[LOCKED] OT: Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia Dies of Natural Causes while on Hunting Trip in Texas

Submitted by VicTorious1 on

He was on a hunting trip in West Texas. He complained of not feeling well Friday evening. It is reported that he passed in his sleep.

Edit: Folks, don't think it needs to be said, but let's remember to avoid the politics. Just wanted to post the news as it's current events and sometimes I first get news from you guys while refreshing the site.

MOD EDIT - a couple people are starting to say things which could lead down the path of politics, so we'll lock it here. I know I'll get flack for this, and if you disagree, you can always find me on Twitter if you've got it and we can talk. - LSA

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Darker Blue

February 13th, 2016 at 7:00 PM ^

This thread is shit. 

You have posters calling out the intelligence of others for not knowing a name???? 

I'll bet a dollar to a donut that it's some of these "super intelligent" posters that help make this country the glorious shit hole that it has become.... 

Fuck off with politics 

Joined: 10/30/2011

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Clarence Boddicker

February 13th, 2016 at 7:12 PM ^

Knowing Scalia is basic civic engagement. He and Ginsberg are the two most recognizable members of the highest court in the land. I mean, you realize that an educated informed populace is key to democratic forms of government, right? I'd say that those people who can't bother to be informed are the biggest factor in making "this country the glorious shit hole that it has become."

Joined: 05/27/2011

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Sopwith

February 13th, 2016 at 7:29 PM ^

SIDESHOW BOB: Bart Simpson? The spirited little scamp who twice foiled my evil schemes and had me sent to this dank, urine-soaked hell hole?

PAROLE BOARD: Uh, we object to your use of the term "urine soaked hell hole" when you could have said "pee-pee soaked heck hole."

SIDESHOW BOB: Cheerfully withdrawn.

Joined: 06/29/2010

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sadeto

February 13th, 2016 at 7:07 PM ^

RIP Something about this man: while many of us no doubt detested his judicial positions, guess who his best friend on the court was? The one whom he accompanied to the opera? Ruth Bader Ginsburg. There was a tremendous amount of respect and close friendship between polar opposites who held nothing back when going after each other on the court. A lesson for us all.

Joined: 01/17/2014

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Sopwith

February 13th, 2016 at 7:19 PM ^

and said, in the course of a discussion of standing (which basically means having the right party bring a suit before the court), that "you can't have standing just because you care so much about the issue. If that were the rule, then the ACLU could bring every civil liberties case they wanted, because no one cares more about civil liberties than the ACLU."

Next semester, Michgan Law's ACLU chapter had T-shirts that had that bolded phrase above on the back. Classic.

I had a chance to ask him what was so wrong with having a "living constitution" as he often decries it. I made the point that many of our foundational texts are reinterpreted as we Americans plod through history together these past 200+ years, and that being a living, relevant document might be a better alternative to a anachronistic dead one. 

He didn't concur with my opinion.

Always appreciated his decisive fifth vote in the flag burning case Texas v. Johnson, something that put him in hot water with conservatives but was without much doubt rightly decided. In fact, the National ACLU gave him an award for that if memory serves.

He and Justice Ginsberg were best friends, which was always kind of amazing and inspirational in that it suggests political differences don't necessarily have to make us hate each other. 

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Sopwith

February 13th, 2016 at 7:46 PM ^

is that he sounded pretty incredulous, and his main point was that a document has to mean what it was understood to mean at the time it was written*. If you want to change the Constitution, you have to go through the amendment process, you can't just reinterpret. If that process is hard, it's because the founders wanted it to be hard.

My point was that we've been through a lot as a country, and I used the Declaration of Independence phrase "All men are created equal" as an example of foundational words that meant one thing at the time (all white landowning males are equal) but has come to be interpreted as something else (all people are equal) after centuries of social progress, and that's a good thing. He wasn't impressed. But I appreciated having a chance to ask the question. That's why you go to a place like Michigan. [BOOM! Michigan Difference'd!]

*that's basically his definition of "originalist," which is what he calls himself, as distinct from a "textualist" like Clarence Thomas, who doesn't care what something was understood to mean at the time, only what the words say absent any historical inquiry into the contemporary minds of the people who wrote it.

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SalvatoreQuattro

February 13th, 2016 at 7:36 PM ^

make people hate each other.  People decry racism, sexism, homophobia...but forget that the most lethal form of warfare has been politically-based. Nazism vs Communism, Communism vs Democratic-Capitalists, Nazism vs Communism... ugly, ugly, stuff.

Hate and bitterness are the brick and mortar of walls.

Joined: 11/30/2010

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BluByYou

February 13th, 2016 at 7:35 PM ^

put the best interests of the country in his decisions.  I fear for this country in that the next president will nomitate at least one supreme court justice, a president who is either a socialist, a grifter and serial liar or a blowhard.  

Joined: 12/31/2010

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1980JimG

February 13th, 2016 at 7:43 PM ^

and a proud Michigan alum, good riddance. Condolences to his family, but I am positive God called ihm home to explain his hypocrisy. Only this time his big mouth will not have the final say. 

Joined: 11/23/2011

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