The majority then announced, with an opinion from Chief Justice John Roberts, that it was overthrowing the student loan forgiveness program, granting a request from six Republican state attorneys general on behalf of a loan servicer, the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority, that did not want to be used as a plaintiff. Without MOHELA, the states did not have standing to bring the suit—they are not directly harmed.

Roberts and the majority weren’t going to be bothered by the fact that their plaintiff was an unwilling participant in this highly partisan scheme. “By law and function, MOHELA is an instrumentality of Missouri … The [debt forgiveness] plan will cut MOHELA’s revenues, impairing its efforts to aid Missouri college students,” Roberts wrote. “This acknowledged harm to MOHELA in the performance of its public function is necessarily a direct injury to Missouri itself.”

Never mind that in oral arguments the state admitted that MOHELA wasn’t aiding Missouri college students because it hadn’t paid into that fund in 15 years, and “said in its own financial documents that it doesn’t plan to make any payments in the future.”

  • LordR
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    22 years ago

    Even worse was the other case that was based on a gay person’s marriage. Turns out he is/was not gay, already married, had a child and didn’t know that his name was used for a case.

    The US Supreme Court is judging made up cases now.

    As a European I hope that everyone in the US will vote accordingly to at least try to bring back some semblance of rationality back.

    • @[email protected]
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      12 years ago

      One of the challenges in overcoming the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is needing a sufficient leftist majority in both branches of Congress to pass legislation, and this majority needs to be large enough to overwhelm the more restrained members of that majority. If this ever actually happens, the revamp of the SCOTUS is an inevitability.

      The grim reality is insofar as legislation goes, any law passed or executive action taken can be challenged legally and the SCOTUS seems very willing to grant cert in arbitrary and capricious manners to overturn the legislation (or past judicial decision). The only saving grace of this series of decisions lately is revoking the independent state legislature theory, but that doesn’t really stop state governments from committing electoral fraud :/

      Rationality isn’t returning to the SCOTUS for a long time sadly.

  • Darnov
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    22 years ago

    Could also abolish SCOTUS. Maybe force it to not be a lifetime appointment and rather it be a rotating committee from lesser courts?

    • Machinist3359
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      12 years ago

      Circuit judges elected every 16 years w/o term limits by a popular vote would probably strike a nice balance. The role requires expertise, which is only really established by years in the field. Also want to avoid the election cycle being too influential on decisions. Yet, there needs to be a democratic mechanism.

  • dankapotamus
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    02 years ago

    I’m incredibly liberal but to be honest, I feel like I am at the point where I want to vote for a libertarian solely because I feel like the Dems take my vote for granted. They don’t do shit in response to the dictator-like politics of the right. Our country is decades behind the EU in social progress

    • mrnotoriousman
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      12 years ago

      I’m incredibly liberal but to be honest,

      Literally every time I see this it’s followed by insert right-wing view/talking point

    • HipHoboHarold
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      02 years ago

      So rather than going for the party who has a chance of doing anything good, just throw fuel to the fire. Give them the entire government.

      • RestrictedAccount
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        12 years ago

        No. Rather than going for the party who has a chance of doing anything good, they are going to vote for a party that will do the exact opposite of something good.

  • Seraph
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    02 years ago

    There’s no way out of this without expanding the court right? There are no easy ways to get these lifetime appointments removed, are there?

    Edit: actually I just read they are trying to impose supreme court term limits!

    • HipHoboHarold
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      22 years ago

      The only other option is to bust out the guillotine. Waiting for them to die naturally is gonna take too long, they clearly will never retire if their own free will, and no one in charge seems to care enough to do anything about their crimes.

      So either we expand or revolt.

      • Anna
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        12 years ago

        Are you calling for killing members of the Supreme Court?

        • HipHoboHarold
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          12 years ago

          Less “calling for”, and more so realizing that a lot of regimes in the world only got taken care of through people rising up. Sometimes violence has been needed, and that can be shown throughout this countries history.

          • NotTheOnlyGamer
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            12 years ago

            So, yes, you are calling for a violent insurrection against a part of the government.

  • @[email protected]
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    02 years ago

    I don’t think there’s any argument about it, but there is one key problem and that is, outside of impeachment, there is no provision in the Constitution to do it.

    Alito is absolutely right on that point, which means the only way to do it is through an amendment and we are simply too divided to get either an amemdment or a full convention passed.

    • ArotriosOP
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      12 years ago

      I have to disagree with you here - Alioto is lying. It’s on the very first line where the Constitution starts describing the Supreme Court.

      Article 3, Section 1 first line:

      The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish

      The court itself was established through an act of Congress, the Judiciary Act of 1789, and Congress has had the power to both set the number of judges and impeach them throughout the entire history of the United States. If Congress had the will to do so, they could repeal and replace the Judiciary Act and still be under their Constitutional mandate - and the Act has been amended and expanded on substantially by Congress since its inception.

      Alioto should be disbarred for even suggesting such a facetious legal theory.