5 Comments

I don't have any comment (yet) regarding this article, but since you don't provide any e-mail address where one could write you, I'm using this space to let you know that the last e-mail you sent (from a "no-reply" address) regarding your Coursera course contained two links (to Coursera) that do not work. Annoying. And it casts a shadow on your credibility.

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Sorry JJ. It is true that the Responding to 9/11 course is currently not up and running. I did not intend to include links to that course in the email, my bad. But you can participate in the Understanding 9/11 course and I hope you will comment on articles in Perilous Times.

Best, DS

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I like very much the proposal being made. How does it mesh with the options reviewed in the Report by the recently convened Presidential Commission on Supreme Court Reform? https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/SCOTUS-Report-Final.pdf

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This will just turn into an absurd cycle of one side making changes when they do not like, not just the composition of the court, but their rulings as well. One side will always be in agreement or disagreement. Politics will remain politics and both sides will leverage their power to make (or not make), delay, etc. new appointments. The only current reason anyone wants to expand the court is they do not like the rulings.

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Well, no. My proposal would reverse the worst norm-breaking in the modern era - the failure to allow the Garland nomination go to the floor when he surely would have been confirmed. If Garland had been seated instead of Gorsuch, there would be a 5-4 majority for Republican appointees - this is exactly what I am proposing. The Garland steal can't be left unaddressed. And of course, the "absurd cycle" you fear could only be accomplished when the House, Senate & Presidency are all in the hands of one party. If Supreme Court rulings are a topic of hot contention that the voters care about, and you have a Court that is not restraining itself by the rule of law (overturning lots of precedents), then maybe having this mechanism to impose some element of popular will on the court system is not a bad thing.

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