SCOTUS IS BACK

By Bob Walsh

 

It is the first Monday in October and the Supreme Court of the United States is now in session.  And they have some really interesting things to deal with.

A new Mississippi law that bans abortions after 15 weeks will be up for consideration.  A LOT of people consider Roe v Wade THE big issue of their lives and make political decisions on which way anybody leans on that one issue.  The fight will be epic even if the decision may not be.

The Second Amendment is also up.  A New York law, which is highly restrictive of the right of honest, law-abiding citizens to carry weapons outside their homes or businesses for personal defense is up for consideration.  Some of the really, really draconian and stupid New York City regulations were already overturned by the city because it did not want to face judicial review.  

Public funding of faith-based schools is getting a look-see.

Several death penalty cases are perhaps going to be considered.  

Affirmative action policies by public universities may also be up for review.  

It seems very likely that the court will move to the right.  Just how far is more of a question than if, according to serious court watchers.

My own opinions, for what my opinions are worth to you, are....

There are some aspects of Roe that bother me greatly.  However a rollback of the situation to pre-Roe is, IMHO, not only unlikely but stupid.  I suspect that there will be some tweaking but I think (maybe hope) there will be no massive rollback.  I should, however, not that asking me to make public policy on abortion rights is like asking Nancy Pelosi to be the final arbiter of prostate cancer research policy.  Men can be parents, but they can't be pregnant, no matter what the woke asshole crowd says.

The right to keep and bear arms means just that and SHOULD mean just that.  

I am a little bothered by too much public funding of faith based schools.  At what point does it become public endorsement of a particular brand of religion?  

The death penalty is specifically recognized by the federal constitution and most state constitutions.  If people want to totally prohibit it they should change the constitutions.  I have some understanding of the notion that it is wrong for the state to kill to demonstrate that it is wrong to kill.  I just don't agree with it.  And, by the way, the bible does not say THOUGH SHALL NOT KILL.  A correct translation says THOUGH SHALL NOT KILL WITHOUT JUST CAUSE (i.e. murder).  That got lost moving from Hebrew  to Greek to Latin to English.  

We have had affirmative action for more than 50 years.  At what point does leveling the playing field become something else.  Aren't universities suppose to be meritocracies?