The times they are a changin'

[pecunium]

Ted Olsen (yes, that Ted Olsen, the guy who ran point on the legal team which got Bush appointed to the White House in 2000), is upset with the Calif. Supreme Court.

He not only upset with them, on legal grounds, but he's staging a legal challenge to Prop 8. A federal challenge. Of all things, given this court, an Equal Protection Challenge.

Comments

[jpmassar]

Seems like a really, really, stupid thing to do.

About as stupid as, hypothetically, deciding to take a Roe v. Wade
to the Supreme Court as a pro-life advocate when your
brain was telling you it had an 80% chance of making abortion legal
everywhere in the US. (Not saying this was the case back then,
just drawing a hypothetical analogy).

Unless they know something we don't about the retirement plans of some younger
Supreme Court Justices, the end result of this case is very likely to
be a severe blow to equal rights. The right of the state to prohibit same-sex marriage despite the Equal Protection Clause will become enshrined by Supreme Court decision.

[cruiser]

Two things:
1) A lot of folks in the gun lobby felt the same way about DC v. Heller.
2) Olson's a pretty darn good lawyer and probably has a better feeling for the odds than you do.
3) There's no guarantee that it will get to the Supreme Court

[pecunium]

There are (as I read the court) some big differences.

1: The Gun Lobby believed Scalia, Alito, et al, when they said they actually believed in stare decisis.

2: I don't believe this court is all that faithful to stare decisis (and the verdict in Bush v Gore is, if nothing else, why). I believe the there are at least three members who look at a case and ask themselves how they can bend the law to suit their desires.

4: The track record of this court is that equal protection is non-starter for plaintiffs.

5: The only way this gets to the supreme court is that the circuit ruled in favor of same sex marriage/against DOMA.

If those happen I can't see this court making a decision in favor of same sex marriage.

[cruiser]

See my point 2. Although your cynical take on it could also apply.

[pecunium]

I covered your point to in the original post, where I made reference to just how often (as both a private att'y, and as solicitor general) he's been before the court.

I just don't think the present bench is composed of as many honest (in the judicial sense of looking at the problems with an open mind) jurists as are presented. Alito and Roberts blatantly lied when they were confirmed, and Scalia has a track record of finding convenient scraps of coverage to make the decisions he likes be the, "original intent" of the framers.

I am afraid Olsen isn't as aware of that as I'd like to think.