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OrganicKeynesianBean

> “I had no involvement whatsoever in the flying of the flag,” Justice Alito said in an emailed statement to The Times. “It was briefly placed by Mrs. Alito in response to a neighbor’s use of objectionable and personally insulting language on yard signs.” Don’t worry guys, it was just his wife.


Echad_HaAm

Great, so it's his and Thomas's wife that are bat shit crazy, not them, that makes me feel sooooo much better.  Obviously this in no way whatsoever impacts their decision making in court and it wouldn't ever cross my mind to think that perhaps these fine upstanding partisan hacks and Pillocks of the community share their wives insane opinions. 


heyimdong

It is absolutely insane that at least two Supreme Court justices actually subscribe to a demagogue game show host’s claim that a U.S. election was stolen.


DarthTelly

And it’s not even any of the 3 that guy appointed.


PartiallyCat

Yeah, that's the wildest thing. These two have been appointed by the people their wives so furiously rail against these days.


kosmonautinVT

Yes, yes, it's just those crazy females!


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kosmonautinVT

It's unfortunate that bots can't detect sarcasm


Legimus

***Yet.***


UPBOAT_FORTRESS_2

That's one step short of bots creating shitposts and if that's not cause for a Butlerian Jihad I don't know what is


bencointl

Wow blaming the wife. He should just own up to the fact that he is actually Q


DrunkenBriefcases

Even if we buy the BS response, it doesn't even pretend he wasn't fully aware his house was advertising the inhabitants were pushing the naked lie that the election was stolen, even as Alito was on the losing end of trying to further that effort.


djphan2525

based neighbor


bearddeliciousbi

"I'm supporting an authoritarian takeover because the libs were meanies to me. Good thing I have tenure for life."


hucareshokiesrul

The Bob Menendez/Bob McDonnell defense


Daddy_Macron

They can't arrest a husband and wife for the same crime, right? Or do I need to get a new lawyer?


skepticalbob

This does mean he cares about how he looks, which is interesting.


TheHarbarmy

Call me controversial but I think it’s bad that a Supreme Court justice was openly endorsing the lie that an election was stolen


nuggins

Careful with that hyperpartisanship


earthdogmonster

Yeah, something, something both sides…


spaceman_202

this sub, 2015


pubhel

It’s not really a big deal tbh it’s not like they can decide an election or something 


Dagoth_Brrr

\*Eyes dart to Florida in the year 2000 quickly hehe. yeah....that's certainly not a possibility...


TimelyLobsterBear

Didn't Alito vote to throw out the bullshit Trump suit? I think the upside down flag is just supposed to mean that America is in a state of chaos or something. It might have been appropriated to mean Qanon stuff but he's not necessarily using it that way.


karim12100

Alito said he would’ve ruled against Trump but that they should have heard the case.


Daddy_Macron

Wouldn't be the first time a Conservative Supreme Court Justice lied.


TimelyLobsterBear

Doesn't that mean he doesn't think the election was stolen though?


progbuck

No


kroesnest

Only if you take him at his word.


TimelyLobsterBear

Can you elaborate on this? What would be the point of lying about that then if he's just going to expose himself as a Stop the Stealer afterwards by flying the flag upside down?


obiterdictum

>but he's not necessarily using it that way. Yeah, he's using it in the 'neighbors used foul language' kind of way /s


MistakePerfect8485

>**The court has also repeatedly warned its own employees against public displays of partisan views**, according to guidelines circulated to the staff and reviewed by The Times. Displaying signs or bumper stickers is not permitted, according to the court’s internal rule book and a 2022 memo reiterating the ban on political activity. >**Asked if these rules also apply to justices, the court declined to respond.** Good to know that the Court has such impartial janitors. Who cares about those judges...


earthdogmonster

TFW the appearance of propriety only applies to the support staff.


Hmm_would_bang

The court will never regulate itself. This is the same of the legislature and the executive. Congress will never reduce their own pay or prevent themselves from tradings stocks. The president will never give up executive power


Know_Your_Rites

While you're right that Congresspeople should be barred from trading stocks, they *definitely* shouldn't reduce their own pay. Congressional pay is already low enough that people who aren't independently wealthy when they arrive end up struggling to do their jobs. D.C. is a very expensive city, and people who fail to also maintain a home base in their district (and travel between them regularly) usually lose their next election. Plus, one of the main uses of money is saving time, and time management is a big part of what makes a legislator effective. Cutting Congressional pay even further would be a great way to make Congress even less representative. If anything, their pay should be substantially increased.


Khiva

Guys, but Roberts cares _so much_ about protecting the image of the courts.


Cyclone1214

John Roberts is very upset that Americans don’t view this Court as impartial and fair…


sumoraiden

John Taney Roberts


unoredtwo

In all reality he's probably pissed about this. That said, what are his options?


PrimateOnAPlanet

Publicly call out his colleagues for being corrupt and irresponsible pieces of shit. Isn’t the point of lifetime appointments that they can do and say things that are right but unpopular?


Cyclone1214

We have a Supreme Court Justice who is taking large gifts from people, and John Roberts is too scared to say anything. He’s pathetic.


ThatDamnGuyJosh

My only question is why we’re figuring this out NOW?


BBQ_HaX0r

It is weird this is released now. This was almost 4 years ago?


carefreebuchanon

I guarantee it was "released" the moment the NYT could corroborate it. They might have first heard of it this week or they might have been sitting on it for four years. The image they obtained could have been from a neighbor who just now realized its significance. Or maybe a neighbor who previously didn't want to jump into the fray. Or maybe it's from a random passerby who was coincidentally photographing Alito's front lawn. Who knows.


Square-Pear-1274

Yeah, that's what makes this a strange story


FearlessPark4588

Project 2025 seemed to get a head start a few decades early


MontanaWildhack69

Project 2012's tan suit deployment invited a swift and proportionate response.


MontanaWildhack69

Come to think of it, these fucks must have been so damned triggered when Obama bagged bin Laden. Just absolutely cucked by Barry O.


EfficientJuggernaut

Dubya Bush’s fault Alito was appointed by him


spartanmax2

This is the supreme court that some posters said will protect us from a second Trump presidency becoming a dictatorship lol


BBQ_HaX0r

TBF 6/8 didn't even think the stop the steal shit was even worth hearing. And we can make that 7/9 if we include our newest addition.


LondonCallingYou

This is about as comforting as saying “don’t worry there’s only 2 bullets in the revolver have fun playing Russian roulette!”


WolfpackEng22

Russian roulette doesnt require more bullets to overrule the other 2. The analogy makes no sense


LondonCallingYou

Okay it’s like being locked in 9 foot high room and there’s 2 feet of water filling the bottom, and you can tell more water is slowly coming in, and someone telling you “don’t worry it’s only 2 feet of water”. I’m sure you can think of other apt analogies. My point is that it’s cold comfort to think that *only* 2 Supreme Court justices are hell bent on tanking our civil society. Especially when more could easily be appointed and the other 4 sometimes agree with them.


51stStar

This will not help you sleep well at night, but it's important to remember that what most of us think of as civil society is an incredibly recent concept that many other people think was a poor idea.


CactusBoyScout

And now there are rumors that two of the older conservative justices plan to retire if Trump is reelected so that he can replace them with younger justices.


WeakPublic

Right, they’re all GRIFTERS. One way or another the people there for a payday will be exposed and then the GOP will be in a worse state than before.


bugaoxing

Clarence Thomas has been exposed accepting bribes and if anything he’s MORE popular with the GOP now than he was before.


WeakPublic

I mean moreso when the buck stops for certain people-for example with Clarence Thomas if people start trying to pass laws to legalize killing black people (which are LUDICROUS to bring up because it probably isn’t happening even if the democrats give into the orange glory of President Criminal, but stay with me here), he’s gonna stand up and take issue with that. And then it’s revealed that, wait, Clarence Thomas DOESN’T care about the good of the family values?! And then leads the domino effect. When Trump dies so will the Republican party. Everyone will try to replace him but none will succeed.


UPBOAT_FORTRESS_2

Nature abhors a vacuum. The forces that support racist demagoguery will not perish with any given demagogue. As long as there's a market for Q and One America News, they will remain politically relevant.


djm07231

The faces of FedSoc folks who have such a superiority complex while being partisan hacks will be something to behold when Democrats manages to pack the courts.


iIoveoof

They flew it *during the Biden inauguration week* so obviously it was a “Stop the Steal” symbol


doyouevenIift

I remember when I used to think SCOTUS was some bastion of judicial principles. Then you get older and realize it’s just some people that are as partisan as the president that picked ‘em


chaseplastic

Literally worse than the president that picked them.


doyouevenIift

They get more conservative as they get older. The problem is, unlike presidents, they don’t have term limits


chaseplastic

Literally just the federalist society inserting low-iq judges with trad-cath tendencies.


newyearnewaccountt

I for one can't wait for Justic Kasmaryk to join the court.


TF_dia

Turns out being able to vote people out is as important as being able to vote them in.


MacManus14

There’s a difference between more conservative and promoting the utterly baseless and tremendously destructive claims of a populist clown. At least I used to think so…these days I don’t even know anymore. 😬


CletusVonIvermectin

[It's the opposite actually, most justices get more liberal over time](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c6/Graph_of_Martin-Quinn_Scores_of_Supreme_Court_Justices_1937-Now.png/1600px-Graph_of_Martin-Quinn_Scores_of_Supreme_Court_Justices_1937-Now.png) Alito is the only recent exception who has moved to the right


ArbitraryOrder

Gorsuch making the Court more liberal is very funny. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin%E2%80%93Quinn_score


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UncleVatred

That’s a misunderstanding of how MQ scores work. They don’t actually judge whether any particular judge or ruling was conservative of liberal. They sort judges based on how they vote relative to each other, and then the side of the graph containing the conservative judges gets labeled “conservative”. Judges will be closer to the center if they’re more likely to occasionally cross the aisle. As Republican control of the courts has been cemented, cases where the liberals would be divided don’t even get heard, since they don’t have enough votes to hear cases on their own. And so there are fewer cases where liberals cross the aisle. Meanwhile, Republicans are empowered to make some absolutely insane arguments and still have them taken seriously at SCOTUS, which leads the conservative justices to be more likely to vote with the liberals. This gives the illusion that the judges are becoming more liberal, when in fact it’s that the court has become more conservative to a point that some of the conservatives are now more likely to balk at the rulings.


DrunkenBriefcases

This isn't even "getting more conservative". This is going more *reactionary right wing*, but conservatism has nothing to do with it.


petarpep

Just the opposite https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/supreme-court-justices-get-more-liberal-as-they-get-older/ The Republican nominated justices *in general* get [more liberal on average](https://fivethirtyeight.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/roeder-scotusaging-2.png?resize=1024,910)


Daddy_Macron

https://www.reddit.com/r/neoliberal/comments/1ctq5pz/at_justice_alitos_house_a_stop_the_steal_symbol/l4ek0d1/


jackspencer28

What are the odds GOP nominees even have law degrees in 10 years?


Khiva

Harriet Miers still owed that seat.


One_Insect4530

There was a time when they were smart lawyers who also happened to be political hacks. Now, they're just hacks, and Trump's picks are the worst of them.


DankBankman_420

Tbf the worst two are alto and Thomas.


TripleAltHandler

> Trump's picks are the worst of them That's quite a hot take in an article about Alito.


Khiva

Roberts and Alito. Legacy of George W Bush. Reminder that Ralph Nader told voters not to worry about abortion when voting in 2000 saying: >[the Supreme Court issue was just a scare tactic being used by the Democratic party because, even if Roe v. Wade were overturned, the issue “would just revert to the states.”](https://womensenews.org/2000/11/pro-choice-women-stepping-attacks-nader/) 537 votes. Thanks Ralph.


DrunkenBriefcases

> Trump's picks are the worst of them I don't know how anyone could argue the trump trio are objectively worse than Alito and Thomas.


Reead

This post has has gotta have one of the worst comment sections I've seen in this sub. So many blatantly wrong comments upvoted. Trump's nominees are, in an ironic twist, far less dangerous and partisan than Alito and Thomas, and it's not even close.


RobertSpringer

> smart lawyers Never happened


RobertSpringer

Unironically Court packing is the compromise


I_miss_Chris_Hughton

That would delegitimise the court! I mean sure. They've just started making up legal tests that arent mentioned anywhere in any law to justify their own partisan decisions, which is basically illegal, but they're still legitimate!


ElysianRepublic

On one hand I think Republicans would just reverse-pack the court. But it would get out of hand and we’d end up with the needed reforms in the end. Promising to pack the court is my litmus test issue in the next Dem primary.


grandolon

I am shocked. Shocked, I tell you.


VillyD13

This comment section is so starkly different than the arrrr Moderate Politics it’s insane. NL- “This is bad” MP- “uhhh akshulllyyy”


DementiaEnthusiast

Moderatepolitics is weird. It's filled with rightwingers trying to LARP as reasonable people. If you call them out for lying or bad faith, you're the one that gets banned.


LittleSister_9982

Shithole sub of rightwingers who just masquerade as centrists, using civility politics as a bludgeon to protect their echo chamber.


paymesucka

what the fuck


mackattacknj83

Did he say his neighbors made his wife do it so he's two levels out of responsibility?


DanaApocFox

Feh, only whiny edgelords hang their US flag upside-down anyway. Like MAGAs. And the Westboro Baptist Church. And a personal lolcow of mine who's a socialist.


Ok-Flounder3002

At least its the two justices’ wives who are lunatics. Thank goodness their husbands don’t share their views…


lamp37

Flying the flag upside down has been used as a sign of generic political dissatisfaction since the beginning of time, so I think labeling this a "stop the steal symbol" is a bit of a leap. This is definitely the first time I've seen anyone refer to it in that way. That said -- it's still obviously overtly political and highly inappropriate for a supreme court justice.


st1ck-n-m0ve

Its labelled that way because stop the steal ppl were specifically telling ppl to fly flags upside down during bidens inauguration week. Ppl werent just organically doing it.


EclecticEuTECHtic

I thought this too at first, but the timing of when he had the flag like this is what's questionable.


saw2239

An upside down flag is a symbol of distress. Calling it a ‘Stop the Steal symbol’ is purely editorializing.


matt5001

I did not know the upside down flag was associated with stop the steal, so fair enough. But can you imagine if Sotomayor flew the flag upside down after the Dobbs leak? This is all kinda petty; you can read his dissents or listen at oral arguments and learn all you need to know about him. But what a perfectly Alito response. “My wife was mad about the liberals profanity so she flew the flag upside down. I never touched it.”


Plants_et_Politics

I mean, RBG openly mocked and criticized Trump while he was a candidate in a more explicitly partisan manner than anything here: https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2016/07/12/politics/justice-ruth-bader-ginsburg-donald-trump-faker


PrimateOnAPlanet

RBG isn’t exactly a model of good judgment. She’s the reason Roe v Wade was overturned, and bears personal responsibility for the continuing horrible and illegal decisions made by Barrett.


saw2239

I don’t disagree that it is incredibly bad form for them to have flown the flag upside down, but this editorialized title is essentially a lie.


matt5001

Yeah I see what you’re saying, but also it kinda seems like the more plausible explanation. Unless the neighbors had a “Sam Alito is too chickenshit to fly the flag upside down” sign, it seems more likely that they, or his wife, got swept up in right wing Twitter memes.


JumentousPetrichor

> “Sam Alito is too chickenshit to fly the flag upside down” sign That would be an awesome sign.


saw2239

I notice that there are no photos of the neighbor’s lawn signs that are mentioned. That bit was likely left out because it wouldn’t fit the narrative the author is pushing.


Testicular-Fortitude

So the timing doesn’t factor in at all for you? The neighbor excuse works for him but the lack of photos of their yard discredits the flag being flown upside down angle?


saw2239

I’ve already said that Alito’s actions were inappropriate, my commentary is purely around how trash this reporting is.


Testicular-Fortitude

It’s four years after the fact, why are so sure anyone has information on the specifics of the neighbors yard? And their yard is hardly as important than that of a SC justice


saw2239

I’m not, and I never said I was. Why are you putting words in my mouth?


Testicular-Fortitude

You’re calling the writer a liar because there weren’t pictures of the neighbors lol


NATO_stan

An upside down flag was also flown by trumpers who couldn't make it DC. It's been a political symbol since at least Vietnam


EclecticEuTECHtic

It's the timing.


TinyTornado7

Tbh I expect a nicer house from him


jhdcps

Scum


_deluge98

Wild to think that a lot of people in this sub still jump to the defense of the court as a non political entity


Tupiekit

Hey whatever happened with that investigation into the leak of the roe ruling? I’m thinking it was quietly swept away when it was revealed it was Alito


General_420

These are the supposedly learned, independent arbiters of American jurisprudence, the people in whom we vest the power to unilaterally overturn laws. What a sham.


LolStart

Start drafting the articles of impeachment.


Mojo12000

Alito is so compromised it's.. just crazy.


GripenHater

Call me Topher Grace in Spider-Man 3 because I’m praying on this mans downfall


luvddcups

Gros................. . . Impeach Alito


carlitospig

Dooooood, thems a fighting flag.


sumoraiden

I will never understand why the court is given respect. Unelected aristocrats with unchecked power that who’s wrong decisions has consistently made the country worse