this post was submitted on 19 Dec 2025
618 points (97.7% liked)

politics

26989 readers
2542 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

  1. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  2. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  3. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
  4. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  5. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] dhork@lemmy.world 92 points 2 weeks ago (11 children)

The real problem is the lifetime tenure of the justices. The Founders did that for good reason, to insulate the Court from the immediate politics of the time. But people are simply living longer now, and Republicans figured out how to ratfuck the Court to stack it in their favor. (Helped in no small part by RBG, who could not be convinced to retire at the right time). Openings on the Court are so rare that it is worth expending significant political effort to get them to go your way.

If Democrats ever get control of the Presidency and Congress again, they should immediately move to blow up the Court to 13 members. They can do it by immediately turning it up to 11, and then making it 13 two years later, in order to stagger the changes. But this is important enough that they should blow up the filibuster to do it.

(13 is a magic number because it matches the number of Federal district courts.)

And then, after the bill is passed, they should work with Republicans on a framework to add term limits to the Constitution. Each of the 13 justices gets a 13 year term, each justice could serve up to two terms, consecutive or not, and would have to be re-appointed and re-confirmed for their second term. They can even tie the number of justices directly to the number of Federal circuits, so that it is harder to ratfuck on the future. 26 years is long enough to insulate a justice from politics. And out of our 116 justices to date, only 28 have served more than 26 years.

But by giving every President the right to nominate one justice per year, it makes the process more regular, and the political payoff for engineering a single appointment becomes less attractive. Supreme Court turnover becomes a predictable thing.

At this point, Republicans may be willing to support that amendment, because the alternative would be for President Newsom to appoint 4 Liberals to the court for Life in quick succession, and wait for their own full control to ratfuck it again. That might take a while.

[–] xenomor@lemmy.world 52 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (2 children)

It’s so adorable that you think Democrats might ever actually do anything if they got power. Enjoy your cookie.

[–] dhork@lemmy.world 25 points 2 weeks ago

A boy can dream, can't he?

[–] SippyCup@lemmy.ml 16 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

We have two pro capitalist parties in the US.

What's interesting is that during the great depression they knew that economic collapse would lead to a socialist revolution, and so put in the work to "inoculate" the US against it. They would give us a little socialism, so that we wouldn't go all in. Medicare, social security, minimum wage, all these things came out of that philosophy. And it fucking worked. The US had the single most robust economy in human history from the 40s all the way through to the 1970s. When, in response to the civil rights movement, white southerners actively voted against their own self interest KNOWINGLY, so that black people wouldn't get a fair share of the pie. Nixon began the week to work to dismantle the New Deal, and we're basically living with the shattered broken corpse of the best social program we were ever going to get with votes.

[–] arrow74@lemmy.zip 5 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

The US had the single most robust economy in human history from the 40s all the way through to the 1970s.

This was mostly due to being basically the only industrial economy to not be bombed to bits during WW2. We had the entire world reliant on US manufacturing

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] CosmicTurtle0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 16 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

they should work with Republicans

Have....have you not been paying attention?

Republicans want power. They don't care how they get it. They will negotiate in bad faith to get it.

[–] dhork@lemmy.world 10 points 2 weeks ago

That's why you need to add 4 young, Liberal justices in thir 40s (who would serve for 40+ years with a lifetime appointment) before starting to work with Republicans. Make it so that the alternative to not working together is much worse for them.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] homura1650@lemmy.world 16 points 2 weeks ago

You do not need a constitutional amendment. Until 1911; part of a Supreme Court Justice's job was "riding circuit", to serve on more local circuit courts. This practice was established and abolished by Congress. Congress has the existing constitutional authority to assign Justices to circuit courts.

There is also a recently proposed TERM act, which would promote Justices to senior Justices after 18 years. A senior Justice is still a Justice, but would not actively decide cases unless there was a shortage of active Justices.

Congress could also impeach some of the current Justices. Either for partisan political reasons; perjury at their confirmation; or blatant corruption.

[–] ILoveUnions@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago

Each of the 13 justices gets a 13 year term, each justice could serve up to two terms, consecutive or not,

Absolutely not. You NEED it to be one term, because judges should never have to rely on approval of others for their jobs. The only reason they should be able to be removed after appointment is a severe ethics violation.

[–] ronl2k@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago

The real problem is Democrats giving rubber-stamp confirmations to conservative Supreme Court justices.

load more comments (6 replies)
[–] SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 52 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (5 children)

A democracy shouldn't have a single person in power who wasn't elected.

The United States needs to discard the "republic" part of our democratic republic.

  • no more electoral college
  • no SCOTUS
  • no appointments for positions of power
  • no private political donations

And in order for these changes to happen, rich men in positions of power will need to die.

[–] DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works 8 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I feel like if a corrupt executive and legislative branch can get elected, having an elected judicial branch doesn't exactly fix anything.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] FlyingSpaceCow@lemmy.ca 4 points 2 weeks ago

Aren't judges appointed in almost all countries outside of the US, Mexico and Switzerland.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 40 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

One author is in the federalist society (the reason SC is corrupt)...

And the other seems to believe international laws shouldn't exist and Israel is totally cool...

They want us to "accept" it's corrupt and somehow do away with the entire notion of a SC and replace it with some "populist rule".

Similarly, progressives are increasingly converging on the idea of both expanding and “disempowering” federal courts. Attentive to the reality that the supreme court especially is not and rarely has been their friend, left-leaning advocates are finding ways to empower ordinary people, trading the hollow hope of judicial power for the promise of popular rule.

To label as “nihilists” those sketching an alternate, more democratic future is, in other words, not only mistaken but outright bizarre. Rather than adhere to the same institutionalist strategies that helped our current crisis, reformers must insist on remaking institutions like the US supreme court so that Americans don’t have to suffer future decades of oligarchy-facilitating rule that makes a parody of the democracy they were promised.

In Trump’s second term, the Republican-appointed majority on the supreme court has brought their institution to the brink of illegitimacy. Far from pulling it back from the edge, our goal has to be to push it off.

They're right wingers trying to hijack progressivism to destroy the SC after it changes all the laws to how they want, and before the left can use it as a weapon to change the laws back.

I'd love to say people won't be naive enough to fall for this, but I don't want to lie

[–] LesserAbe@lemmy.world 5 points 2 weeks ago

I think this is a misread of the article. They don't seem to be suggesting any actual solution, and only mention "populist rule" in passing with no specifics.

But they do seem to be blaming the left for not doing anything about the problem. And I thought it was funny how at the top they were like "even liberals like Roberts"

[–] BlameTheAntifa@lemmy.world 27 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Only six of them deserve to be replaced, but they should also spend the rest of their lives in prison.

[–] Bytemeister@lemmy.world 8 points 2 weeks ago

Clean it all out and start over again.

[–] Alaik@lemmy.zip 3 points 2 weeks ago

All of them ruled against an ethics framework. All can go. The Republicans need to be in prison, the democrats need disbarred.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Rhoeri@lemmy.world 23 points 2 weeks ago

The time was a decade ago.

[–] Foni@lemmy.zip 19 points 2 weeks ago (4 children)

The United States needs a completely new constitutional process, to stop idolizing as political gurus people who lived 300 years ago and did a great job for their time, but that's over. In Europe, some countries, during that same period, had dozens of constitutions and nothing bad happened about it.

load more comments (4 replies)
[–] TheReturnOfPEB@reddthat.com 19 points 2 weeks ago

term limits is a start

[–] lmmarsano@lemmynsfw.com 16 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

The US needs to resume amending the constitution. That's been the historical recourse when the Supreme Court makes shitty decisions.

[–] buddascrayon@lemmy.world 5 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

I think the absolute failure of the ERA has proven unequivocally that ratifying amendments to the Constitution are no longer possible in an age where mass media has broad and instant reach.

There will always be someone powerful who opposes any amendment to the Constitution. And they will always make themselves heard loudly around the world, thereby making a consensus completely impossible.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] W3dd1e@lemmy.zip 13 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

SCOTUS is flawed because it IS beholden to the other branches.

What I mean is, the President picks the nominee and Congress approves them. Every other branch is selected by the people.

It gives the other branches too much power over the judicial branch. It harms checks and balances.

[–] ILoveUnions@lemmy.world 7 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

It's far worse than that. The judiciary is able to be fired by the executive branch and that simply should not be possible.

I feel the checks on the supreme court is close. I think with 18 year ish terms to replace 1 every every 2 years consistently would work

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

The judiciary is able to be fired by the executive branch

No it isn't. Federal judges serve for life. They can't be removed by the President

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 13 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

The US political system is antidemocratic (Madison) and should be replaced.

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 6 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

People don't want to hear this. They want to blame the marginal voter for not supporting their compromise candidate.

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Oh yeah the only way to fix the broken two party system is to vote for the great team B^tm^ and not that terrible team A^tm^. Gotta make sure there is never any other options then team A^tm^ or B^tm^ after all.

Oh and when it all goes wrong (now) make sure to blame voters without choice and also state how nothing can be done as the usa is somehow special and what works everywhere else could never work there.

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (2 children)

Gotta make sure there is never any other options then team Atm or Btm after all.

The best part is when you do all the work to win the seat for B and they change parties to A right after the election (Jim Justice down in WV being a great example).

There's a bunch of speculation that Cuellar got his Appropriations seat back to keep him from flipping to R after the Trump pardon. The parties were in a bidding war for one of the most corrupt mother fuckers of the 21st century

And this is who we're choosing between

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] slickgoat@lemmy.world 12 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Difficult to argue against but impossible to actually change.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] jordanlund@lemmy.world 11 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Unfortunately, there's no process for that. Single judges can be removed via impeachment, but being a partisan hack is not a high crime.

Similarly, nothing can happen with Conservatives controlling the House and Senate.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 18 points 2 weeks ago

Oh, they know...

https://fedsoc.org/bio/ryan-doerfler

They want to trick people into dissolving the SC before the left gains control and can replace the problematic ones while taking steps to prevent this from happening again.

It's like a kid that walks up and slaps a peer, then immediately says "no tag backs" and says the game is over..

The federalist society got what it wants out of the SC, and now they want people to stop abusing it before we can undo what they just did.

I don't know why googling authors isn't the norm when billionaires own all the media companies. If you don't you'll never notice clear hypocrites like Ryan Doerfler.

[–] henfredemars@infosec.pub 11 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Alas, the Constitution does little to protect against incompetent voters who refuse to act to protect their democracy.

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Sam_Bass@lemmy.world 11 points 2 weeks ago

The entire friggin government needs to be replaced.

[–] Lucidlethargy@sh.itjust.works 10 points 2 weeks ago

We accepted that a long time ago, in the before-fore.

[–] Formfiller@lemmy.world 10 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)
[–] meep_launcher@sh.itjust.works 5 points 2 weeks ago

The time was ~~yesterday~~ ~~last year~~ ~~last decade~~ but I guess we can do it now of everyone is up for it.

[–] TigerAce@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 2 weeks ago

Replaced by who? The one appointing new judges is the president. He would love to replace them all.

[–] CircaV@lemmy.ca 7 points 2 weeks ago
[–] Sunflier@lemmy.world 6 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

It's not a nuice we need. It's a guillotine. We need their blood splatter to wash away the shit these people have put out.

[–] PissingIntoTheWind@lemmy.world 5 points 2 weeks ago

Why the fuck didn’t they pack the court with 11 justices when they had the chance?

[–] WhatGodIsMadeOf@feddit.org 5 points 2 weeks ago

It’s time to accept that the US ~~supreme court~~ is illegitimate and must be replaced | Ryan Doerfler and Samuel Moyn

Fixed the title for you.

load more comments
view more: next ›