Tuesday, March 07, 2006

FAIR to middlin'

I am no lawyer and I don't have much experience reading Supreme Court decisions, but I do have some experience with academic debate. I took the time to read the entire opinion of Rumsfeld v FAIR that is linked on NRO because my interest in the subject. This opinion seemed like an complete demolition of poorly reasoned and factually unsupported arguments presented by an inferior debate team. The law professors (!) who drafted this suit and the Appeals Court which overturned the District Court should be embarassed to have their collective hat handed to them by the Chief Justice.

My question is: are Supreme Court opinions always so clearly written, and so decisive? If not, you may have the reason we are seeing decisions handed down without dissent. The dissenting judges are so overmatched, that they would seem ridiculuous when their arguments are held up to those of Chief Justice Roberts.

Given that, Roe v Wade is not looking like such a super duper precedent, if the quality of the scholarship out of FAIR is the best that side can muster for a case so near to their hearts, and with "Sleepy" Ginsburg, "Dopey" Souter and Great-granpappy Stevens matching wits with Chief Justice Roberts in the Supreme Court Conference Room.

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