Strip Search Supreme

The Supreme Court was considering a case today dealing with when it is appropriate to allow school officials to strip search students in the search for contraband. The ACLU lawyer discussed the school’s actions in terms of an “ick” factor, and certainly thinking about Clarence "Bill of Responsibilities" Thomas and Antonin Scalia discussing searching a girl’s underwear was enough to make me gag. As John Cole pointed out when talking about the same case, our priorities are seriously out of whack when there is even an argument about the appropriateness of this.

When dealing with childhood and children, there’s a remarkable and unfortunate tendency for people to completely forget what it was like to be a child and to attend a school. Schools already possess, for better or worse, an unbelievable amount of control over kids. This is for the most part a good thing – kids are incredibly stupid, and tend to get themselves into all sorts of problems. I’m certainly not saying schools shouldn’t have a reasonable amount of leeway to act in the best interests of children. However, forcing little girls to strip in the search for ibuprofen (!) is so far beyond that line that they should really call home, the line might be worried. People so wrap themselves up in this idea of “I’m protecting the children/country/sanctity of marriage” that they are unwilling to allow criticism of their actions, even once they have blown any sort of reasonable cost/benefit scale.

Did or Didn't, Doesn't Really Matter

In an update to something I blogged about in the fall, the Supreme Court has decided the case of an Alabama man arrested under a false warrant. As a recap, the issue at hand was not whether or not the search was legal or not – it wasn’t – but whether it’s reasonable to expect the government to keep up-to-date records and if convictions predicated on out-of-date or incorrect information can be upheld by the courts. According to a five-to-four decision by the Roberts Court, it can.

This man went to get his truck out of the impound lot. An investigator at the sheriff’s office knew of his criminal past and looked up his warrants in the county they were in: nothing. So, he had them looked up in the next county over, which did bring up a warrant. The problem is, that warrant had been withdrawn five months earlier. They went and arrested him for that (bogus) warrant and discovered meth amphetamines and a hand gun in his car. He was later convicted of drug charges and possessing a firearm. The Roberts Court decided that this was an inbounds use of federal power, even though the man was arrested initially for something that wasn’t real.

This case was once again decided with the conservative bloc pitted against the (somewhat) liberal bloc, with Anthony M. Kennedy casting the spoiler vote. While the next couple of justices to retire are likely to be from that liberal bloc, it reminds me once again of how pleased I am that we’re not going to face the prospect of a McCain Administration ramming a ramming another movement conservative onto the courts while screaming “No litmus tests, no litmus tests!” We will, of course, have to watch a solidly Democrat Congress and Administration slowly bow to conservative caterwauling, but hopefully we won’t end up with another Roberts or Alito.

This Untrue Information May Be Used Against You

According to Wired’s Threat Level blog, the Supreme Court is about to consider a case on the government’s use of databases. In Alabama, a man was arrested because a database falsely said that he had a warrant in another county. When the officers arrested him (on a non existent warrant) they discovered crystal meth and a handgun. What’s surprising about the case is that the government is not arguing the search was Constitutional – everyone agrees that it wasn’t. What the government is saying is that it just doesn’t matter: it’s too complicated and involved for the government to bother keeping up-to-date records.

More and more of our information is being collected and collated in government databases. It’s nothing more than the government’s responsibility to make sure that these kinds of incidents don’t happen. If this evidence would be thrown out because a police officer didn’t have probable cause to search him in the first place, it ought to be thrown out because he was arrested for a warrant that wasn’t active. I fail to see a distinction between the two.

With nonsense like the “terrorism watch list” and other shadowy government databases, we need to hash out some new rights regarding the kind of information the government can collect, keep and use against you. If the government isn’t responsible for making sure this information is accurate and correct, than why would they bother?

McCain, Temperment and Judges

George Will express some doubt about McCain’s reaction to the Paulson buyout scheme:

Conservatives who insist that electing McCain is crucial usually start, and increasingly end, by saying he would make excellent judicial selections. But the more one sees of his impulsive, intensely personal reactions to people and events, the less confidence one has that he would select judges by calm reflection and clear principles, having neither patience nor aptitude for either.

Judicial appointments aren’t something we’ve heard a lot about in this campaign, but Will is exactly right: the next president is going to radically reshape the Supreme Court. In all the ways that I think a McCain administration could be a disaster for our country, his influence long after his time in office would rest on the appointments he would make. Will rightly decries McCain’s “boiling moralism and bottomless reservoir of certitudes,” an incredibly dangerous combination in anyone, let along someone as important as the President of the United States.

A lot of the problems with George W. Bush have flowed from a very similar source. McCain, like Bush, has a rigid worldview that depicts himself, and those who follow him, as being morally pure, no matter what they actually do, and those who work against them as more than simply misguided on policy. Opponents aren’t merely misguided – their opposition is morally corrupt.

As long as McCain was in the senate, in a safe seat, it didn’t matter what kinds of random moralistic quests he undertook. Even if he was wrong (as he almost invariably was), his ability to actually affect change was severely limited. McCain seems wholly disinterested in the actually process of governing – despite his extremely long tenure in national government, his actual list of accomplishments is fairly paltry. Placing a man like this in the executive branch – especially a branch strengthened beyond all reason by Bush – is a scary thought.

Will is talking about how McCain’s worldview would affect the temperament judicial nominees, but you can see this tendency all over McCain’s campaign, especially this week with their was against the New York Times and Ben Smith personally. These are not people who are able or willing to deal with criticism, contradiction or even oversight. If you know in your heart of hearts that you’re right, throwing a few lies around to help out the greater good (or a few wars) isn’t that big a jump.

The whole thing just underscores how dramatically wrong the standard read on John McCain was, and just how much his personality and temperament make him unsuitable for the job that he’s trying so hard to get.

Thought Experiment of the Day

One of the issues that intermittently arises when voters and pundits have been discussing the presidential candidates is who they might appoint to the Supreme Court and what effect that might have on Roe v Wade. This issue is particularly salient as the court, and liberal torch-bearer John Paul Stevens in particular, is quite old. In fact Steven's, at 88, is the second oldest serving member in the court's history.

My questions are: 1) In the event of a McCain presidency what are the chances that he could ever appoint a judge willing to overturn R v. W? 2) Could Bush do it if Stevens retired or passed away before the end of his term? And finally, 3) even if an arch-conservative justice replaced Stevens, what do you think the odds are that the court would vote to overturn the precedent?

In my opinion the odds of one and two are almost zero. I just don't think the Senate would ever allow a vote. In the event of a McCain presidency I honestly believe they would explicitly say, don't send us a judge who won't publicly state that they're not willing to overturn the decision. With the very significant majority Dems soon figure to have, I think their political will would be almost limitless.

With Bush they just don't have enough time in session to get somebody up and down, and they'd do everything they could to drag their feet.

Now for three. Call me insane, but I don't believe the court would reverse course even if a vote in the bag replaced Stevens. I honestly believe John Roberts would come to the rescue of the pro-choice movement (I will now be struck by lightening). Clearly Thomas, Scalia, and Alito are complete ideologues who wouldn't think twice. But, I think Roberts is smart enough to consider the real social implications such a ruling would have. I think he knows what literally millions of pissed off women marching on Washington would look like. Really, that would be the tip of the iceberg, as I imagine there are reproductive rights groups that could advocate violent protest if we went back to pre-Roe law. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe the public would take it in stride, or maybe Roberts wouldn't predict or care about such considerations, but I just have a feeling that he'd back off if push came to shove.