the other guests for breakfast, Poindexter and Scalia’s lawyer friend found his cold, lifeless body in bed.
A local justice of the peace contacted by telephone pronounced Scalia dead of natural causes, freeing his body to be shipped back to Washington without a coroner’s investigation or autopsy.
This episode pulls back the curtain a bit on how big financial interests have been pulling the strings in the Supreme Court.
Poindexter confirmed to the Washington Post that Scalia was not going to pay for his stay at Cibolo Creek Ranch. “He was an invited guest, along with a friend, just like 35 others,” Poindexter said. According to media sources, Poindexter hosts gatherings two or three times a year.
Last year, James Hinga, a 76-year-old machinist for MIC Group, one of Poindexter’s companies, filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking review of a lower-court decision that summarily dismissed his claim that he was fired based on pretexts because of his age. Scalia participated in the October 5, 2015 decision denying review, thus ending the case in Poindexter’s favor. Scalia’s acceptance of gifts worth several thousands of dollars so soon after ruling in a party’s favor is a clear violation of judicial ethics.
Other significant ethical questions remain unanswered a full week later. Poindexter maintains that he did not pay for Scalia’s chartered jet. There is no indication yet whose pocket that money came from, but one can be assured that it did not come from Scalia’s own.
Similarly, it is not yet known whether Scalia’s companion, or any of the 35 other Cibolo Creek Ranch guests, similarly had matters pending before the Supreme Court, because none of these witnesses to the circumstances of Scalia’s death have been identified.
This silence itself suggests that Poindexter and the others may have something to hide. At minimum, given the central role Houston plays in the United States energy industry, it is likely that some of Poindexter’s guests benefited from the Supreme Court’s extraordinary five-to-four order the preceding Tuesday that halted implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency’s “Clean Power Plan,” which would have shifted some energy production from fossil fuels to renewable sources such as wind and solar.
This is not the only time Scalia has been caught hobnobbing during private hunting junkets with people who had vested interests in his actions as a Supreme Court justice. He was, in addition to being an arch reactionary who consistently ruled in opposition to democratic rights, a thoroughly corrupt individual who flaunted his corruption.
In a notorious incident 12 years ago, Scalia accepted an invitation from a Louisiana oilman to spend several days hunting ducks with about a dozen others at a private camp in the Bijou. The Los Angeles Times discovered that Scalia’s companion on the trip was Vice President Dick Cheney.
Cheney at the time was the lead defendant in a case brought by the Sierra Club that was then under review in the Supreme Court, making Scalia’s outing a clear violation of the principle that sitting judges must avoid even “the appearance of impropriety.”
Asked for a comment, Scalia sent the newspaper a flippant response, noting that the “hunting was lousy,” but “I did come back with a few ducks, which tasted swell.”
Scalia later issued a belligerent and disingenuous 21-page memorandum to explain why he refused to remove himself from the case. After attacking the press for raising the issue, Scalia asserted that because the hunting took place “in two- or three-man blinds,” referring to the camouflaged hideaways used by bird hunters, and because “I never hunted in the same blind with the vice president,” no one could conclude Scalia’s “impartiality might reasonably be questioned.”
The Supreme Court later ruled for Cheney by a vote of 7-2.
Scalia’s practice of slipping away from Washington, unannounced, all expenses paid, to socialize for days in private, intimate settings with selected people who have business either before or affected by the Supreme Court epitomizes how justice in the United States is dispensed. It highlights the role of a social layer that is profoundly hostile to democratic principles and feels itself in no way bound by traditional political methods or legal prescriptions.
_______________________________________________________________________
The author of the purely opinion piece you posted is the Chairman of the California Democratic Party and a far-left activist.
What do you think his opinion of the most highly respected Supreme Court Justice in this century would be?
Here's some criticism of Scalia. Is this guy racist?
Antonin Scalia’s death during secret junket points to new ethical violations
By John Burton
20 February 2016Antonin Scalia died as he lived, indulging behind closed doors in the largess of the very wealthy, who could depend on the right-wing associate justice to defend their interests in the United States Supreme Court.
The nauseating praise for Scalia as a towering judicial figure is exposed as all the more dishonest and absurd by the still emerging circumstances of his passing.
On Friday, February 12, the start of the Supreme Court’s annual week-long President’s Day recess, Scalia took a chartered jet from Washington, D.C., accompanied by an unidentified lawyer friend, to the exclusive Cibolo Creek Ranch in the Chinati Mountains of West Texas, near the Mexican border. US marshals assigned as Scalia’s bodyguards were told not to make the trip.
John B. Poindexter, a former commanding officer in Vietnam who now controls a Houston manufacturing empire with multiple subsidiaries, taking in total annual revenues of close to $1 billion and employing 5,000 people, bought the 30,000-acre property in 1988. He renovated its three adobe forts, which date back to 1857, turning them into plush accommodations for a high-end resort.
Among the guests seeking seclusion in the lap of luxury at Cibolo Creek Ranch that have been identified by the press are Mick Jagger, Bruce Willis, a variety of businesspeople and “European royalty.”
According to its web site, among the resort’s most popular activities is the guided tour of its scenic desert terrain in a Humvee, the same vehicle used by the United States military in its occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq.
Guests can hunt pheasants and chukars along with bigger game such as deer, elk, buffalo and mountain lions. Retired Supreme Court Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor once told Houston lawyer Mark Lanier that Scalia “will do anything if you take him hunting.”
After landing at the ranch’s private airfield, Scalia enjoyed an outing with some other guests, followed by dinner. Weary from traveling, Scalia retired alone to the 1,100-square-foot “El Presidente Grand Suite” shortly before 10. The advertised rate for “El Presidente,” which includes a private fire pit on the veranda overlooking Cibolo Lake, is $700 per night, inclusive of meals and one bottle of wine per stay.
The next morning, after Scalia did not join the other guests for breakfast, Poindexter and Scalia’s lawyer friend found his cold, lifeless body in bed.
A local justice of the peace contacted by telephone pronounced Scalia dead of natural causes, freeing his body to be shipped back to Washington without a coroner’s investigation or autopsy.
This episode pulls back the curtain a bit on how big financial interests have been pulling the strings in the Supreme Court.
Poindexter confirmed to the Washington Post that Scalia was not going to pay for his stay at Cibolo Creek Ranch. “He was an invited guest, along with a friend, just like 35 others,” Poindexter said. According to media sources, Poindexter hosts gatherings two or three times a year.
Last year, James Hinga, a 76-year-old machinist for MIC Group, one of Poindexter’s companies, filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking review of a lower-court decision that summarily dismissed his claim that he was fired based on pretexts because of his age. Scalia participated in the October 5, 2015 decision denying review, thus ending the case in Poindexter’s favor. Scalia’s acceptance of gifts worth several thousands of dollars so soon after ruling in a party’s favor is a clear violation of judicial ethics.
Other significant ethical questions remain unanswered a full week later. Poindexter maintains that he did not pay for Scalia’s chartered jet. There is no indication yet whose pocket that money came from, but one can be assured that it did not come from Scalia’s own.
Similarly, it is not yet known whether Scalia’s companion, or any of the 35 other Cibolo Creek Ranch guests, similarly had matters pending before the Supreme Court, because none of these witnesses to the circumstances of Scalia’s death have been identified.
This silence itself suggests that Poindexter and the others may have something to hide. At minimum, given the central role Houston plays in the United States energy industry, it is likely that some of Poindexter’s guests benefited from the Supreme Court’s extraordinary five-to-four order the preceding Tuesday that halted implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency’s “Clean Power Plan,” which would have shifted some energy production from fossil fuels to renewable sources such as wind and solar.
This is not the only time Scalia has been caught hobnobbing during private hunting junkets with people who had vested interests in his actions as a Supreme Court justice. He was, in addition to being an arch reactionary who consistently ruled in opposition to democratic rights, a thoroughly corrupt individual who flaunted his corruption.
In a notorious incident 12 years ago, Scalia accepted an invitation from a Louisiana oilman to spend several days hunting ducks with about a dozen others at a private camp in the Bijou. The Los Angeles Times discovered that Scalia’s companion on the trip was Vice President Dick Cheney.
Cheney at the time was the lead defendant in a case brought by the Sierra Club that was then under review in the Supreme Court, making Scalia’s outing a clear violation of the principle that sitting judges must avoid even “the appearance of impropriety.”
Asked for a comment, Scalia sent the newspaper a flippant response, noting that the “hunting was lousy,” but “I did come back with a few ducks, which tasted swell.”
Scalia later issued a belligerent and disingenuous 21-page memorandum to explain why he refused to remove himself from the case. After attacking the press for raising the issue, Scalia asserted that because the hunting took place “in two- or three-man blinds,” referring to the camouflaged hideaways used by bird hunters, and because “I never hunted in the same blind with the vice president,” no one could conclude Scalia’s “impartiality might reasonably be questioned.”
The Supreme Court later ruled for Cheney by a vote of 7-2.
Scalia’s practice of slipping away from Washington, unannounced, all expenses paid, to socialize for days in private, intimate settings with selected people who have business either before or affected by the Supreme Court epitomizes how justice in the United States is dispensed. It highlights the role of a social layer that is profoundly hostile to democratic principles and feels itself in no way bound by traditional political methods or legal prescriptions.
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The author of the purely opinion piece you posted is the Chairman of the California Democratic Party and a far-left activist.
What do you think his opinion of the most highly respected Supreme Court Justice in this century would be?
I don't know. I only read his piece on Scalia. 😛
