Jon Kyl: Supreme Nay Sayer

Honeymoon? What honeymoon?

From the Phoenix Business Journal, Nov. 7:

"Jon Kyl, the second-ranking Republican in the U.S. Senate, warned president-elect Barack Obama that he would filibuster U.S. Supreme Court appointments if those nominees were too liberal.

Kyl, Arizona’s junior senator, expects Obama to appoint judges in the mold of U.S Supreme Court Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, David Souter and Stephen Breyer. Those justices take a liberal view on cases related to social, law and order and business issues, Kyl said.

“He believes in justices that have empathy,” said Kyl, speaking at a Federalist Society meeting in Phoenix."

http://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/stories/2008/11/03/daily77.html

Effing Brilliant, Part Deaux

Associate Justice Antonin Scalia said the G-Word on Tuesday.
And that word, of course, is "golly waddles."
I think it's a neologism.
Amazingly enough, the Supreme Court on Tuesday spent an entire hour discussing indecent language without anyone using the words in question. Instead, during what proved to be a pretty darn lively oral argument in the case FCC v. Fox Television, justices and attorneys alike preferred the terms "F-word" -- 16 separate times -- and the "S-word." Bor-ring.
But that's not to say the oral argument was entirely devoid of spicy language. Not at all. Justice Scalia, for one, offered up the term "golly waddles" as a, well, as a fanciful euphemism I guess you would call it.
And let us not ignore:
Justice Stevens used the word "dung." As in, the S-word without the S.
Justice Souter used the word "prong." As in, the three-prong test that right at this very moment sounds extra salacious.
And, my personal favorite, Solicitor General Gregory Garre's ominous warning that loosened decency standards could lead to "Big Bird dropping the F-bomb on Sesame Street."
All of this delicacy should be no surprise. After all, an earlier DoyleReports Special Investigation revealed that a majority of the amicus briefs filed in the dirty words case http://www.abanet.org/publiced/preview/briefs/nov08.shtml avoided using the words themselves. Of seven amicus briefs filed in support of the FCC's zip-your-lip position, only Morality in Media used the swear words. The others, filed by the likes of the National Religious Broadcasters, prefer circumlocutions.
Of course, if I was smart, I would use the words in this post and thereby optimize search results...McClatchy story in full at http://www.mcclatchydc.com/257/story/55255.html

Effing Brilliant

An R-rated case requires R-rated briefs, or so one might think.
But as the Supreme Court prepares to hear oral arguments Tuesday in the closely watched case FCC v. Fox Television Stations, many lawyers are delicately averting their eyes, and our ears, from the words in question. This is the case in which the FCC wants to fine television stations for naughty words ejaculated by Bono, Cher and Nicole Richie.
A DoyleReports Special Investigation -- thanks, Mr. PDF Search Mechanism! -- reveals that a majority of the amicus briefs filed in the dirty words case http://www.abanet.org/publiced/preview/briefs/nov08.shtml actually avoid using the words themselves. Of seven amicus briefs filed in support of the FCC's position, only Morality in Media used the swear words. The others, filed by the likes of the National Religious Broadcasters, prefer circumlocutions like "the f-word." The words are just too hot to handle!
Briefs supporting the broadcasters, perhaps predictably, are considerably more likely to let us in on the $#@!ing secret. Five such briefs, filed by the likes of the ACLU, cite the words in question. The idea, maybe, is to de-mystify them: see, they're mere words. However, five other briefs filed by the by the likes of Time Warner and the ABC affiliates avoided the swear words.
Of course, if I was smart, I would use the words in this post and thereby optimize search results...

Scotus

"It's good to be back, covering something that nobody cares about," one well-known Supreme Court reporter said this morning.
Technically speaking, it's not true. Plenty of people care, starting with the two dozen or so reporters who showed up for the 10 a.m. oral arguments Monday. In the front row sat the regulars, AP's Mark Sherman, USA Today's Joan Biskupic, ABC's Jan Crawford Greenburg, the New York Times' Adam Liptak, Tony Mauro of Legal Times. With a tip of the hat to the 1927 New York Yankees' lineup, I'd call it a veritable Murderers' Row of the judicial beat.
The front two benches are handsome, padded and essentially reserved for dedicated court reporters. They offer a great, unimpeded view of the action. It's so close, you can almost hear Justice Thomas snoring.
Behind these benches are individual cheap seats jammed together, many located behind pillars. For all, strict rules apply. No cameras, no tape recorders and, the ultimate insult, no ID cards hanging on chains around the neck. For reasons unknown to me, court security insists that reporters take off the omnipresent ID chains and lanyards that mark the true DC professional.
Multiple challenges arise in covering oral arguments. One is simply recording accurately what the justices and attorneys say, since a real-time transcript is only made available on high-profile cases. (Update: scratch that. I just realized that now, same-day transcripts are routinely available. Sweet!) Fundamentally, a court reporter has to know how much to read into a question posed by a justice. Sometimes a question is just a question; sometimes, it is a revelation. Here, I summon the great Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., one of my heroes. Holmes said the law is predictive: what will a court do in a given situation? A goal of oral argument reporting, I think, is to use the evidence presented through questions and known predilections of individual justices to predict what the court majority will, in the end, decide.