I've made a similar comment to another article today, so pardon the repetition.

After the damage he did to the American economy and people, I always thought that Ronald Reagan had one defense: he was too stupid to be held morally culpable. I think that at least some of the people who raise the "offing Granny" nonsense could claim the same defense. They are just too dumb to tell fact from opinion or think critically. Remember, half the people in America have an IQ under 100.

The other ones are evil. I suspect they know full well what they are saying is all lies, but they are bought and paid for by corporate interests or appealing to a political base of mean, angry, stupid people to stay in office (or to keep an audience). These people have always played a major role in American politics and have been dominant since at least 1968. Democrats have never developed the stomach for fighting back or going after these people politically and personally as they deserve.

For what it is worth, I think Sarah Palin is probably entitled to the Reagan defense. She's a lot like Reagan: background in sports and entertainment, minimal education, hysterical personality, and pretty dumb. I just wish she would shut up.

I find myself wondering how many of the current crazies are entitled to the Reagan defense: too stupid to be held morally culpable. It's really hard to tell the difference between people who are just too dumb to understand the issues and those who are perfectly aware that they are manufacturing "facts" and issues for their sponsors. Stupid I can forgive; the other guys are evil.

I personally think that Palin is entitled.

The debate (ranting, raving and lying?) over health care reform is more evidence of the central problem of democracy in the modern age. Most voters are just too dumb to understand the issues. It's not a matter of education or having the facts; more than half of adult Americans will never understand a system this complex. What I would like to see is the good guys using tactics that are as dishonest, sleazy, fear based and manipulative as the opponents of health care reform. We've never had a fair fight over any political issue in my life time.

The "conservatives" have it all wrong. Their problem is that they want judges who will consistently rule in favor of big business, Republican politics, big authoritarian government, and institutions over individuals. Anyone who does not meet those criteria is a "liberal, activist judge". They now have four justices on the Supreme Court who qualify by reasonable standards as fascists. Those justices do not rule on the "law"; their decisions on every politically sensitive case were predictable before any arguments were heard. Thank God Republicans lost the election so probably can't get another for at least four years.

Among the crimes of the Reagan administration that were extended and expanded by the second Bush, the most serious could be the politicization of the Federal courts.

I am not a lawyer, but a psychologist who worked in public sector employment for 25 years. Much of my work was done under federal court order or as part of a consent decree. I spent more time talking with judges and lawyers than with other psychologists.

I do not have access to details on how the test used in the New Haven firefighter case was developed or validated. Given the outcome of extreme adverse impact on black firefighters, the City of New Haven would have been held to a very high standard of demonstrating the test was valid and it use represented "business necessity". I suspect their attorneys knew they would lose a suit by black firefighters and decided to start over.

The fact that the district judge ruled in the City's favor and was upheld at the appeals level represents the law as it exists at the moment. Judge Sotomayor's ruling would have to be considered conservative, and in no way, legislating from the bench. If the Supreme Court reverses the decision, they will be ignoring precedent that goes back to 1969. They would be engaging in judicial activism.

People who lack empathy, be they lawyers, doctors, or anything else are monsters. Empathy is the basis of all real moral and legal thinking, and it goes back to our prehuman primate relatives. What kind of person would deny emergency contraception to a rape victim? It takes a person devoid of any real human emotions.

If you want to know what a judge without empathy looks like, think Robert Bork, who I would bet suffers from Asperger syndrome. If you ever read any of his stuff, and then saw him during his confirmation hearings, and not conclude that he is a very flawed human being, you lack some basic human screws in your own head.

Finally, if anyone seriously thinks that notable Republican judges are simply driven by the law, consider Bush v. Gore. If the difference had been 500 votes in the other direction, you can bet your ass that the the decision would have gone the other way.

Republicans want judges that would never decide a case in favor of the little guy because they represent rich people and big business.

And Robert Burton just wrote a very fine essay.