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The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

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Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

Bob Gray said:
I don't really get the infallibility angle your discussing.
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I didn't express it very well, if at all, Bob. Justice Holmes stated something like it but far more clearly:

Persecution for the expression of opinions seems to me perfectly logical. If you have no doubt of your premises or your power and want a certain result with all your heart you naturally express your wishes in law and sweep away all opposition...But when men have realized that time has upset many fighting faiths, they may come to believe even more than they believe the very foundations of their own conduct that the ultimate good desired is better reached by free trade in ideas. . . . The best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market, and that truth is the only ground upon which their wishes safely can be carried out.

That, at any rate, is the theory of our Constitution. It is an experiment, as all life is an experiment. Every year, if not every day, we have to wager our salvation upon some prophecy based upon imperfect knowledge.

By our differing senses of fallibility, I was referring to our differing levels of awareness "that time has upset many fighting faiths" and that we each have good reason to reserve some level of healthy doubt of our premises. Confirmation bias makes that a challenge for us all, of course, and sometimes strong religious or political convictions make absolutists of us all on some issues. But I think we are less likely to conclude that what is right for ourselves is right for everybody else if we are more aware of our fallibility. All that is pretty obvious but not so easy to remember when the issues touch closely held beliefs.
 
Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

St. Clown said:
It's beyond extreme, it's a bad argument. If you were to openly oppose a Nazi regime policy while living in Germany, it was certain death. If you secretly opposed the regime then it was only death should they find you. Opposing abortion carries none of those consequences. What's the worst that could happen? Someone might mock you openly. It doesn't quite carry the same magnitude of oh-no factor.
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Yes, very extreme is beyond extreme. Which is why I said very extreme. And not a good example, as I said. But the point stands regarding whether there is a point where the government steps beyond the pale, so to speak, and you have to choose to play along knowing what is happening is wrong or somehow stand against it. Again (and again) this isn't related to most of what goes on in government.
 
Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

burd said:
I didn't express it very well, if at all, Bob. Justice Holmes stated something like it but far more clearly:

Persecution for the expression of opinions seems to me perfectly logical. If you have no doubt of your premises or your power and want a certain result with all your heart you naturally express your wishes in law and sweep away all opposition...But when men have realized that time has upset many fighting faiths, they may come to believe even more than they believe the very foundations of their own conduct that the ultimate good desired is better reached by free trade in ideas. . . . The best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market, and that truth is the only ground upon which their wishes safely can be carried out.

That, at any rate, is the theory of our Constitution. It is an experiment, as all life is an experiment. Every year, if not every day, we have to wager our salvation upon some prophecy based upon imperfect knowledge.

By our differing senses of fallibility, I was referring to our differing levels of awareness "that time has upset many fighting faiths" and that we each have good reason to reserve some level of healthy doubt of our premises. Confirmation bias makes that a challenge for us all, of course, and sometimes strong religious or political convictions make absolutists of us all on some issues. But I think we are less likely to conclude that what is right for ourselves is right for everybody else if we are more aware of our fallibility. All that is pretty obvious but not so easy to remember when the issues touch closely held beliefs.
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Sounds good to me. Wish we'd see more of this in actuality.
 
Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

LynahFan said:
No. If it were, how could it be so heritable? We believe what we are *TAUGHT* to believe. Forced conversion is extremely possible, as has been demonstrated numerous times throughout the millennia.
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I see what you mean, I guess I'm thinking of the word "faith" as most people might think of "religion." To me faith is completely personal, while religion can be taught and institutionalized among a group of many. In the way I think of faith, it's encouraged by, but not dependent on religious activities.
 
Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

geezer said:
I see what you mean, I guess I'm thinking of the word "faith" as most people might think of "religion." To me faith is completely personal, while religion can be taught and institutionalized among a group of many. In the way I think of faith, it's encouraged by, but not dependent on religious activities.
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And fish don't know they're wet. When people grow up surrounded by people of one faith, in a country whose laws were largely generated by people of one faith, with institutions specifically designed to perpetuate that faith, can it really be true that their faith is "completely personal?"

Is it just by random chance that so many Saudi Arabians end up having a "completely personal" experience with Islam and so many Italians have a "completely personal" experience with Christianity? I mean, what are the odds?
 
Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

LynahFan said:
And fish don't know they're wet. When people grow up surrounded by people of one faith, in a country whose laws were largely generated by people of one faith, with institutions specifically designed to perpetuate that faith, can it really be true that their faith is "completely personal?"

Is it just by random chance that so many Saudi Arabians end up having a "completely personal" experience with Islam and so many Italians have a "completely personal" experience with Christianity? I mean, what are the odds?
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I know what you mean, but I would have thought of Islam and Christianity in this context as "religions." So when I replace "faith" with "religion" in your second sentence, it makes perfect sense. Thanks again for pointing out my misunderstanding.
Biblically speaking, there is some undefined fraction of religious people that actually have faith.
 
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Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

Bob Gray said:
Sounds good to me. Wish we'd see more of this in actuality.
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I do too, but all that still requires vigorous debate, and we should expect to be challenged, sometimes aggressively, for what we advocate. And for a hockey board, this place does quite well.
 
Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

burd said:
And for a hockey board, this place does quite well.
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It does.

There was a public broadcasting series that ran many years ago. I think it was called something like "Fred Friendly presents Ethics in America." It was this great show where they had maybe 10 very influential, bright and talented people who sat at a semi-circle table and there was a moderator, who was usually some very bright law school professor, and for an hour or two they would discuss ethical issues on a variety of subjects, such as in war, medicine, the law, business, etc... The 10 panelists and the moderator changed from show to show. But each show you got this very interesting debate involving people from a wide variety of perspectives. But what really made it work was the terrific moderators they had.

I've often thought that message boards could work in a similar way, since there are obviously very bright people from a wide swath of society who participate, if only a moderator could help keep subjects from veering off on wild tangents, or to gently but effectively raise questions that might get people to look at something in a different way.
 
Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

SJHovey said:
It does.

There was a public broadcasting series that ran many years ago. I think it was called something like "Fred Friendly presents Ethics in America." It was this great show where they had maybe 10 very influential, bright and talented people who sat at a semi-circle table and there was a moderator, who was usually some very bright law school professor, and for an hour or two they would discuss ethical issues on a variety of subjects, such as in war, medicine, the law, business, etc... The 10 panelists and the moderator changed from show to show. But each show you got this very interesting debate involving people from a wide variety of perspectives. But what really made it work was the terrific moderators they had.

I've often thought that message boards could work in a similar way, since there are obviously very bright people from a wide swath of society who participate, if only a moderator could help keep subjects from veering off on wild tangents, or to gently but effectively raise questions that might get people to look at something in a different way.
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Those are excellent thoughts.

I recall Friendly's series, The Constitution: That Delicate Balance. It was outstanding.

Also, remember this:

In 1966, Friendly resigned from CBS when the television network ran a scheduled episode of The Lucy Show instead of broadcasting live coverage of the first United States Senate hearings questioning American involvement in Vietnam
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We shall not see his like again.

For the record, USCHO is the best forum for discussing political and social issues I have been on. There are a couple trolls but that's why God made Ignore, and among the rest there are dozens of thoughtful people with highly divergent viewpoints.
 
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Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

dxmnkd316 said:
Did you watch Vice a few weeks back? I thought their piece on transsexuals in Iran was mindblowing.
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Nope, I missed it. Love Vice, though. Even if the guy who runs it is a slime bag.
 
Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

Appellate Court to NSA: Drop Dead.

The National Security Agency's practice of collecting data about Americans' telephone calls in bulk goes beyond what Congress intended when it wrote Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act, a federal appeals court ruled on Thursday.

The three-judge panel was asked to consider whether the program violated the Constitution. Instead, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel punted on the constitutional claim, deciding the program was simply not authorized by federal law.

One of the big reasons it is hard to discern congressional intent in this case, the court wrote, is because the bulk collection program has been shrouded in secrecy. So it cannot "reasonably be said" that Congress OK'd "a program of which many members of Congress — and all members of the public — were not aware."

The court concludes that it has no qualms about taking this step because if Congress wants to "authorize such a far‐reaching and unprecedented program, it has every opportunity to do so, and to do so unambiguously."
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Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

Something tells me that the NSA isn't just going to stop collecting this data.
 
Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

St. Clown said:
Something tells me that the NSA isn't just going to stop collecting this data.
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Ya think?

Just because they lied about doing it in the first place, and then lied about still doing it, and then lied again?

The Intelligence Community on the rule of law is like Joseph Stalin on the Pope: "How many divisions has he got?"
 
Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VI - Roberts rules disorder

St. Clown said:
Something tells me that the NSA isn't just going to stop collecting this data.
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What they wouldnt give to find Snowden right now and "heart attack" him...that guy will never be allowed back on American soil now.
 
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