Monday, December 19, 2011

Newt is a nut case!

Yesterday on a Sunday television talk show, Newt Gingrich, recently soaring into the lead in the Republican Presidential polls, upped the ante and increased the ferocity of his rhetoric in the face of eroding support. It seemed to be classic Newt! He has had a historical tendency to engage in rhetorical flourish and verbal pyrotechnics. It seems to be a way for him to garner attention. It fits with his self-absorbed "look at me" adolescent way of gaining attention.

So, yesterday Newt said that he would use the Capitol police or the US Marshall's service to arrest judges whose rulings violate Gingrich's self appointed sense of US Constitutional rectitude. In Newt's view, these errant judges would be brought before the Congress to explain their ruling and if they failed to do so they would be impeached. The impeachment process has historically been used as a consequence of personal indiscretion. In Newt's view, a judicial ruling at odds with the view of a portion of the public (Tea Party nut cases for example)would be subject to review and correction.

Newt is an alleged scholar with a PhD from Tulane. I presume he has never read Marbury vs. Madison and understood the underpinnings of our independent judiciary.
Newt's notion would destroy the independence of the judiciary. It is an appalling idea.

The polarized political environment in which we live causes candidates with insufficient intellectual mettle to pander to a narrow core constituency that lives in a fear based reality. In Newt's view and theirs, the world would be a better place but for those "activist" judges. If it were only that simple.

What a crazy time! I can't wait for the next ridiculous proposal from Newt.