Roberts could just be playing the hustler and giving them just enough of what they want to hear. Saying and doing are two different things. I'm not too worried though, Bush and his constituents are brilliant tacticians when it comes to playing the Dummies, Roberts could have been picked as a stealth candidate with the knowledge that the head spot would soon open for him.It is clear that Roberts is extraordinarily well coached/prepared.
It is also really a shame that the abortion debate has led conservatives to argue that there is no right to privacy. What is more conservative than for the government to leave you alone unless you are hurting someone? The framers were correctly concerned that listing some rights might mistakenly lead people to conclude that other rights no longer existed.
On the other hand, the liberal position that somehow the right to privacy gives a woman the right to kill her child is insane.
Hopefully Roberts will correctly recognize a right to privacy but not apply that to abortion. In this age with hundreds of thousands of surveillance cameras and electronic communication privacy will be a top five issue in the coming decade and we do need a conservative justice able to reconcile that right without going crazy.
"On the other hand, the liberal position that somehow the right to privacy gives a woman the right to kill her child is insane."
I agree. The fourth amendment concerns GOVERNMENT seizing without reasonable warrant a person or their property and belongings. So, the right to privacy is certainly constitutional and should be protected in the manner in which it was written, however, abortion clearly does not fall under the amendment and is clearly judicial activism.
Here’s why. If a child, unborn or not, is labeled as "property" that is protected under the fourth amendment, then abortion could easily be overturned just by citing the thirteen amendment which outlawed slavery.
However, the abortionist found a loophole by claiming that the fetus is not it’s own person since it resides within the mothers body, making the fetus the property or same person as the mother. Science clearly shows this as not the case since the fetus, at the moment of conception, has it’s own unique DNA, can be of different gender, blood type, (the host and fetus blood do not mix), et. In truth, the fetus relies on the mother only for protection and nourishment while it develops but is its own unique human being. What is needed then is a simple truthful scientific definition of what constitutes an individual human being and the role the host plays during pregnancy. Establish that definition legally and abortion falls apart all over itself.
All this seems like common sense in us but in practice it can be quite difficult…especially legally.
Check yesterday's transcript. There was a long exchange about right to privacy. (I think it was with Shumer, but all the Dems kind of merge in memory.) Roberts maintained that there is a constitutionally protected right to privacy (or several -- he went into 4th amendment, and 1st amendment freedom of religion at least). The exchange (too combative to be an actual discussion) got down to "general" right of privacy vs. "substantive" right of privacy, but I found it hard to follow. Shumer (if it was him) was trying to get Roberts to say whether he agreed or disagreed with a statement from Thomas, but his use of terms sounded slippery to me, and it got tedious.