In fact we currently have a public option. We have several programs that are need based ranging from Medicaid for the indigent, to SDI for the infirmed, to Medicare for the elderly.

If the law that passes, increases the income requirements for medicaid, eliminates the waiting period for SDI, or lowers the age for Medicare eligibility, you could expand the public option without actually haveing to mention having a public option.

If you likewise establish a goverment board to set minimum standards and costs for a basic plan, which all americans could afford, and agreed to fund the premiums of the working poor (similar to the German System), you would again have a public option without needing to use the term or create a new administrator for the benefits.

We have a public option already, in many ways one might wonder if all the hubub about death panels, and single payers might have been a smoke screen so that when everyone agrees to just expand medicare to allow those who are unemployed or the working poor to buy into it looks like a victory for everyone.

Originalism holds that the courts can only use the words of the documents to determine their meaning, and that any greater spirit of the law that a judge may determine to exist outside of the text of the law is little more than judicial imperialism.

Within the field of Constitutional law, this view holds that only the constitution can be a source for interpreting the constitution. As such, what is written in the Declaration of Independance, the Federalist papers, or any other writings of the founding fathers, has no bearing on the Constitution itself. The Constitution is what passed the continenal congress, and its text bears the scars of that democratic process. Although today, certain words of Jefferson may seem more acceptable than the words of the Constitution other of his words are not so grand. If you wish to include in your deliberations the words of Jefferson that raise up humanity, how can you exclude another's pont of view when he seeks to include Jeffersons words that tear us down.

While there is still room for interpretation in originalism, (exactly how regulated a well regulated militia is for example) the premise is you must go back to those words.

If we as a democracy wished to change our rules, the founding fathers put forth a method to do so. And beyond that, what is written is what we must use to determine our laws.

It is unfortunate that originalism is so closely tied to conservativism. The words in the constitution can be interpreted quite progressively, and one can hold that such progress was the intetion of the founding fathers all along.

He has always held that the courts job is not to overturn properly ajudicated cases, but to consider whether or not the case was properly ajudicated.

The issue of new evidence, is only significant in Scalia's reasoning if said new evidence would alter the likely outcome of the original case, and suffice it to say Scalia has a very high bar for such a decision.

To Scalia, the justice system, is best refered to as the legal system (I can't say off the top of my head if either term is used in the constitution, though I assume the Judiciary is the name of the specific branch to which he blongs so one could imagine that justice is implied)in that, the courts simply look to see if the law is applied fairly, properly, and equally. So long as everyone is punished equally within a state, and no one is given greater or lesser leniency in that states laws, it is not for the supreme court to countermand the decisions of those judges and juries closer to the source case.

It seems callous, because it is, this is that lack of empathy that Republicans were admiring earlier in the year. The argument to put forth in support of this style of judicial administration is that such empathy leads to individual favoritism in a case. For example, if the words of Pope Benedict might sway the Catholic Scalia to reexamine the case, what justice can be considered for those who do not have such an advocate?

The recanting of testimony one can say is persuasive, but one would have to weigh the actual value at trial of the testimony against the defendant, not to mention the possibility that such recanting might be tied to other issues, such as intimidation of a witness after the fact, or failure of memory later on (such as someone hearing over and over that they do remember incorrectly and then readjusting their memories to match the general consensus of those who disagree with them).

I'm not saying that Scalia is correct in his opinions with regard to the law, in fact I'm fairly sure he's dead wrong on many issues. But that doesn't mean his arguments are as weak, or unreasoned as his opponants might imply.