Their ruling was, essentially, that all of that research into the specifics of anticipated regulations — all those hundreds of scientists, millions of public comments, and hundreds of thousands of science-hours invested in understanding problems and coming up with workable solutions — must be done by Congress rather than administrative regulatory agencies.
As if Congress had the time and staff. As if Congress was stocked with scientific experts, a much larger budget, and had millions of hours a year for hearings. As if Republicans in the pockets of fossil fuel billionaires wouldn’t block any congressional action even if it did.
Republicans on the Supreme Court succeeded in dancing to the tune of the billionaire’s fossil fuel network in the West Virginia v EPA case, but it was narrowly focused on CO2.
In the upcoming Loper v Raimondo case they’ll hear this fall, however, the Court is explicitly preparing to expand that victory by blowing the entire Chevron deference out of the water, thus ending or severely limiting most protective government regulations in America and opening the door to court challenges to every regulatory agency established since the first decades of the 20th century.
They’re saying, essentially, that the EPA (and any other regulatory agency) can’t do all the steps listed above: instead, that detailed and time-consuming analysis of a problem, developing specific solutions, and writing specific rules has to be done, they say, by Congress itself.
A Congress where arcane rules and gerrymandering have given Republicans the ability to block pretty much any legislation their billionaire patrons pay them to block.
All of this adds to the urgency of removing Clarence Thomas, John Roberts, and Samuel Alito — corrupt members who have benefited to the tune of millions from their billionaire patrons — from the Court as soon as possible. Or at least diluting their influence.
Democrats were happy to speak out when Al Franken was accused of a tasteless joke, being photographed with his hands a half-foot above the breasts of a faux-sleeping colleague, but seem paralyzed by the naked corruption going on with this Court.
It’s time to raise some serious hell, and Dick Durbin’s Senate Judiciary Committee is the logical place to start with subpoenas of the three mentioned above to bare their corruption to the American people. If you agree, you can find Durbin’s phone numbers and addresses here and a list of the Committee’s members here.
Every day that goes by without these corrupt judges resigning or at least recusing themselves from these vital cases — because of public outrage and congressional pressure — is another day closer to the end of the functional America we’ve all grown to know and love.
And that includes Social Security, Medicare, and the other programs Republicans are gleefully expecting the Supreme Court to rule unconstitutional with these cases in the upcoming months…
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