• Vermonter17032 -- out of the "judicial mainstream"

They're actually sitting on the right bank of the judicial mainstream, adjusting the locks to ensure that the stream flows in a propitious manner to the other Mills of Government downstream.

• Various -- I don't see the need to squabble over whether SCOTUS candidates are motivated by naked greed, avarice, and venality, or conversely, are public-spirited altruists who are somehow making a sacrifice by accepting a SCOTUS seat.

A SCOTUS seat is the Amerikan equivalent of a royal estate grant, a titled position conferring a form of "ownership" of the abstract playing field of the Law. It's exactly equivalent to a title of nobility.

Ascending to the SCOTUS is ascending to the bastard Amerikan Aristocracy, the very real Ruling Class that runs the rest of us. In this rarefied realm, this Olympus, the office itself is worth a fortune, despite whatever dollars flow into its possessor's coffers.

They're all ultimately in it for the power; for financiers, unbridled acquisition of wealth is their means to this end. But it is possible to covet power independently of financial avarice.

I haven't investigated the question, but my edumacated guess is that SCOTUS justices may not be as fabulously wealthy as elected representatives, but are all affluent (or effluent) and prosperous professionals.

Just as a financial baron may be wealthier than a country earl, an ambitious high-percentile attorney may be richer than a sitting Chief Justice. But the compensations of class are an equalizer.

Yes, in our commodified ruin of a culture, advancing up a professional hierarchic ladder increases one's market value; so elevation to the SCOTUS guarantees commercial demand and commensurate remuneration; it's not exactly like entering a monastery.

And IMO, it's a question of "collusion" or "co-option" rather than overt "corruption".

Finally: legal opinions wouldn't be published if they didn't convey some insight into the tryer of fact's legal reasoning and judicial character.

So heaven forfend that I appear to suggest to lawyers and laypersons alike that close reading and analysis is foolish or futile. It would be like telling a group of rabbis not to discuss the Torah.

That said: there's a (once?) famous James Thurber cartoon in which two frowning women at a cocktail party are watching some uninhibited young floozy take center stage, whirling about with glass in hand. The caption reads, "She's all I know about Bryn Mawr, and all I need to know!"

Thurber's party girl may be a case of res ipsa loquitur, but in evaluating a SCOTUS candidate, it's ludicrous to reduce a given judicial ruling to a litmus test, or microcosm, of the tryer of fact's overall ability and fitness.

If one reads a reasonable sample of a judge's overall output, one may discern meaningful and revealing patterns and tendencies. But even that is not a reliable predictor of future work.

There's an Uncertainty Principle in play, and a sophisticated analyst takes it into accout.

I don't feel especially qualified to form a firm opinion on whether Sotomayor will be a "good" or "bad" justice for We the People. But even with important decisions, analysis should transcend mere Peanut Gallery second-guessing as a means of judging the judge.

The latter point is a tough sell in a population acclimated by "Reality Shows" to be just that: Peanut Gallery spectators eagerly second-guessing the contestants and the Celebrity Judges.

If anything, and as Glenn pointed out, opinions on the decision are nearly fifty for and fifty against. Close to fifty percent of the judges who've been involved in this case don't agree that Sotomayor's analysis was lazy or any of the other descriptors you used. You seem to be taking this personally.

Baloney. Judges in Sotomayor's own circuit thought her decision was lame, lazy, and dismissive. That's why it got kicked up to SCOTUS. Appeals judges are supposed to weigh in on important cases. That's what they're paid for. Imagine if the liberal wing of SCOTUS had prevailed on Ricci and Ruth Bader Ginsburg's entire majority opinion consisted of "the original Ricci v. DeStefano decision is perfect. I can't add anything to it." People would look at her like she was senile.

Are you saying that it is your position that she should have cut and pasted the decision she was agreeing with so that those who are too lazy to actually read the initial decision didn't have to go back and revisit it?

The statement the appeals court gave was clear that they affirmed the initial decision because they agreed with that decision for the reasons given in that decision.

What more should she have said?

Anklebiters. Yes, no?

The Brookings institute new plan on ways to start a war with Iran.

http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/rc/papers/2009/06_iran_strategy/06_iran_strategy.pdf

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, Baloney. Judges in Sotomayor's own circuit thought her decision was lame, lazy, and dismissive.

So now it's her decision again? Make up your mind, kid. :)

You are hopeless. I repeat -- if we can't hold the members of that 3-judge panel responsible for their own decision, then who? With your thinking, NONE of the individuals involved are responsible. All 3 of the judges could avoid accountability, because they were only one judge out of 3. Ergo, NOBODY is responsible for ANYTHING.

I suppose you could have made an argument that Sotomayor was in dissent from the other two judges, but if that was the case she certainly didn't bother to tell anybody about it.

Where is the reason given for why the test was not certified?

Where is that rationale?

It's been stated, repeatedly, by the city that it had to do with the disparate impact that they felt came out of the test. Hence, they did not certify the results. You haven't read this anywhere, but disagree with Sotomayor's opinion?

This is the first case, where the factual background has not ever been in dispute.

http://www.nysd.uscourts.gov/courtweb/pdf/D02CTXC/06-03903.PDF

It is quite amusing to watch conservatives bemoan the USSC as activist and left-wing, and to call exsiting precedent (Roe v. Wade, etc.) as wrong. Strangely enough, and I won't speculate to what this phenomenon should be attributed to, when a decision like Ricci comes down, the court is "right" and justice prevails. One day a panel of activist hacks, the next purveyors of justice! Perversely ironic!