eftychia: Me in kilt and poofy shirt, facing away, playing acoustic guitar behind head (Default)
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posted by [personal profile] eftychia at 05:27am on 2010-08-24

"Originalism is a pretty weird ideological phenomenon from a Canadian point of view. It suggests that the Founding Fathers had some sort of super-human knowledge and foresight. Canadians like their national heroes, but I don't think that we tend to imbue any of them with godlike powers. But a significant portion of Americans place a faith in the infallibility of these men's documents that I can only compare to the passion of the most doctrinaire of Marxists." -- [info] sabotabby, 2010-08-18

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posted by [identity profile] acroyear70.livejournal.com at 02:47pm on 2010-08-24
Originalism is merely an excuse to justify a decision, and it is (especially by Scalia) often thrown out entirely when it suits them. Originalism would mean that assisted suicide and medical marijuana would both be issues the federal government should stay out of (and especially not allow the Commerce clause to so intervene in internal state affairs as it does).

There no "faith" in it. It is merely an excuse, a text to fall back upon as absolute when it suits them, and blatantly ignored when it doesn't.

Then again, it is perhaps like faith in that it is like the supposedly "absolutely true in every word" Bible, where passages that support their views are magnified, but passages that goes against something they want (like, say, playing football on the Sabbath, or eating shellfish) are discarded.

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