4/22/21 Supreme Court Conservatives Reveal Their Tiny, Twisted Little Hearts

In a move of breathtaking hypocrisy, Justice Brett Kavanaugh and his five conservative colleagues, have voted that there's no reason why juveniles who kill can't be sentenced to life without parole.

We wonder what would have happened to Justice Kavanaugh if he'd spent just one additional minute lying on top of young Christine Blasey in his teenage drunken stupor, suffocating her. As a child of wealthy parents with money to spend on fancy lawyers, the party boy might not have spent a single night in jail. Be that as it may, Kavanaugh clearly believes that justice in the form of cruel and unusual punishment is applicable to other people.

One such person is Brett Jones of Mississippi, who killed his grandfather with a knife during a domestic dispute at the age of 15. He had been physically and emotionally abused right up to that point. No parole, no problem, say the SCOTUS conservatives.

The kicker is that in writing his opinion, Kavanaugh fell back on the techniques he probably used in high school: He strung together quotes from previous opinions, taking them out of context so that his conclusions were not the same as those previous opinions. Huffpo's example shows quotes from Miller v. Alabama, in which the justices found that sentencing kids to life without parole was cruel and unusual punishment; but Kavanaugh used those quotes to support locking 'em up and throwing away the key.

Two factors that SCOTUS conservatives brushed aside: 1. Social science research concluding that people's brains aren't fully ripened until they're well into their 20s, and 2. A requirement in some states full of judicial Draculas -- excuse me, some states that allow this harsh sentencing for juveniles -- for somebody important to declare that there's no hope that the kid will ever become a good citizen.

The conservatives also ignored a trend that creates backward movement in social justice. Life-without-parole sentences are being used less and less frequently overall. Sadly, the frequency is dropping more for white juveniles than for kids of color. Sonya Sotomayor, one of a mere three justices who uphold liberal ideas, wrote a blistering dissent making mention of the trend.

Since the conservatives have the majority, they, led by Brett Kavanaugh, ignored Sotomayor's dissent -- as well as common sense and legal precedent.

When you see this decision, do you think Biden should pack the court, increasing its size to 13? That idea once seemed so farfetched. But so, too, was the travesty of justice we would see in a SCOTUS forged by Trump and Mitch O'Connell.

Or can we at least impeach Justice Kavanaugh, pretty please? Do you think we need to do something to get these Conservatives out of the majority?

Or do we just have to live with it, and keep electing Democratic Presidents who nominate more liberal justices?
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/supreme-court-juvenile-life-without-parole_n_6081c9dee4b0dff254037d31?fbclid=IwAR045KVBxQ1EBxLe3LkxT9EN1yXpGpEJOkRMot2dJ1x3IDhW7NheJcg39TU