# US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg passed away



## Ericzander (Sep 19, 2020)

As I'm sure many of you know by now, Ruth Bader Ginsberg died on September 18th 2020, less than two months before the next U.S. presidential election. 

She joined the Supreme Court in 1993 under Bill Clinton and fought cancer 5 times during her term.

While senate majority leader Mitch McConnell refused to proceed with Obama's choice to replace Antonin Scalia who died 9 months prior to the presidential election with Merrick Garland; McConnell's made it clear that there will be no such refusal to proceed with Trump's nomination. 

Ultimately, this likely means that the Supreme Court will include 6 republicans and 3 democrats for the foreseeable future. This would also be the third Supreme Court Justice that Trump appoints. What are your thoughts on this?


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## omgcat (Sep 19, 2020)

very risky for them to push the nomination pre-election. it could ruin the chances of GOP keeping senate majority. they will probably hold off, then push a vote during lame-duck. if they lose the senate majority, pushed through a SC justice, and Biden wins the presidency; you can bet your ass the supreme court total count is going straight to 13.


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## Taleweaver (Sep 19, 2020)

I'm not a fan of filibustering, but if ten months prior to presidential election is too close, then two months is so as well. 

How about Mitch admitting he wipes his ass with his promise to do what's best for the country? Then Garland can replace Kavanaugh and Trump can put whomever he wants in that spot (including Kavenaugh) . Everybody wins!
(yeah, on the surface it doesn't look as if Mitch wins, but hey... He put himself in this blatant hypocritic position. Coming clean is at least a step in the right direction)


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## x65943 (Sep 19, 2020)

It's not really accurate to say it will have "six republicans" - although chosen by partisan presidents, the members therein are (at least technically) apolitical and owing to their long stint on the court (for life) their views often change with time. Consider John Roberts nominated by Bush who has been siding with the liberal justices lately and defending Roe v wade.

In any case this election season just got a whole lot more interesting


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## Veho (Sep 19, 2020)

x65943 said:


> although chosen by partisan presidents, the members therein are (at least technically) apolitical


And if you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you.


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## Ericzander (Sep 19, 2020)

x65943 said:


> It's not really accurate to say it will have "six republicans" - although chosen by partisan presidents, the members therein are (at least technically) apolitical...



The Supreme Court has never been apolitical. Their political viewpoints dictate how they interpret the Constitution. It's been that way throughout U.S. history. Judicial conservatism vs. judicial activism for example. Or originalism vs. textualism.

While the majority of cases are decided nearly unanimously, it's clear that often really hot button issues come down to a 5-4 decision. Justice Roberts is of the view that precedent is important. So he's not transformed into a liberal, he's just hesitant to reverse precedent (which I think is admirable.) 

He dissented in Obergerfell v. Hodges (which ultimately decided that gay marriage is a fundamental right) and his personal views of gay marriage likely hasn't changed. That said, he's consistently keep up with precedent that gay marriage is a fundamental right. Others, like Thomas, completely disagree.

But anyway, I know what you mean. In theory you would think that they would be apolitical. But they're technically not, as they've all labeled themselves as belonging to a particular political party. So I think it was fair to say Trump is likely to nominate a republican.


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## x65943 (Sep 19, 2020)

Ericzander said:


> The Supreme Court has never been apolitical. Their political viewpoints dictate how they interpret the Constitution. It's been that way throughout U.S. history. Judicial conservatism vs. judicial activism for example. Or originalism vs. textualism.
> 
> While the majority of cases are decided nearly unanimously, it's clear that often really hot button issues come down to a 5-4 decision. Justice Roberts is of the view that precedent is important. So he's not transformed into a liberal, he's just hesitant to reverse precedent (which I think is admirable.)
> 
> ...


"But they're technically not, as they've all labeled themselves as belonging to a particular political party"

I agree with most of what you said, barring this part. They go out of their way in most cases to never say they are partisan.


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## Viri (Sep 19, 2020)

RIP!


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## Ericzander (Sep 19, 2020)

x65943 said:


> "But they're technically not, as they've all labeled themselves as belonging to a particular political party"
> 
> I agree with most of what you said, barring this part. They go out of their way in most cases to never say they are partisan.


That was really poor wording on my part. I don't necessarily mean self labeled as much as I mean their decisions on certain topics clearly label them.

Thomas is very much a conservative and Sotomayor is very liberal. Roberts is really the only one that hops the fence occasionally, but I wouldn't say he's nonpartisan. When there's not clear precedent to follow he's likely to vote alongside the conservative wing. 

But overall, I think we agree.


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## Hanafuda (Sep 20, 2020)

Ericzander said:


> What are your thoughts on this?




She should have retired when Obama was still the President.


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## smile72 (Sep 20, 2020)

x65943 said:


> It's not really accurate to say it will have "six republicans" - although chosen by partisan presidents, the members therein are (at least technically) apolitical and owing to their long stint on the court (for life) their views often change with time. Consider John Roberts nominated by Bush who has been siding with the liberal justices lately and defending Roe v wade.
> 
> In any case this election season just got a whole lot more interesting


John Roberts is a conservative though. He's just doing the bare minimum of making sure the court doesn't become as obviously political as Congress. And it should be noted that close to 80 to 90 percent of the time he sides with the courts conservatives. It's just without Anthony Kennedy (who was ALSO conservative) he's the closest to a swing vote. Of course when Trump appoints someone that will fail. It's interesting seeing how America is slowly BUT surely destroying itself. I wouldn't be shocked if America had another civil war.


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## notimp (Sep 21, 2020)

Posting this for personal reference:


(Has a short clip about Ginsberg her history and her 'dying wish' in it as well)

edit: The more entertaining video is this one:
h**ps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ggbXXc2npY


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## Viri (Sep 22, 2020)

Hanafuda said:


> She should have retired when Obama was still the President.


This.

Hey guys, I'm really old, and have cancer, pretty bad cancer at that. But, don't worry, I'll live forever, and not retire during a time when we have a President from my party, that will probably allow me to have some input on my replacement.

She brought this on her self, and her party should have told her to fucking retire when they had the chance.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg#Health
Read this shit. Jesus, she should have retired during Obama's first term, if she wanted input on her replacement.

And now her worst nightmare is going to happen, Trump is going to choose her replacement.


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## gregory-samba (Sep 22, 2020)

I'm sorry for her passing, but I wasn't her friend or in her family so I could really care less what her life choices were unless they impacted me. I didn't agree with her politics and since we didn't know each other the only thing she did that impacted me was being a Judge on the Supreme Court. The judgements she made impacted me mainly on an negative basis so I won't miss her rulings at all.

I'm also glad that Trump gets to appoint yet another Supreme Court Justice and we're already seeing the Democrats and Liberals cry foul, but as of today (Tuesday) Trump is set to announce his pick on Saturday and the Senate has ruled the process is to go forward. The Liberals can cry hypocrite or whatever they come up with, but since they don't have the White House and the Senate this situation is different and unique from anything that happened in the past. Even if Mrs. Ginsburg's dying wishes were to keep the seat vacant until after the election her wishes don't dictate how our Government works. Let's just hope the Democrats don't play dirty and try to frame the next Justice with made up bullshit like the did with Kavanaugh, but knowing Democrats they'll refuse to accept they lost and try to change the rules of the game. Democrats are pretty sorry losers in that respect.

Hopefully we get another Conservative leaning judge on the court as soon as possible as there is a vacant set and with the upcoming 2020 election happening. Biden is already claiming he's not going to accept the results and has hired a team of lawyers to contest the election if he looses so we would really need a full Supreme Court to rule on his apparent premeditated poor loser tactics. We also have important things like saving the life of unborn children, making sure people have health care, getting rid of illegal aliens and the mess that removing gender identity politics from all aspects of life that need to be sorted out.

Again, I'm sorry for her passing, but as about as sorry as I am when I hear some random person I didn't know got in a car accident and died. I'm completely ecstatic though that she's gone from the Supreme Court and we're more than likely going to get another Conservative leaning Judge on it. Now all we'd need to do is have Trump server another four years and things will continue to get better and better.


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## notimp (Sep 22, 2020)

gregory-samba said:


> I'm sorry for her passing, but I wasn't her friend or in her family so I could really care less what her life choices were




Dont like the glorification aspect and the gang signs either, but at least you ought to acknowledge what she has done over the years.

Also she was the only progressive in the supreme court for as long as I'm alive.


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## gregory-samba (Sep 22, 2020)

notimp said:


> Dont like the glorification aspect and the gang signs either, but at least you ought to acknowledge what she has done over the years.
> 
> Also she was the only progressive in the supreme court for as long as I'm alive.




I'm really not aware of how her life went as I wasn't involved in it. I know there's a movie about her, but regardless she's just some random person I don't know. I'm sorry she had to die and wish the best for anyone that was in her life that was personally affected by her death, but I'm not going to shed a tear for some random twitter user half way across the USA who's never talked to Mrs. Ginsburg let alone been involved in her life. The only things she did that effected me was her rulings while she sat in the Supreme Court and from what I've seen I don't agree with most of them.


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