I Have a Dream

Republicans boldly appoint avowed conservatives to the Supremes. Namely, these guys: Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Alito. They belong to the right-wing Federalist Society. They hire right wingers as clerks and help them move up the ladder in the court system or corporate world. They have an ideology and a strategy to match.

Democratic Presidents timidly nominate moderates to the Supremes, who deny being even mildly liberal. They do not belong to the ACLU, and claim not to know anyone in the Lawyers Guild. They have no ideology, they are just broad minded.

Barry Goldwater summed that up: "Sometimes a broad mind means a flat head."

So, while it’s great to see a Latina join that stodgy club, she’s a former corporate lawyer and prosecutor with no populist inclinations. She will join the so-called "liberals," a la Souter.

“Liberal” is reduced to this: they will not allow prayer in the schools and will uphold Roe v Wade and affirmative action. I’m glad they do, but, in fact, so is corporate America glad. After all, CEO's have daughters who may need an abortion, and they rarely put monuments of the Ten Commandments in their corporate HQ.

Thus a liberal is not someone who stands up to corporate power, but one who dares to part ways with Rush Limbaugh.

A corporation is considered a "person" in this country. Corporations have "free speech rights," for example. Find that one in the US Constitution! Name one "liberal" potential nominee from Obama who will laugh at that nonsense as you and I do. Or cry, when the context is more real.

Well, I was thinking about this, and then I had a dream last night. What follows is a verbatim transcript of my dream...

I turned on NPR in the morning and heard:

"Today I am nominating a person who will bring a small bit of balance to the court. Not a corporate lawyer, but a people's lawyer. Not one who joins country clubs, but one who has picketed them. Not one from a corporate firm, but one from a public interest firm. Not one who believes that a polluting corporation enjoys "Constitutional rights," but one who believes that corporations need to be reined in.

"Today I nominate a man who knows that when the US Constitution was written, the drafters were concerned about checking the global reach of the King of England. And he knows that today the Queen of England has more tea bags than power, and he is concerned about checking the global reach of corporations.

"And so now, we will have one justice out of nine who stands on the side of the hard working people of this nation.

"Today I nominate Paul Alan Levy.

"And, on a lighter note, I've learned that Paul's friend Stosh Pulaski drove him to the Men's Wearhouse yesterday to get him a spiffy new outfit for this historic occasion."

And then I woke up to America.