AP NewsAlert: Supreme Court: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 85, Hospitalized After Fracturing 3 Ribs

[Honeycombe8]

31. History shows that they don't give it up except under extraordinary circumstances.

The power must be intoxicating, as you say. Plus it's a cushy gig...a part time job that pays well, comes with beaucoup benefits, and gives you one of the highest status positions in the country. And you get to affect the country's direction.

Ginsburg said in 2016 or 2017 that she will not step down for at least four years. She was aware that Democrats wanted her to resign during Obama's administration, for fear she might be forced to during a Republican administration.

Her husband is deceased. Going by how a couple of my elderly co-workers felt in the past, they felt that if they retired, they would die. They had nothing else to do, no other interests, no reason for being. So they hung on, falling asleep at their desks, having to have younger co-workers help with their work.

I suspect Ginsburg feels similarly. She has had some serious health problems, incl two bouts of cancer I think, and has come through.

I think there should be a mandatory retirement age for the Justices. When the "life" appointment thing was created, people didn't live that long. I doubt it was foreseen that 90 year olds would still be sitting on the bench, having been there for 50 years.

I just hope she is correct in her confidence she can go the distance.