It's FINE if law bans books – UPDATED

June 28, 2010 By

“…because the government won’t really enforce it!”

Thus spaketh…Supreme Court Nominee Elena Kagan?

Actually, what she says is, essentially, it’s alright to create laws banning books, because the government has never YET enforced such a law.

Okay, this is the Dean of Harvard Law School, and another one of the “brightest people” in the country with whom Obama seems to deal with, exclusively. I am not a lawyer; I am not Ivy-Educated, and I think this is one of the most breathtakingly stupid arguments I have ever heard.

Kagan appears to be the sort of lawyer who would advise Lucy to keep promising she’ll hold the football in place, because Charlie Brown has always believed her, before. Or, she’d advise Schroeder to go ahead and kiss Lucy, because she really won’t hold him to anything.

Either way, that is not a good sort of lawyer. An attorney who would advise her client to be stupid and trust something not to happen, because it has never happened before is not an advocate, or an advisor; she is either incompetent or working for the other side.

And I not only predicted Kagan’s nomination but sort of liked her, ‘way back in the beginning of all this. Shame on me.

I think a GOP senator on the Judiciary Committee should show this exchange to the President, respectfully ask him if Kagan is really the absolute “best” choice he could offer the country, and then–when the president answers in the affirmative–ask Obama why, then, he feels so offended by immigration laws, since the fed will never enforce them? Would Elena Kagan tell you and me that we should not mind the Obamacare Mandates, because such things have never been enforced, before?

There are a lot of questions one can ask President Obama, now, about the importance of legislation, the rule of law and law enforcement, thanks to this Naked Emperor compilation.

Btw, Justice Ginsberg appears in that video. She has just lost her husband of 56 years, Martin Ginsberg. I condole. As a bashful woman with a gregarious hubby, I have a sense of what she has lost: a secure, warm hand leading one out into the scary, cold world or, if need be, pulling one back from it. My prayers are with her.

Also, Glenn Reynolds writes about today’s McDonald decision. Can’t wait to read what the lawyerbloggers think of this.

UPDATES:
Bookworm: Notes how differently the left and right interpret notions of judicial activism
Allahpundit: Doing the fair-and-balanced thing

Filed Under: Bookchat, Free Speech?, Obama Bad?, Obama White House, SCOTUS
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  • Jeff

    I’m more concerned about her reluctance to affirm yesterday that the Commerce Clause does not give Congress power to regulate what we eat. In the clip I saw she seemed uncomfortable saying this. Bizarre. Abortion rights, but no right to eat what you want. Our country has gone mental, or at least Liberalism is mental.

  • John

    Anchoress: yes, normally a lawyer has to tell a client if an argument is indefensible, assonine, etc. But her client here is the government and, in this particular case, her job is to defend an almost certainly unconstitutional statute. Thats why the Solicitor General’s role is unique even to lawyers-all Attorney General offices are this way. Your client is the state or the federal government-you have to give whatever argument you can think of, no matter how bad it is. There are innumerable fine attorneys working for the 50 states and the US government who constantly make implausible arguments because they have to-it would be a breach of their duty not to give anything they can possibly think of as justification for defending a law.

  • Trump

    Though she is undoubtedly a terrible choice, in this instance, she was doing her job. She was there to defend a lousy law, and had to try whatever.

  • Doc

    Powerline has two great posts over the last couple of days on Kagan’s dishonesty over her disgusting role in persuading Clinton (not that he needed persuading) and the courts to kill partial birth abortion bans. That alone should be enough to snuff her nomination, and she would withdraw if she were a Republican nominee. Since she’s a Democrat nominee, she’ll be confirmed and any Republican who opposes her will be described as mean, nasty, etc, by the toadies in the corporate media.

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