Chief Injustice Robberts is a halfwit.

[lagomorph777]

Or maybe he just thinks we are.

In arguments today over the workplace mandates:

Robberts: "The Executive Branch shouldn't act on this occupational safety and health hazard. Congress should authorize it."

Solicitor General Prelogar: "Ummmm... they did. They passed the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA)."

Robberts: "But that law doesn't count anymore; it was passed over 50 years ago. Besides, it doesn't mention COVID-19 by name."

Prelogar: "Ummm... OSHA covers a broad range of hazardous agents introduced into the workplace"

A couple of pro tips for Robberts:

(1) You need a remedial course in Constitutional Law. The Constitution doesn't say that laws automatically expire after 50 years (even if signed by a flaming liberal like Nixon). I know just the professor who can help you out.


(2) Here's how OSHA defines hazardous agents:

"Any biological agent and other disease-causing agent which after release into the environment and upon exposure, ingestion, inhalation, or assimilation into any person...will or may reasonably be anticipated to cause death, disease, behavioral abnormalities, cancer, genetic mutation, physiological malfunctions...or physiological deformations in such persons or their offspring.

As implied by the plain language of this definition, the phrase "other disease-causing agents" refers to any substance not otherwise covered under subparagraphs (A)-(D) of the definition, which causes death, disease, behavioral abnormalities, etc."

https://www.osha.gov/laws-regs/standardinterpretations/1996-11-07

[spooky3]

1. Excellent. Nt

[Ohio Joe]

2. "Ummmm... they did."

Simply pointing out reality should not be so funny but...

[Nevilledog]

19. It's even better.....2 of the anti-vax attorneys are appearing remotely cuz they have Covid

Link to tweet

Tweet text:

Elie Mystal
@ElieNYC
·
Jan 7, 2022
Now the *second* anti-vax Republican lawyer is arguing remotely because... they popped for Covid...

Elie Mystal
@ElieNYC
They, like, don't even have any questions for this woman. They treating her like a child who argues that they never have to take a bath.
11:22 AM · Jan 7, 2022

[Pantagruel]

3. "it was passed over 50 years ago. Besides, it doesn't mention COVID-19 by name."

He really said that?

[lagomorph777]

6. Paraphrased, but yup, he kept repeating those two invalid points and even realized he was

repeating himself. Like the addled dementia-suffering asshole that he is.

[PatSeg]

23. That is really disturbing

[LiberalFighter]

37. Maybe he can be forced to retire.

[brush]

26. Makes one want to scream, right? The chief justice voicing such stupidity.

How the hell did we get here with this Supreme Court?

"It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than open one's mouth and remove all doubt."
— Mark Twain

[Solomon]

27. He got there by spending his career fighting voting rights. They always reward the voting rights

deniers with the Chief Justice spot. Like Rehnquist.

Roberts is the bastard that said we didn't need voting rights protection anymore and now look where we are!

[90-percent]

50. i remember that

and the details are fuzzy, but once he "nullied" the voting rights act the republics pounced and proceeded to get jim crow voting discrimination laws back on the books.

he is either an imbecile, or else only wants rich white people to vote. i'm surprised they haven't passed laws that give not-white-caucasian-people 3/5 of a vote, like the good ole days.

-90% jimmy

[lagomorph777]

4. I think I made an error.

I should have called him a quarter-wit.

[airplaneman]

40. a dimwit or nitwit n/t.

[erronis]

45. Or "He thinks he's a real wit. But he's only half right." (Seen on toilet stall.)

[niyad]

52. Or lackwit.a great word popular in Elizabeth I's time, I believe.

[TheRealNorth]

5. Sounds like Justice Roberts either need remedial reading lessons...

Or is suffering from a condition that is impacting his reasoning skills and thus should resign.

[NewHendoLib]

7. Pretty dim bulb

[JohnSJ]

8. A real jackass, opening the door to more deaths

[highplainsdem]

9. Almost unimaginably stupid.

[Bettie]

10. Wait....if they say no mandates

will businesses bring that as precedent to get rid of OSHA in order to allow them to expose workers to whatever they please without any recourse?

Is that the ultimate plan? To be allowed to harm and kill workers?

[lagomorph777]

14. That's his plan.

[Bettie]

15. FFS...what next?

Are they trying to just destroy any sort of government oversight?

Never mind, I know the answer "only for women's reproduction, not for business".

[Drunken Irishman]

11. That sucks. Pretty much means the mandate is dead.

Extremely unlikely they'll get two conservatives to uphold it, especially if Roberts is a not on board.

[The Magistrate]

12. Not A Half-Wit, Sir, An ideologue Who sees His Chance

Striking at delegation of regulatory power is a major goal of Federalist Society types.

As practice has been since the founding of our government, Congress enacts a law, and leaves detail of its enforcement to the Executive.

These people attempt to torture words written long ago to confess that this is all wrong, that Congress cannot delegate such authority, and so the Executive can see faithfully carried out only the exact words of Congress. Thus, for example, Congress would have to pass every single regulation and definition OSHA now promulgates, and if it does not, or more to the point here has not, such things are null and void.

[leftstreet]

21. It's like no one wants to take any accountability or something n/t

[DFW]

30. A gifted author wrote, over 40 years ago:

"Nicholai......had worked with the American military mentality for two years, but he could not pretend to understand its rigid penchant for forcing facts to fit convenient preconceptions."

[Kid Berwyn]

13. Just-us Roboto

Florida 2000? John Roberts was there

Bush (II) gets to name a Supreme Court justice because he sits in the White House.
The man he has chosen helped put him there in the first place.

By TIM GRIEVE
Salon, PUBLISHED JULY 21, 2005

Republicans railing against Democrats' "obstructionist tactics" in the Senate return again and again to a phrase they like to use: "Elections have consequences." What they mean, of course, is that George W. Bush won the White House, and to that victor go the spoils.

It's not a bad way to frame the argument, the separation of powers and the Constitution's "advice and consent" clause notwithstanding. But when it comes to Bush's nominee to the Supreme Court, there's a bit of a circular quality to it: John G. Roberts helped Bush become the victor in the first place -- and not just by giving a grand to the first Bush-Cheney campaign. As the Los Angeles Times is reporting today, Roberts traveled in the fall of 2000 to the sunny state of Florida, where he played a mostly behind-the-scenes role in helping Bush prevail in the legal fight that followed the disputed presidential election.

Republican lawyers who worked on the recount told the Times that Roberts advised Florida Gov. Jeb Bush on the role that he and the Florida Legislature could play in the fight over the recounting of ballots. "Mr. Roberts, one of the preeminent constitutional attorneys in the country, came to Florida in 2000 at his own expense and met with Gov. Bush to share what he believed the governor's responsibilities were under federal law after a presidential election and a presidential election under dispute," Jeb Bush spokesman Jacob DiPietre told the Times. "Judge Roberts was one of several experts who came to Florida to share their ideas. The governor appreciated his willingness to serve and valued his counsel."

Working on the recount is hardly disqualifying -- as the Times notes, just about every leading constitutional-law type was involved in the case somehow -- but Roberts' role does raise some questions about whether he's really the nonpartisan lawyer and jurist that his proponents would make him out to be. "What's interesting is that only now is it coming to the fore that John Roberts was part of that," People for the American Way President Ralph Neas told the Times. "He always created an impression of being above the political fray, being part of the Washington legal establishment, but not of partisan politics."

Continues…

https://www.salon.com/2005/07/21/florida_33/

Time after time, the record shows the GOP can’t win without cheating.

[Solomon]

53. Don't forget. And Kavanaugh was one of the rioters storming the vote count offices. I think they

called those asses the "brooks brothers" something. It's all incestrous.

[Duppers]

16. K & R

[crickets]

17. K&R for visibility.

[Eliot Rosewater]

18. GOP wants to kill us off.

[TheRealNorth]

20. Well, it's mostly Republicans that are dying now....

But they think they can make all the anti-vaxxer deaths a campaign issue. You know, because Biden didn't give them a tax cut in order to get vaccinated.

[LiberalArkie]

28. If the supremes gut OSHA, it will be the non-union workers in the south that end up dead.

[brush]

22. God! We are so screwed. That's the chief justice voicing such stupidity. Maybe his term...

should automatically expire too.

[AZLD4Candidate]

24. I guess the War Powers Act, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations Act, the Immigration

and Naturalization Act, and Over 21 Drinking Act also don't apply. They were all passed at least 35 years ago.

[bucolic_frolic]

25. CJ is signalling stare decisis is dead /nt

[Lonestarblue]

29. Unfortunately, Roberts seems to believe that corporations should run the government,

not the people elected and appointed to run the government. I never liked his policies, but I lost all respect for him after he helped gut the Voting Rights Act. Citizens United and the Hobby Lobby decisions were also really stupid.

[yaesu]

31. Fascist fill the courts with the dumbest people they can find, just like they do with politicians. n

[rockfordfile]

32. What a fking idiot

[spanone]

33. Do laws have a sale date on them mr. roberts?

[turbinetree]

34. This should be a reckoning to expand the court with questions like this from this

Federalist Society justice sitting on the bench his modus operandi says as such, this shows why he and others of his ilk gutted the Voting Rights Act because it was over 50 years old.................now he has a litmus test for the age of an agency next up Social Security and Medicare...he and the other six right wing fascist loving hypocrites should be impeached ... .

[czarjak]

35. Bushie appointee said "Racism is dead" when he knows better but won't admit it.

[Probatim]

36. The Bible doesn't mention America either.

Let's do away with religion.

[Ray Bruns]

38. Robert is a halfwit? Being kinda of generous, aren't we?

[Xipe Totec]

39. Too much by half. nt

[lagomorph777]

41. Quarter-wit? Eighth-wit?

[Trueblue1968]

42. the toe-nail i chopped off my LEFT big toe is smarter than Justice Robbbbberts

[peppertree]

44. That's why Dubya picked'im

To get ahead in the GOP rat race, you don't have to be smart - just shameless.

[peppertree]

43. Once again, a reminder that Obama SHOULD be the Chief Justice.

But that's the world we live in.

[former9thward]

46. Your "transcript" is not true.

He did not say what is written in the OP and you have provided no link.

Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts wondered whether Congress or the states should have a say. Questioning U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, who argued for the administration, Roberts appeared skeptical that the 1970 law that established OSHA gave that agency the power it needs.

"That was 50 years ago that you're saying Congress acted. I don’t think it had COVID in mind. That was almost closer to the Spanish flu than it is to today's problem," Roberts said, referring to the pandemic that occurred a century ago.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-supreme-court-considers-whether-halt-biden-vaccine-mandates-2022-01-07/

[CaptainTruth]

48. Thank you. Claiming Roberts said OSHA "doesn't count anymore" is misleading...

...especially to the millions of businesses that have to comply with OSHA regulations & the millions of workers who are protected by them.

[DoBotherMe]

47. He should retire. Nt

[MineralMan]

49. Do you really think misspelling his name deliberately

advances your argument in some way?

[lagomorph777]

54. Yes, a reminder how he got the job and how he uses it.

Robbing us of free and fair elections, our money, and now our lives.

[Hassler]

51. He's not an idiot. He's doing it on purpose. The GOPee 6 are

Political Hacks in Robes.