When Obama wins, will Ginsburg do the right thing and retire from the Court? Will Breyer?

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

Assume Obama wins in 2 weeks (which he will). Obama needs to be able to appoint two younger center-left justices to replace them. We cannot run the risk of Republicans winning in 2016.

To be perfectly honest, Ginsburg should have retired in 2010 along with Stevens. She's a pancreatic cancer survivor and she looks more frail than ever. If she cares about these issues (which I know she does), she know that Roe is more important than her getting to serve more time.

Breyer should also retire. If Republicans somehow win in 2016 and serve two terms, Breyer would have to live to be 86 to outlive a possible replacement that would overturn Roe. Breyer cannot risk that. He's 74. He simply must retire during Obama's second term, preferably in the first two years, so the acrimony can be reduced as much as possible.

Obama ALSO needs to appoint younger justices. Kagan was fine. She was 50. That's okay. Demographic trends will allow us to cement Roe for good in 20 years. I did not like the Sotomayor appointment to be honest. Did not. Love the lady but she was 55. I would have preferred a younger Latina appointment.

Clarence Thomas was appointed at age 43 with almost no judicial experience. Let's appoint some justices in their early and mid 40s so that they can serve for as long as Rehnquist and Stevens did.

[hrmjustin]

1. I hope so only because you do not know what will come in 2016.

[LongTomH]

2. Breyer is actually two years younger (74) than Kennedy or Scalia (76).

Expect Scalia and Kennedy to hang on for at least Mr. Obama's second term.

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

5. I know, I said he's 74.

But if Dems lose in 2016, Breyer has to live to be 86 to prevent Roe from being overturned, assuming Scalia does not retire/die and Kennedy does not retire/die.

I agree that Scalia is likely to hang on stubbornly. Not sure about Kennedy. He's more moderate.

[JiminyJominy]

3. Ginsburg and Scalia

Ginsburg shoulda done the right thing for the party and retired right after Health Care was upheld. If God forbid Obama somehow loses it'll be a disaster for our SCOTUS position because Ginsburg at some point in the next couple of yrs WILL have to leave. Roe V Wade GONE.

As for Scalia....he is a petty partisan right wing nut who will die before he retires under a Dem President. I don't see him walking away at all and especially under a Dem President.

[TDale313]

13. If she had stepped down...

That close to the election, Repubs woulda just refused to confirm anyone until after the election, in the hope of a republican president. I don't think the can stall for four years if she does it after.

[Hutzpa]

4. We don't need to replace from our side, silly. nt

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

7. Sarcasm right?

Ginsburg is a 79 year old pancreatic cancer survivor. She absolutely must retire in Obama's second term. If Republicans won in 2016 and Ginsburg was still in office and then died in the Republican's term, Roe v Wade is as good as gone.

[Hutzpa]

8. We should be looking over at the side that has the

majority, yes she is 79 years old, we need two from their side to go. Replacing Justice Ginsburg keeps the equation the same.

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

12. Let me give you a sports analogy.

If you're leading 5-4 in a baseball game, isn't preventing the team from scoring two runs (and going up 6-4) just as important as scoring another run yourself to go up 6-4? A run saved is a run earned. A good defense wins championships.

We need to keep the equation the same, so that when a conservative or moderate conservative finally retires from the Court, we can keep Roe v Wade 5-4, because Republicans will never appoint another Kennedy again.

[unblock]

6. that would be good, but personally, i hope scalia and thomas do the right thing and bite it.

not that i would wish ill on anyone, of course. i'm just hoping they see the merit in keeling over.

[Sekhmets Daughter]

10. I shouldn't laugh, but I can't help it.

[davidpdx]

46. I would wish ill will on Scalia, he's a fucking scumbag

I don't like Thomas either, but he's not as nasty as Scalia.

[unblock]

49. only because he doesn't go around make speeches trying to justify his decisions

but his court votes are as only barely different from scalia's.

[davidpdx]

50. I don't know on that one

There is something that just really irritates the fuck out of my about Scalia based on the things I've read. I don't want to leave any impression I like Thomas because I don't (same goes for Alito, Roberts, and Kennedy).

[Sekhmets Daughter]

9. I think she will retire

as soon as she is confident President Obama will be able to appoint a center left justice to the court. Mitch McConnell and friends would have fought to the death to block a third appointment in Obama's first term. She is my favorite Justice and I will miss her, but you're right she looks like a slight breeze will knock her down.

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

15. I disagree

They would have let him appoint a replacement to Ginsburg. It would have been a close vote but no filibuster imo.

The real shit will hit the fan when a conservative retires or dies and a Dem president wants to appoint a replacement, or vice versa.

[Sekhmets Daughter]

24. I don't agree,

but you are, of course, entitled to your opinion. Obama had already replaced two liberal leaning judges...the goal of the republican party is to achieve at least a 6-3 or 7-2 majority. They can almost taste that now and I think they would have put up one hell of a fight....Why else do you think they have been so determined to make Obama a one-term president? It's all about the court.... As Roberts demonstrated in the ACA ruling, a 5-4 court does not serve their every purpose.... They need a 6-3 court and want a 7-2 court to dismantle everything from entitlements, Affirmative Action, and every bit of progressive legislation passed over the past 75 years.

[ashling]

18. she looks like a slight breeze will knock her down.

Maybe, but I still say she could take Scaleya down ...and she could make Alito's wife cry like a baby.

[Sekhmets Daughter]

20. Mentally and emotionally, perhaps

She is 79 and has had pancreatic cancer. She was never a large woman, but when you see pictures of her now you can easily see just how fragile she has become.

[frazzled]

11. Excuse me, but why should either of them retire?

Ruth Bader Ginsburg is still sharp as a tack, and definitely up to the task of sitting on the Court. Her questioning and opinions have been not only the most trenchant, but also the most liberal of late. As Amy Davidson wrote this summer in the New Yorker, in a post titled "RUTH BADER GINSBURG, HERO":

Roberts’s view of the Commerce Clause, she wrote,harks back to the era in which the Court routinely thwarted Congress’ efforts to regulate the national economy in the interest of those who labor to sustain it…. It is a reading that should not have staying power.

“Staying power” is something that Ginsburg has. As Jeffrey Toobin says in this week’s Political Scene podcast, “Ruth Bader Ginsburg is seventy-nine. She is about five feet tall, eighty pounds, she has had every disease known to humanity. She is as tough as nails.” She made her way at a time when you could have a legal education from Harvard and Columbia and still be turned down for a job because you were a woman. She is not as loud or colorfully charismatic as Scalia—who is?—but neither does she seem to have learned to give up. (Those wondering about the liberal future of the Court might note that, on a point related to Medicaid expansion, Ginsburg was joined by only one Justice: Sonia Sotomayor.) We don’t know what happened inside the Court, or why Roberts voted


Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/closeread/2012/06/ruth-bader-ginsburg-hero.html#ixzz2ARNpmXHQ

Breyer does not need replacing either. He's a pretty solid liberal vote and is not that old. Keep them both, unless they want to retire.

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

16. Sotomayor is just as good as Ginsburg

Don't get me wrong, I love Ginsburg. But Obama can easily find justices who are just as good as her and who we won't have to worry about whether they're going to die or not.

Kagan is almost as good. Her views on executive power worry me, but overall a good pick.

[frazzled]

23. If she gets sicker, he can replace her

But until that day, it's her decision, if she's able and willing to serve.

This sounds like plain old ageism to me. There's nothing wrong with people in their 70s or even 80s, if their minds are still sharp. And there are many whose minds are better than younger folk. My dad turns 96 in about a month. He's not only still totally sharp, but he cycles (at the gym now; until a few years ago he was still on the road) 100 miles a week.

Let's not be guilty of bias against age.

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

25. This is not ageism

This is not about her ability to serve. But it is a fact that people in their mid-late 70s are more likely to die than those in their 50s. The mortality rate is many, many times higher. Having had pancreatic cancer doesn't exactly help, either. Roe v Wade is more important than Ginsburg being on the court.

[frazzled]

27. We haven't even had the freaking election yet

There's no reason to push her off the court now, or even to be having this discussion. Let's talk again two years from now, halfway through Obama's second term. But there's no reason at this moment. There are four and a half years (if Obama is elected) to deal with this. If he doesn't win, it's too late to replace her now anyway. The process couldn't be finished between November 6 and January 20.

Before the end of her term, yes, she should, and probably will, resign. But that is a function of politics, not her age or her health. She may live another 20 years for all we know.

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

30. Obama is not going to lose

just vote, and everything will be fine

[davidpdx]

47. I was just reading about her in Toobin's new book

A reporter described her a "frail" and her son asked her how many push ups he could do. The son said she could do 15. For an almost 80 year old gal, that's pretty damn good.

[pnwmom]

14. You're correct - the right thing would have been for her to retire three years ago,

given the prognosis of someone with pancreatic cancer.

So I don't expect her to retire soon.

[Lex]

17. We need the rightwing nuts on the Supreme Court to "do the right thing" and retire.

That's what we really need.

[Pab Sungenis]

19. If she had, we would have had another quasi-right-winger

like Elena Kagan take her place.

My hope is that she holds out until the President promises to appoint a LIBERAL to replace her.

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

26. How is Kagan a quasi right winger?

4 of the 5 right-wingers on the court voted to strike down ObamaCare, just to give one example. There was never any doubt about her stance on that.

[Pab Sungenis]

29. Anti gay. Anti Fourth Amendment.

Those two alone mark her a right winger in my book. She will go down in history as being to the Democrats what Souter was to the Republicans.

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

31. Hows she anti-gay?

And Breyer has sided against the Fourth Amendment in one case that I remember as well. I think you're overreacting. Souter would have voted to uphold ObamaCare. The equivalent would be Kagan striking down Roe v Wade?

What about this anti gay stuff though? Pretty sure Kagan would vote for marriage equality if the case came before her.

[Pab Sungenis]

34. This has been posted many times

even though certain sectors refuse to believe it.

Kagan: 'There is No Federal Constitutional Right to Same-Sex Marriage'

If a Democratic nominee had said the same words about the Right to Choose, their nomination would have been pulled so fast that there would have been a sonic boom. But this was from the early days before the President "evolved."

We need more liberals on the Court to not only counteract Scalia, Thomas, Alito, and Roberts, but now to compensate for Kagan.

[RudynJack]

35. She wrote the truth.

There is no federal constitutional right to same-sex marriage.

The question wasn't SHOULD THERE BE a federal constitutional right to same-sex marriage. So until the court rules that there is, such a right doesn't exist.

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

36. Thats how I interpreted it too

Before Roe v Wade, there was no constitutional right to abortion either. Roe rightly created one.

[RudynJack]

37. Great analogy.

To call her "anti-gay" because of that answer seems over-the-top.

[Pab Sungenis]

38. Loving v. Virginia.

Marriage is a fundamental right.

[RudynJack]

40. yes

But that wasn't the question asked.

[Pab Sungenis]

52. It was.

Loving v. Virginia established a fundamental, Constitutional right to marriage. The only reasoning that can allow you to say it exists only for heterosexuals is bigotry, pure and simple.

Until and unless she actually votes for gay marriage I will continue to classify her as a bigot.

[RudynJack]

53. Knock yourself out...

I find your conclusion ridiculous.

[OldHippieChick]

21. I truly wish Thomas would retire

He's the most useless Justice ever: never asks questions, rarely writes an opinion. That said, I disagree vehemently w/ your desire to have Justices appointed in their 40's. Sotomayer is hardly "old" at 55. Very few lawyers/judges have extensive enough experience to truly have the gravitas for an appointment in their 40's.

[former9thward]

42. The Chief Justice assigns opinions evenly among the Justices.

Over time each Justice gets about 11% of the opinions including Thomas.

[TroyD]

22. If Obama is re-elected, there is no reason for Ginsburg or Breyer to rush into retirement

They can take a while to determine when they want to retire, as long as it is before the end of the 4 years.

It would be preferable in the first 2 years while the Democrats still have the Majority in the Senate.

[davidn3600]

28. The issue with appointing young judges is their thinking can change over time

And their experience with complex legal matters is very limited.

It's very rare for people to hold the same exact beliefs through their whole life. As you learn things and experience life, it can effect the way you view the world. And your opinions on certain issues can change.

It's also not always clear-cut. The conservatives thought Justice Souter would be a conservative. He wasn't. You could replace Ginsberg with some young guy in his early 40s based on a few liberal rulings he made, but then turns out to be a conservative as he gains more legal experience. That COULD happen.

These judges are not robots, they are people. They are individuals. And they are supposed to not have any political bias.

[IfPalinisAnswerWatsQ]

32. That's why we appoint Goodwin Liu

nt

[NewJeffCT]

54. The GOP already blocked Liu

from the lower court - they'd go even more apeshit crazy if he got nominated for the Supreme Court.

[craigmatic]

33. Ginsburg should've retired a while ago. I know she loves her job but the issues are bigger than 1

justice.

[Chan790]

39. Only if he DOESN'T go center-left.

Let's just be honest about this, if Breyer and RBG retire and Obama replaces them with center-left jurists, that's a substantial shift to the right of SCOTUS.

Should RBG retire? Maybe, but she should hold on until the president relents to replace her with another liberal and not some center-left jurist like Kagan.

[former9thward]

41. Neither will retire.

Being on the Supreme Court is a great position. You only work 2 or 3 days a week for 8 months. You receive a type of immortality because your decisions are placed in law school casebooks for future generations to study. Nobody can tell you what to do or when to do it. Your law clerks do all the heavy lifting providing a summary of cases and doing the first draft of opinions.

[yellowcanine]

43. I trust Justice Ginsburg to know when she should retire.

And she has earned that right not to mention that it is her right according to the Constitution. No one here has the standing to tell Justice Ginsburg what is the "right thing" to do.

[amborin]

44. my belief is that she is sharp as a tack; why doesn't Scalia step down?

[dontknowmuchbout]

45. Pack the Court

Obama should've pulled all the stops to pack the court when he first came in.

[davidpdx]

48. The thing is neither one of them have to retire, nor does anyone really have the right to ask them

to retire. They are appointed for life. I believe Ginsburg said she wanted to stay until she has the longest tenure of any Supreme Court justice. Kennedy and Scalia are both 79. Now I know I'm might get pummeled for saying this, but I have a feeling Scalia is going to not make it through another 4 years. So I think the two possible replacements would be either Ginsberg (if her health turned bad) or Scalia (I believe he won't resign, but will stay on the court until he dies).

[Paladin]

51. So Age 50 Is Good With You, But Age 55 Isn't?

Sounds like you're more hung up on age than you are on ideology. Strange.