The new supreme on 2nd amendment

[Madcap_Magician]

She's been solicitor general for a long time and has excellent relationships with all of the Court justices.

The "no experience" meme is false and wrong. Anybody pushing that should be ashamed of themselves for carrying Fox News water. Kagan is probably one of the most qualified candidates imaginable. She's on good terms with the far right-wing activist judge arm of the court, and also comfortable with the smart people. A really good pick and she should be easily confirmed.

No, she really doesn't have any judicial experience, and in the last 20 years has somehow gotten tenure at two major law schools without really publishing anything. Literally.

By all appearances, she's a good academic lawyer, but has no experience as a judge. She reminds me of the Harriet Miers nomination. Miers had been a great lawyer and worked as White House chief counsel for a while, but had no judicial experience herself and had the misfortune of having known George Bush for long enough to be considered a crony. Kagan has known Obama for a long time, too.

Now don't get me wrong, she's not the worst possible appointment. I think President Obama is trying to get some credibility as a moderate and avoid a confirmation fight in the senate before midterms. The far right and the far left will both squawk about her, the former for her stand against military recruiters as a Harvard dean and the latter for her moderate stances on judicial deference.

 

[dom1104]

<Insult removed> So long as she protects my 2nd amendment rights.

I think its the best we could have hoped for.

 

[ConstitutionCowboy]

As a solicitor general, she's bound by precedent. As a supreme Court Justice, she can change precedent.

Woody

 

[ArmedBear]

She's been solicitor general for a long time

Since 2009!

The "no experience" meme is false and wrong.

Show how. She's never been a judge, and she's been a practicing lawyer for a few months.

Apparently, she's very good at being the dean of a prestigious law school. Saying she has no experience at being a judge is not saying she is stupid, evil, or anything else. She has no known experience restoring antique British sports cars, either. That's not a personal attack. It's just a fact.

I wouldn't hire her to restore an XKE, because she doesn't have concrete qualifications that show me she's worth paying. But I'd certainly want her if I were on the search committee for a law school dean.

Tell me, have you ever hired anyone?

Kagan is probably one of the most qualified candidates imaginable.

A really good pick and she should be easily confirmed.

ROTFLMAO

Talk about carrying water!

So, until yesterday, what did you know about her? What qualifies you to decide that she's a "really good pick"?

I am not saying she's a really bad pick. She could, through sheer luck, end up being the greatest justice in American history. I don't know.

I'm going to guess that you have no idea, either.

 

[stonecutter2]

Problem is, She has never been a judge, anywhere. We have no idea on how she will actually vote since there is zero track record from past decisions. Anybody can say what they want to get into the job. It's after she is seated for life that worries me. Also remember who is appointing her. Odds are she thinks just like him..

Barack Obama appointed her, and last I checked, he is a President who has done nothing to hinder gun rights. I guess I'm not so sure what exactly the fear about Obama is, as he's so far done absolutely nothing to affect gun rights, unless I've missed something?

 

[harmonic]

unless I've missed something?

Apparantly a great deal.

And you posters who are applauding this recent appointment need to learn to do research. Our rank liberal president is only going to appoint a rank liberal to the bench. And liberals are not your friends.

Also, the OP's reference conveniently stops short of essential information.

http://www.examiner.com/x-1417-Gun-...at-are-Elena-Kagans-views-on-Second-Amendment

When asked if she believed Heller was "rightly decided," she answered:

I do not think it would comport with this responsibility to state my own views of whether particular Supreme Court decisions were rightly decided.

Note: she's withholding her personal sentiments re guns. Guaranteed she'll rule as a rabid liberal in any future case that's presented.

She also said,

there is no question, after Heller, that the Second Amendment guarantees individuals the right to keep and bear arms and that this right, like others in the Constitution, provides strong although not unlimited protection against governmental regulation.

Read the above very carefully. The second doesn't provide unlimited protection against govt regs? Heck, we could wind up w/gun laws like mexico, 22s and 38 supers only.

This is a very bad appointment re gun ownership.

 

[eye5600]

I think there is no telling whether she would have voted with the majority in Heller, or been in the minority. Odds are the latter, but that's guessing.

As for Obama, remember that although gun rights may be the most important thing to you, it's not the most important thing to him. He would be looking at Kagen's views over a wide range of topics, of which gun rights is only one, and not the most important.

When Obama represented Chicago, he voted with the powers that be in Chicago. There is no reason at all to think that gun rights are important to him, but it seem that he doesn't want to lose any political support in the wider country by antagonizing the gun lobby. I tend to think Obama doesn't care about gun rights except as a political issue to be negotiated. The only people in the country who are calling for more restrictive gun laws right now are the mayors of New York and Chicago.

 

[natman]

Apparantly a great deal.

And you posters who are applauding this recent appointment need to learn to do research. Our rank liberal president is only going to appoint a rank liberal to the bench. And liberals are not your friends.

You may well be right, but I think most of the comments here are not in favor of this nomination in absolute terms, but rather in relative terms. That is, sure Obama is not going to nominate a good appointee in 2nd Amendment terms, but more along the lines of "it could be worse, best of a bad lot, at least it's not so-and-so, he'd be really bad".

 

[svtruth]

No!

In Heller, the court held that the CONSTITUTION guarantees the right to keep and bear arms.
An important distinction to my mind.

 

[Bartholomew Roberts]

No, she really doesn't have any judicial experience, and in the last 20 years has somehow gotten tenure at two major law schools without really publishing anything. Literally.

Uh, not true. Kagan has published four major articles in the eight years she worked in academia - and at least two of those are major articles that have prompted much discussion in legal academia.

I can think of a lot of reasons not to want Kagan nominated for the Supreme Court and I don't think she is going to be a positive for gun rights (on the plus side, she probably won't be any worse than Justice Stevens who was pretty bad and she is probably the best of the likely picks); but she isn't an intellectual lightweight by any means and she has more than enough experience to do the job - so did Harriet Miers for that matter.

I'm more concerned that we now have a Supreme Court consisting solely of people from Yale and Harvard and haven't elected a President who wasn't from Yale or Harvard in the past 20 years. I'm sure they are good schools and all; but somehow I think there are probably equally qualified people out there who bring the benefit of having known what life is like outside Yale/Harvard circles.

 

[stonecutter2]

Quote:
unless I've missed something?

Apparantly a great deal.

What have I missed? I didn't see any weapons bans, in fact I've seen national parks get carry opened to them, and a hangun ban get overturned in Washington DC. So, where exactly has our President affected our gun rights negatively, so far? I'm serious, I just haven't really seen anything to indicate I should really be scared.

 

[ArmedBear]

Kagan has published four major articles in the eight years she worked in academia

You do realize that, for someone in her position, that would be like saying that an "experienced" bicycle racer has competed in four races in his eight-year career, and finished in the top 25 twice?

 

[Bartholomew Roberts]

You do realize that, for someone in her position, that would be like saying that an "experienced" bicycle racer has competed in four races in his eight-year career, and finished in the top 25 twice?

Bad analogy. First of all, I said "major" articles - not that this the sum total of all she has written. Second, do you have some statistics on the typical publishing output of a legal professor in her field? Finally, it is the quality, not the quantity of work. One of Kagan's pieces is the 6th most cited legal article in the last ten years (across all fields). That is not a minor accomplishment.

Is Kagan the best qualified? No. Is she qualified for the job? Yes, undoubtedly. If the Dean of Harvard Law and Solicitor General isn't qualified to be a Justice, then who is? You realize that unless the Yale/Harvard hold on SCOTUS is broken, she probably taught law to half the future SCOTUS Justices?
*

 

[BruM]

I agree with the comment above that we could do worse e.g Eric Holder. All supremes are a crapshoot because they have a history of changing their views over time but at this point she seems to favor following the constitution. Time will tell but we dont get a vote and she will be confirmed.

 

[harmonic]

and a hangun ban get overturned

Huh? Hangun is only allowed in Washington and New Hampshire. The states that even allow executions use lethal injection, for the most part. Obama didn't have anything to do with hanguns.

 

[JN01]

What have I missed? I didn't see any weapons bans, in fact I've seen national parks get carry opened to them, and a hangun ban get overturned in Washington DC. So, where exactly has our President affected our gun rights negatively, so far? I'm serious, I just haven't really seen anything to indicate I should really be scared.

As one of the board of directors of the Joyce Foundation, Obama approved funding for numerous gun control "studies" designed to attack the RKBA.

Senator Obama joined an amicus brief in support of DC's draconian laws in Heller vs DC. SCOTUS overturned the DC ban, Obama had nothing to do with that. DC is now doing everything they can to avoid complying with SCOTUS. Has Obama exerted any presssure to change that? No.

The National Park carry provision was a rider attached to the credit card bill that Obama wanted passed. Would he have signed it as a stand alone bill? I doubt it.

It is true that Obama has not pushed any new legislation thus far. He may feel that he may have a difficult time passing any such bill right now, and doesn't want to expend the political capital to try. He is in no way, shape, or form a friend to the Second Amendment, however.

 

[bulldog10]

bulldog10

I think that if we all turn around and look to the things that were said and promised by the White House occupant we will recall that he has kept all his promises and never told a lie. In a pigs uh, eye. You can bet that the lady appointed is of like kind. They will tell us what we want to hear then, cut our throats.

 

[sixshooterfan]

I find this thread very interesting. Some posters obviously have knowledge of constitutional issues to the point of knowing what the levels of scrutiny are that are applied in certain cases. I visit this forum infrequently, but it is heartening to see this.

As for the pick, it is fine. No one knows for sure what goes on in the mind of a judge, and they do change as they age. The experience thing is mostly a red herring from the right wing news circles, and the comparison to Harriet Miers is an absolute joke. Miers was an embarrassment of a nominee and is nowhere near Kagan or any other judicial nominee that I can remember. Bush made a solid pick with Roberts, a little less so with Alito in my mind. Kagan I think is the best a gun rights advocate could hope for in a pick from the current administration; I think it would be foolish for the right to sink the nomination.

 

[Airman193SOS]

I think she's a good choice for a variety of reasons. Probably the reason you guys will like most is that the Democrats aren't happy with her as she's seen as a moderate choice who is replacing the "most liberal" member of the Court. The Democrats are seeing this as a further shift to the right.

I don't know about all that, but from the standpoint of gun rights it could have been much worse. The Republicans should be ecstatic.

 

[ArmedBear]

If the Dean of Harvard Law and Solicitor General isn't qualified to be a Justice, then who is?

Equivalent rhetorical question: If the head of the Harvard History Department isn't qualified to be a four-star General, who is?

Studying the imortant decisions people make, and making them, are different. They both matter, but they are not equivalent activities, aptitudes or experience.

I suck at fly-fishing. But so does the Hemingway prof I've fished with.

 

[harmonic]

but from the standpoint of gun rights it could have been much worse. The Republicans should be ecstatic.

That's exactly what the gun grabbing socialists who run the state of kalifornistan tells its subjects. When the slaves start complaining about kal's draconian gun laws, the elite tell them, "Be happy. It could be much worse."

 

[IdahoSkies]

On another note; why isn't anyone claiming sexism because the President has now nominated two women? Certainly there are qualified male candidates, no?

I think that Bush let the Dem's take the highroad on this one by not nominating a woman to replace O'Conner.

I don't know much about this nominee, but she is from NYC I believe. Odds are she's anti-gun. What I would like to know is whether she owns a gun or has been shooting as a hobby or for self defense.

There are currently three justices who grew up in NYC, Ginsberg, Sotomayor, Scalia. Add to that Alito who grew up in Trenton and I'm not sure that growing up in NYC is a good indicator of judicial philosophy or opinions.

It has been a long time since a Justice was named that was not a judge, but it is a lot of precedence and may provide some "new blood" to the court. Kagan won over a lot of conservative professors with her ending of the tenure dispute under her watch.

that said I have a greater concern with the lack of representation from middle America (geographically speaking). The justices are east coasters or Californians and there is a lot more going on in the middle. O'Conner is sorely missed.

 

[Bartholomew Roberts]

Equivalent rhetorical question: If the head of the Harvard History Department isn't qualified to be a four-star General, who is?

Not at all an equivalent rhetorical question for starters - does the Harvard history department have a sustained record of producing 4-star generals? Because Harvard Law School does have a pretty impressive (and probably undeserved) record of producing Supreme Court Justices. Further the connection between teaching history and being a general is at best tenuous, the connection between teaching law school and being a Judge is a little more clear.

Studying the imortant decisions people make, and making them, are different.

A judge most know the law and know how to apply it; where do you feel Kagan is unqualified in these areas?

After all, Kagan already worked as a law clerk for the D. C. Court of Appeals and for Justice Thurgood Marshall - so she certainly has some appellate court experience that few lawyers will get.

On a completely unrelated note to my discussion with ArmedBear, it appears that Kagan is the one who drafted the1998 Clinton Executive Order expanding the number of semi-automatic rifles banned from import under the "sporting purposes" clause and that she was also helpful and supportive of the Harvard Law School Shooting Club while Dean there.

Not sure how useful either of those two pieces of information are since in both cases she was pretty much just doing the job she was supposed to be doing; but it at least tells us that she is comfortable with carrying out a decision she may not personally agree with.

 

[Leanwolf]

Texas Rifleman - " As I mentioned in another thread, the problem with agreeing with Heller is that she may also agree that there are 'reasonable restrictions' and she might very well be on a Court that will decide what those are."

Correct.

And, most importantly, to an anti-firearms NeoLib Progressive, there is no such thing as an "unreasonable" restriction on firearms owned by the serfs and worker peasant rabble.

L.W.

 

[speaksoftly]

Problem is, She has never been a judge, anywhere.

Guys I agree that it's always a scary deal when picking a new judge but ignorance isn't going to win us any points in the legislative sector. If I'm not mistaken, over 40 of the appointed Supreme Court Justices (about 111) have not had previous judgeship positions. Just because Fox News wants to make a big deal out of it as it pertains to the current headlines doesn't mean that it's a new or even bad practice. WADR of course.