Where in the world is…?

We need either a new founding document or new founding institutions or probably both.

Either our constitution has created the government it was meant to or it has failed to prevent the government that exists today. In either case it and we have failed to preserve our liberties.

This may be the cagiest political maneuver since John Marshall established Judicial Review as a doctrine. Consider this:

1. The Democrats were prepared for all out warfare on the legitimacy of the SCOTUS. Marshall faced the exact existential threat: rule for Madison, President Thomas Jefferson was going to destroy the SCOTUS. Rule for Marbury, and Jefferson’s opponents would seek to destroy the SCOTUS in the future.

  1a. The game is “Who Replaces Ginsberg, Kennedy, and Breyer.

  1b. Impressionable voters now see confusion: is the SCOTUS the font of all evil, or defenders of the common man? The SCOTUS is safe for another generation.

2. The Democrats never expected the decision would define Obamacare as a tax. They expected the mandate to be struck down. They expected the entire law to be struck down. They were caught flat-footed.

  2a. A lot of money that was spent to prop up Obamacare.

  2b. A lot of folks who gave money will be informed of their now-pending tax bill. Cash is going to dry up for the Dems.

  2c. Democrats like Tennessee’s Haslam are now earnestly pedaling in reverse.

3. Polls showed a majority of Americans want to get rid of Obamacare – and a majority want to keep Obama. Now they’re pissed off enough to vote for folks who’ll get rid of both.

4. That anger, if maintained by the local Tea Parties, should be enough to get rid of a lot Dems at the national, state, and local levels. Unfortunately, the Tea Parties need to operate apart from the GOP, who will frankly side with the Dems against the Tea Party.

Dave Weigel mentioned a “smitty” in his first hand report from SCOTUS.

“Obamacare upheld,” said a conservative blogger with the handle
Smitty, with a phone that could load the right site. “Mandate survives
as a tax?”

Primly dressed people with intern badges turned around to see what his sources were.

“CNN’s reporting it was struck down.”

“The networks are disagreeing with each other.”

“Well,” said Smitty. “Here’s what [RedState blogger] Moe Lane says. ‘This is a disaster…’”

Was that you, Smitty?

I am the Smitty in question. I was viewing Twitter on my ‘droid phone via Seesmic.

The one thing that becomes obvious here is that while we are supposed to have a system of checks and balances between the three bodies of government, that is not in effect.

Part of it is that all three branches operate within the same insular environment in DC.

Part of it is, though, that while the executive and legislative branches can check each other, there is no real check on the judicial system except to blatantly ignore the rulings it has no power to enforce, an apocalyptic solution that, if applied even once, would effectively destroy the judicial branch and even the potential for true rule of law in this country.

Perhaps we should consider an amendment making possible the overturning of a SCOTUS ruling by some extreme measure, say a supermajority of both Houses of Congress.  There is a risk of course in such a device — e.g, The Pelosi/Reid Congress of 2006 could concievably have overturned Heller for instance,  but there are also obvious and ongoing risks in the current arrangement where the Supreme Court has repeatedly whittled down individual liberties in this country (Kelo and Obamacare come immediately to mind), and justices feel free to ignore the Consititution they swore to uphold and interpret what they feel should be the law in the light of laws passed by foreign governments in foreign lands.