Good ol' Gribbit repeats this one ridiculous argument that is par for the course among the STACLU crowd: the notion that the ACLU intentionally files cases in "ACLU friendly districts":
They often times take "establishment clause" cases in districts where activist federal court judges are more likely to favor their positions...
But even if the town doesn't and it does go to trial, because the case was taken in an ACLU friendly district, the town hasn't a chance to survive the argument.
It's just such an idiotic argument and it shows Gribbit's rank ignorance of the judicial process. Judges are assigned to cases randomly. Each judicial district has multiple judges and neither the plaintiff nor the defendant has any control whatsoever over which judge they get. It's a total crapshoot. And in fact, many of the cases they've won have come in front of judges who are not ACLU-friendly, but are conservative Christians. Two recent examples are Judge Jones in the Dover case and Judge Vaughn Walker in the NSA spying lawsuit (Walker is not only a conservative judge, his nomination was fiercely opposed by liberals when he was nominated by Reagan and he had to be renominated by Bush 41 before getting into office).
In fact, the majority of the Federal bench was appointed by Republican presidents (55% appointed by Republicans, 45% appointed by Democrats). And despite the myth that so many conservative judges turn out to be liberals on the bench, studies of their opinions show that Republican-appointed judges vote far more conservatively than those appointed by Democrats. For instance, Republican appointed judges have ruled positively in gay rights cases on 11% of the time, as opposed to 70% for Democratic appointed judges.
This notion that the ACLU shops around for ideologically friendly judges is not only absurd, it's not possible. With random assignment of judges, they have no way of controlling who they get. And on a typical appeals court, they are more likely to get Republican appointed judges than not. Yet they keep winning these cases, which is what really frustrates the STACLUless. Maybe, just maybe, it's because they've got the stronger legal arguments, eh?
- Log in to post comments
I think you meant "many of the cases they've won have come in front of judges who are not ACLU-friendly" ...
Actually it's right as printed. "They" in that sentence refers to the STACLU crowd, which has lost a number of cases in front of judges who were not pro-ACLU.
I'm amazed at the sheer quantity of hate and fear the far right have for the ACLU. It goes far beyond the appropriate response to the ACLU's worst actions (and I have to admit they've had some real clangers). I can only conclude that the far right hate ALL of the freedoms for which the ACLU has ever fought. Nothing else can explain the level of hatred we're seeing here, which is on the level of the shrillest wartime propaganda.
PS: Is there any way you gan get your comments form to remember my handle, email address and URL? How can I fire off snarky one-liners when the majority of my keystrokes have to go to repeating the same information in each post? I am an ARTISTE! How can I create in such conditions?!
OK, off topic, but is the phrase "part for the course" or "par for the course"? I always thought it was the latter. I'm just wondering because my dad always uses the phrase "play it by year" rather than "play it by ear".
Raging Bee wrote:
This is the point I've been making all along. It's not that the ACLU is above criticism - they take some positions I flatly disagree with and I've criticized them myself many times, and will continue to do so. Volokh was right when he called it ACLU Derangement Syndrome. These people are so fanatical in their hatred of the ACLU that they completely lose the ability to think rationally about it. They cannot even begin to see that any position taken by the ACLU could even be sincerely held, much less be valid. No one connected with the ACLU can merely be wrong, they must be evil and satanic and intent on destroying the country. It's monumentally stupid and completely irrational.
Unfortunately, no. For some reason, the techs have removed that code from the setup and do not want to put it back in.
Will-
It's par for the course (of course). That was just a typo on my part.
It is possible to get a specific federal judge under some circumstances. For instance, here in the Western District of North Carolina, if you file the case in Charlotte, you will randomly be assigned one of five or more judges, depending upon vacancies. But if you file at the secondary site here in Asheville, generally only two of the judges are available, so your odds improve. If you file at the Federal Courthouse in Cherokee, Court generally meets for only one or two sessions a year, and generally only has one judge, and he's not even from this District! David Sentelle of the DC Circuit moonlights during his summer vacation. So if you want Judge Sentelle to hear your case, now you know where to go.
That being said, it is fairly rare for a Plaintiff to have options as to where to file her suit. Jurisdiction normally will be in the Judicial District where the offending party is located or the offense occurred. It may also lie in the home district of the Plaintiff, but in almost all civil rights cases, this will be the same District as the government being sued.
By the way, speaking of the Dover v. Kitzmiller case, if you think Glib Fortuna is ill-informed about other matters, check out what he's claiming about Dover:
http://stoptheaclu.com/archives/2006/08/14/when-the-aclu-claims-to-be-t…
I've got a long comment in the moderation queue that I assume will be approved, given Glib's boundless and unfounded confidence in his own arguments.
Your comment went through, Willie. Unfortunately, you got a few of your facts wrong in it. Jones is a Presbyterian, not a Methodist, if I remember correctly. And it wasn't the defense's presentation that he called "breathtaking inanity", but the school board's decision and the process they went through to reach it that he called that. He was quite complimentary of the defense team, though I think an objective observer would have to conclude that they were clearly overmatched in the courtroom.
I thought Judge Jones was a Lutheran.
Oops, Raging Bee is right. He's Lutheran. I knew that, I don't know why I conflated that with presbyterian.
"Your comment went through, Willie."
My first comment did, but I've since added another. Hopefully this one will be error-free - thanks for the clarification on Jones' "inanity" comment. I really should be more conscientious about fact checking, but when in Rome...
As noted, the wingnuts have an irrational hatred of the ACLU. One aspect of this is seen when they are confronted with specific examples of the ACLU taking the "pro-religion" side (such as defending the street preachers)--they conclude that such cases are only taken in order to confuse people to hide their anti-Christian agenda.
"It's par for the course (of course)".
Thankyou, Mr Ed.