Control of the court

Dear editor:

Robert Bork’s claim to fame was that he was an originalist. But it was and is impossible to practice judgeship in the Supreme Court just as conceived by our Founding Fathers. That is because when Thomas Jefferson and others invented the Supreme Court, corporations did not control the economy. Even large plantations were mainly mom and pop and capitalism was not mentioned in the Constitution or Bill of Rights. Nor was it an important factor at the time. SCOTUS members were envisioned to be wise men in the twilight of their lives, given a lifetime appointment, who would be independent enough to make good rulings on the law.

Skipping to 1971 — the late Lewis Powell, a right-wing operative, wrote a memo detailing how corporations could take over control of the United States. Soon after, President Richard Nixon appointed Powell to the Supreme Court, where Powell was active in pushing into law Roe vs. Wade with a Republican-controlled Supreme Court. Whether Powell was sincere or not or acting as the most clever of all rightwing manipulators, we’ll never know. But, regardless, he gave less than .01 percent of the population — right-wing millionaires — the means to take control of the American people: the anti-abortion, hot-button issue. Since that time, liberals and we moderates and our leaders have not been able to fight back propagandistically. Because of that stronghold on good people, many have been hurt and some have died because a heartless economic system has taken over.

The Kavanaugh confirmation hearing is being affected by the clash between the right-wing donor class’ entitlement right to control everything in this country and the middle class and poor Americans wanting to hold onto some hard fought rights. To protect their property rights, the donor class members have created a Stepford judicial organization, The Federalist Society, that will decide cases exactly the way the Koch brothers and their allies tell its members. The federalists appointed to the Supreme and other courts are young and thoroughly indoctrinated in the right-wing, FOX news ideology. The heartless rich don’t care that draconian anti-abortion laws won’t save the lives of fetuses, but will kill women and their other children.

Here are just a few of the right-wing Supreme Court rulings that have harmed people: SCOTUS selected George Bush over Al Gore, which cost thousands of lives and trillions of dollars. Citizens United has allowed money to rule over elections. People have a difficult time now suing corporations who pollute them and new decisions are making it harder every year to sue corporations for anything. Congress has weakened labor laws, but Supreme Court rulings also have taken food away from working people.

Mitch McConnell held off on the Democratic nominee for SCOTUS, Merrick Garland, for almost a year because replacing him on the bench with a right-winger meant billions of dollars. For the rich, control of the Supreme Court means money and absolute power; for the opposition, it’s a matter of life and death for them.

Linda Woodbury Hot Springs