From: cedman@714-725-3165.nts.uci.edu (Carl Edman)
Subject: Re: GOP Convention, Houston
Newsgroups: alt.activism,alt.drugs
Reply-To: cedman@golem.ps.uci.edu (Carl Edman)
Date: 13 Aug 92 07:12:23 GMT

Tom Fitzgerald writes
> Oh come on.  Buckley is writing articles while G. Bush is
> appointing federal judges.  In the long run,
> prohibitionism will fade, but it'll have no more to do
> with a "conservative" effort than the end of alcohol
> prohibition did.  Eventually, people will figure out
> that they've been lied to.  But it'll take a while, and
> it'll take longer as long as the current Republican group
> is in office.

And what helped shape the political views of Federal Judges before their  
nomination ? What will continue to influence their views afterward when they  
are on the bench ? The writings of conservative intellectuals. And among those  
William F Buckley and Milton Friedman are among the most widely influential and  
admired. If you believe that ideas don't matter I'm afraid there are many  
things about politics which you can't understand. If you need any specific  
example I'll just encourage you to look at what Milton Friedman alone has done  
to change the monetary policy of the entire world.

> Son, you're dreaming.  This court is also the one that
> ruled that evidence obtained without a warrant could be
> admitted if police mistakenly thought they didn't need
> one (Scalia also wrote the opinion on that one); and that
> the police could beat a confession out of a suspect and
> have it admitted. Combined with the affirmation of
> forfeiture cases, there have been far more anti-rights
> rulings by this court than pro-rights, and there's no
> reason to expect that to change. 

Pop, you are overlooking several facts:
1. It is possible for a person to have staunch pro-individual rights views, but  
believe that either the framers of the constitution did not share those views,  
or that quite simply they did not put those views in the constitution. In that  
case, a honest judge will rule in a way which may not reflect his personal  
political preferences but his duty to the constitution.

I believe that there are rights which deserve explicit constitutional  
protection, but which currently don't. Don't you ? If you do, do you think a  
judge should rule a case on the basis on his or her political preference (even  
if you and I happen to agree with it) and not on the basis of the constitution  
?

2. Even someone who is very concerned about individual rights and police  
misbehaviour can consider the exclusionary rule to be just about as stupid,  
rights-violating, unconstitutional and inappropriate "solution" to this problem  
as can be imagined. You'll certainly have no problems divining my position on  
this matter.

3. Finally, I don't think that you've established that the right on this court  
(as probably best represented by Justice Antonin Scalia) has moved against  
rights. As a matter of fact, I would consider it considerably more likely that  
it will stand up against political pressure to distort the constitution and to  
stand up for all the positive ideas is clearly expresses and which earlier  
left-wing courts have found within their power to completely ignore.

	Carl Edman
Newsgroups: alt.activism