Bong Hits 4 Jesus; or, Fun at the Supreme Court

Originally posted at 19:35 19 March; bumped to the top because I decided I actually have an opinion on the case itself and did some more rambling.

I think the Supreme Court is a pretty entertaining bunch of folks -- because here are these nine very smart people, and every time they hear a case this is what happens:

1. The lawyer for one side gets up and starts arguing, and the Supreme Court Justices start interrupting with this barrage of questions that (since they have him outnumbered nine to one) pretty much inevitably make him look like a complete fool. This warms the cockles of such members of the other side as have never seen the Supremes in action, because they are sitting there thinking, "Oh, hoh, that guy is so stupid, we have this in the bag."

2. Then the lawyer for the other side gets up and starts presenting his case -- whereupon the nine Supremes promptly proceed to tear HIS arguments to tatters as well.

Again, you're talking nine to one, and the Supremes -- even the ones who are grotesquely intellectually dishonest -- are not likely to take a back seat to anybody on sheer brainpower. So I don't care who it is that's going up against them, at least one and usually more of the Supremes are going to find the flaws in his argument and just blow him up. Which is highly entertaining, IMHO.

3. Then time runs out and the Supremes disappear into their mystic chambers and, I don't know, consult Ouija boards or something, and a few months later they give their opinion -- which is usually in a form that any reasonably intelligent person can blow holes in, since the Supremes are as daftly biased by their own hobby-horses as anybody else is. (At least, the Supremes have been thusly daft ever since Congress decided that judges should be chosen not on their competence and objectivity but instead on the likelihood that they will take what Congress considers to be the "right" side on political issues.)

My point? Well, if you're smart enough, you can probably find a weakness in just about any argument put forward by anybody whose name isn't God, because there are very few truly perfect arguments in the world. But just because you know you wouldn't do any better if you got shoved into the same spotlight, that doesn't mean it isn't fun to watch the circus.

And in pursuit of that mildly amusing pasttime, I give you Dahlia Lithwick's -- I just have to interrupt myself for a moment here to say, is that a great name or what? -- anyway, I give you Dahlia Lithwick's account of a recent Supreme Court case that sported (in the great tradition of Supreme Court cases' making very odd bedfellows indeed) a whole bunch of conservative Christians showing up to argue on behalf of the kid who got in trouble for waving a sign recommending "Bong Hits 4 Jesus." (Warning: there's a VERY bad word in the very first sentence, but after that she mostly behaves herself.)

Or you could just read the transcript here. I love the way Roberts has clearly just been waiting for the bong kid's lawyer to get up there so he can blow him up just two sentences into his spiel:

MR. MERTZ: Mr. Chief Justice and may it please the Court: This is a case about free speech. It is not a case about drugs.

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: It's a case about money. Your client wants money from the principal personally for her actions in this case.

Or there's this exchange not much further on:

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: But there's a broader issue of whether principals and teachers around the country have to fear that they're going to have to pay out of their personal pocket whenever they take actions pursuant to establish board policies that they think are necessary to promote the school's education mission.

MR. MERTZ: That is indeed a legitimate fear, Your Honor [I am less than wholly convinced that Mr. Mertz personally fears that it will be too easy for lawyers such as himself to talk silly persons into filing absurd lawsuits, but we'll pretend to believe he's sincere - Peril], and we believe the existing law takes care of it by requiring before qualified immunity can be breached that there be a demonstration that under the existing law at the time available to her [the principal] --

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: And you think it was clearly established that she had to allow a student at a school-supervised function to hold a 15-foot banner saying "Bong Hits 4 Jesus"?

Ken Starr's arguments are at least as bad but he's so all over the place it's hard to get a nice short funny quote.

Anyway, for those of you who share my oddball sense of humor, I think you'll get a kick out of that transcript.