IMPEACH CLARENCE THOMAS? · Reason and Balance

[Note: This is the latest edition of Tick’s Notes and Tunes. It comes in 3 parts.

1.The first is the first half of the radio broadcast with tune links.

2. The Editorial/Article: Impeach Clarence Thomas?

3. The second half of the radio broadcast with tune links.

The purpose of this blog is to discuss, enlighten and educate the reader about relevant political, economic and business matters and to help maintain both a record and an appreciation for good ole man-made music. ]

Good evenin’ guyz galz and all of

The rest of Yinz out there.

Stony Riva here to bring everyone

Some good tunes and fun.

And we promise to not just throw

A bunch of the typical stuff atchya

No, we aim to bring a few new tunes

To everyone’s attention

Because believe it or not there’s a lot of

Excellent undiscovered music out there

But, we do throw in a golden oldie

Here and there just to keep everyone

On board

And grounded.

And maybe even letchya sing along

That bein’ said

We do start off tonight

With a tune

that was a fairly big hit back

in the early 70s

Lighthouse One Fine Morning

https://youtu.be/iDQNhA5X3Bk?si=hw1DvzeDc9wnrghJ

That was Lighthouse

A group from Toronto

In the early 70s they won

several awards up there in

for bein the best Canuck band around.

Next up

We go with a great tune that

Many consider to be Northern Soul

Which usually means that it’s American

And that it’s soul music

But that it became popular

In Northern England

Particularly as dance music

Back in the 70s.

Here’s

Frank Wilson with

Do I Love You

https://youtu.be/xwvpeYiQwss?si=hqzcgWCgKsE_rNM4

Alright, I think that got us goin’

Next we have an artist

Whom the Oracle of Wiki says

Some folks have referred to as

One of the founding fathers of soul music

noting that some have even referred to him as

“King Solomon”

Who many say was a key figure in the transition

From R&B to Soul music back in the 60s.

And with our next selection you’ll see why.

https://youtu.be/mEu8DrO9PbY?si=_sA67j7eDotJZ5bH

That was Solomon Burke

With his great tune Cry to Me.

Alright I see Buck over there

In the control room

justa pointin’ away

In the direction of

Our station manager

Rufus Coldwater

That can only mean one thing…

Yep….

It’s time for a few cogent thoughts

From the bossman himself

So take it away Rufus…

—————————————————————

Good evening folks. Let’s start with a quote:

“Senator Lindsey Graham, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, plans to block an effort by Senate Democrats to unanimously pass a Supreme Court ethics bill Wednesday on the Senate floor.

“The Democratic-led Judiciary Committee advanced the Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal, and Transparency Act on a party-line vote nearly a year ago, but it can’t break a filibuster on the Senate floor without 60 votes. Democrats have 51 members, and no Republican is on board with the bill.” https://www.yahoo.com/news/sen-lindsey-graham-says-block-025136590.html?fr=sycsrp_catchall

All of this is going on in response to the recent discovery that Justice Clarence Thomas has during his time on the bench received large gifts totalling over $4 million. https://www.newsweek.com/scotus-gifts-explained-3-charts-supreme-court-justices-clarence-thomas-1909482. Looking at the figures Justice Thomas is averaging gifts valuing more than $120,000 per year every year since he’s been on the bench. This is on top of his regular salary of about $265,000 per year. This means a full 1/3 of his income is from gifts. It appears to us that the average value of a gift is over $20,000. Obviously, these aren’t poor folks doing the giving. If one breaks down the numbers further Justice Thomas is receiving “gifts” at the rate of over $60 per hour for every hour he works. This is more than four or five times the minimum wage in most states. This is on top of his salary.

What could gifts of such magnitude possibly be for? Isn’t there an obvious need for a system of ethical rules for Supreme Court Justices, at least as they pertain to gifts? Some have argued that under the doctrine of separation of powers that Congress cannot constitutionally adopt rules applicable to the Supreme Court. However, while there may be some limitations as to what Congress can do, many legal experts including Michael Luttig, a highly respected now retired conservative judge, who sat on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has advocated for ethical reform of the Supreme Court, especially when it comes to the issue of regulating gifts. In a letter to Congress he has stated that Congress: “[I]ndisputably has the power under the Constitution” to prescribe ethical standards for the Court, if it were to fall short of what he described as “the housekeeping that is necessary to maintain a Republic.”

“The Supreme Court should want to lead by the example that only it can set,” Judge Luttig wrote. “It should want to conduct itself in its non-judicial activities in all ways such that it is beyond reproach.” https://www.npr.org/2023/05/09/1174944642/supreme-court-ethics-michael-luttig-federal-judge

We haven’t researched the point, but it would seem that it would be unlawful for a Supreme Court Justice to commit murder or to get a simple speeding ticket. In other words, that there’s no exemption or immunity from application of the general law for Supreme Court Justices. If that’s the case, then it is beyond us why making rules regarding the receipt of gifts which is otherwise applicable to all government officials shouldn’t or wouldn’t be applied to Supreme Court Justices. If there’s a statutory reason for it then Congress should be able to simply amend the statute in question.

In a separate article, we took the position that the maintaining respect for the courts and the judicial system was the number one issue facing this nation. See: https://reasonandbalance.com/worlds-biggest-problems-ai-and-more/ Why did we say this? Because ever since January 6, 2021, the rulings of courts have consistently been denigrated and/or flat out ignored, especially by MAGA Republicans. They’ve consistently tried to debunk legitimate court rulings by 60 different Democratic and Republican judges that have held that Joe Biden was, in fact, validly elected President in 2020. Moreover, we’ve continued to see consistent efforts by many MAGA Republicans to downplay, denigrate or ignore the judgments reached by the Courts. Senators McConnell and Graham said that wouldn’t care if Trump were convicted of a felony in the Stormy Daniels hush money case. And when a New York state court jury unanimously found that, in fact, former President Trump had committed 34 separate felonies, MAGA Republicans have consistently denigrated that verdict.

All of this is very bad news for democracy simply because the only way a government can function and for peace, law and order to be maintained is if court judgments are honored and respected. There is no other way for disputes to be peacefully resolved in a civilized manner without resort to threats, force, violence and bloodshed unless the rulings of courts are respected so that disputes can be resolved and put to rest. At all costs, a way to peacefully resolve disputes, especially in these hyper-partisan must be maintained, otherwise anarchy, if not civil war may ensue. And this is exactly why courts exist, to maintain the peace.

Going back to Justice Thomas and the millions of dollars he’s received in gifts going back now over three decades, it is very difficult for any unbiased rational person to believe that there was not an element of payola, undue influence or quid pro quo involved. No one gets gifts on that scale on such a regular basis unless someone is trying to get a favor. No one. And, simply put, no one is going to respect the Supreme Court’s rulings as being unbiased as long as such large repetitive gifts like those received by Clarence Thomas are being accepted.

Let us be frank. Because we believe that this is a vitally important matter. And it pains us to say this, but the very simple fact of the matter is that in this particular context race matters quite a bit. While there are, in fact, many very honorable Republicans who are Black who genuinely, honestly and sincerely believe in many conservative values, Black Republicans have historically constituted relatively small portion of the total membership of the Republican Party. This is because, most persons of color have traditionally supported more progressive and liberal causes. In short, Blacks, in the vast majority of instances, vote Democratic far more often than they typically vote Republican.

Moreover, Justice Thomas was put on the court during the George H.W. Bush (Republican) administration. Until Ketanji Brown Jackson was elevated to the Supreme Court in 2022, Justice Thomas was the only Black on the Supreme Court. And, it’s important to note, during most of his tenure the Supreme Court was much more evenly divided ideologically between progressive and conservative justices than it is today. In short, during the vast majority of Justice Thomas’ thirty-plus-year career there were many cases decided by 5 to 4 votes one way or another on incredibly important issues. Thus, during this time the vote of one justice was extremely important in a lot of very important cases over the last 30 years and this includes the case that decided the 2000 election of George W. Bush over Democrat Al Gore with Thomas siding with Bush I Republican Thomas supporting Bush II Presidential candidate George W. Bush.

In short, Justice Thomas’ vote was crucial to not only getting the court to render more conservative decisions on vitally important cases, but also in terms of both actually getting the Black community to accept the legitimacy and righteousness of those decisions and to getting the Black community to believe that conservatives were sympathetic to the plight of Blacks.

The bottom line, is Justice Thomas was in an unusually powerful and influential position for the better part of the last 30 years. Putting two and two together, most rational unbiased and reasonably intelligent observers would conclude that there was an excellent chance that many of these “gifts” were made to Justice Thomas with the expectation that he rule a certain way on cases before the court. To suggest otherwise is to display utter contempt for the ability of the public to see and to draw rational conclusions.

The very sad fact of the matter is, that virtually every decision that Justice Thomas has made since he was sworn in back in the 1991 has got to be looked at in a very new and different light.

This is not to say that gifts received by any or all of other justices, including those to liberal and/or progressives might not be equally bad. And if they are then they should be held responsible and suffer the consequences. But allowing gifts like those in the Thomas case merely reaffirms an extremely bad precedent and encourages outright bribery and payola on the Supreme Court in the future.

Candor does require one to admit that the gift and disclosure rules applicable to U.S. Supreme Court Justices are uniquely complex, meaning not the same that are applicable to other government and/or judicial officials, and might well have made what Justice Thomas did technically lawful. For more on whether what Justice Thomas did was lawful see https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/what-gifts-must-supreme-court-justices-disclose. Nevertheless, it is imperative that whatever the practice has been, whether legal or illegal, it has got to stop. And, in any event, surely a reasonably ethical public servant, especially a judge or Justice on the Supreme Court would have been extraordinarily concerned that accepting such large and valuable gifts created at least the appearance that the gifts in question were given for the purpose of improperly influencing Justice Thomas’ decision-making. This would be especially true, if the gifting rules applicable to other public servants would have been disallowed if the gifts in question had been received by a public official other than a Supreme Court Justice. Moreover, and just as importantly, it is very difficult to see why the gift rules pertaining to Supreme Court Justices are any different than they are for other public servants. The whole situation has a distinctive stench to say the least and must be changed.

And so, the big question here is why are Republicans against taking any kind of firm stand on this vital issue? Is it because many of them are on someone’s payroll too? Is it because they and/or their big donors are the ones who are lavishing huge gifts on Supreme Court justices, other government officials and themselves? Is it because so many of these gifts have helped to promote the conservative agenda of the Supreme Court. These are all very legitimate questions and, in this regard, another look at the present record indicates that a Republican megadonor, Harlan Crow, was one of the people bearing gifts for Justice Thomas. See https://www.cnbc.com/2024/06/13/supreme-court-clarence-thomas-harlan-crow-trips-senate-judiciary.html. And regardless of whether Crow’s gifts were lawful and innocent or not, the sad fact of the matter is that the mere appearance of what transpired between him and Justice Thomas casts doubt on the neutrality and objectivity of Thomas’ decision-making and this calls into question the integrity of the Supreme Court.

Excepting for smaller gifts that an average family might exchange during birthdays and holidays where there was no real chance that the donor was attempting to influence a justice, all other gifts over a $100 or so received by justices should be deemed to be impeachable offenses. In fact, if it is possible under existing law, Justice Thomas should be impeached, tried and if found guilty of receiving extravagant gifts for no apparent legitimate reason then he should be removed from the bench. If this is not possible, then Congress should cut off funding for his position on the Supreme Court until he’s replaced. And this is true regardless of whether his actions were technically legal or illegal. Why? Simply put, given his long history of receiving substantial gifts regardless of how honest and lawful his decisions are in the future everyone will always have some doubt about the legitimacy of his future decisions.

In short, our citizens must have respect for the courts and their vital importance in maintaining the rule of law and the rights that each of us have under the Constitution. We are already experiencing an unprecedented amount of flagrant disrespect for the ruling, verdicts and judgments of the courts and it must stop. The potential adverse consequences of failing to act on this are far too great.

This is Rufus Coldwater.

Back to you Stony.

————————————————————–

Okay we’re back

Thanks Rufus.

Next Up we stick around in England

But now we’ve moved on into the 90’s I believe

Here with a punk slash new wave group called

Elastica

Who, like a shooting star

Flashed brightly for a short while

But, unfortunately they weren’t around

Near long enough

Why do I say that?

I’ve even seen our bossman Rufus tapping his toe

To some of Elastica’s stuff.

In fact, here’s one of his favs

https://youtu.be/WlOje4ly4hg?si=vjZBmvnoHTvipLxL

That

folks was Elastica

with their hit…

Waking Up

And next we come to a part of the show

That I just love

Why?

I love asking our intern

Errr …err…rather

excuse me…I’m sorry…

I forgot…she’s on the payroll now

I meant to say

our Senior Executive Production Assistant

…also known as..

… your heart throb and mine

….Suzi

…where was I…

..oh yes…

This is the part of the show where

We ask Suzi to go down to the garage

And dig us up somethin’

Probably a tad dusty and moldy

That’s rather obscure

…but that’s also aged like fine wine.

Either that or some ole garage punk

Anyway… Suzi knows me way too well at this point.

She just handed me the vinyl from a real old album

That I really really love

Here I’ll just play this tune

Because it’s sooooo good.

In fact, this whole album is a real treasure.

Anyway, I’ll shut up

And let yinz listen …and enjoy

https://youtu.be/b8-wYDAV-5s?si=WvmLcCYppgl5xtJE

That

my friends was the inimitable Johnny Horton

Who departed this earth far too early

in his young but still

To my mind

stellar career….what a talent!

I think it was a car accident that did him in.

Anyway the name of that tune was

Evil Hearted Me.

Well folks,

I see by the clock on the wall

That’s its time for ole Stony to call it a night.

I see here that our

Fearless

musical

And spiritual leader GURU

Who says he’s just finished singin’

A rock n roll set at Caddy’s

has just texted

And insists that we wind up tonight’s show with

Tonight’s clean up hitting tune

And believe me this artist

Always hits homers

400 foot shots

Here’s Roy Orbison

and some friends that I think Yinz’ll know

With a great rendition of

….Dream Baby

By the way…

This musta been taped shortly before Roy passed on

See how many artists yinz can name in this clip

…extra credit if ya can name both the white shirted geeetttarr player

AND the two other major artists he

(talkin’ here the guitar player)

has played for over his many years

In the business.

https://youtu.be/ANy4x3wgTSA?si=s40Ciubbqe3oOnEw

Wasn’t that just great?

And if yinz said James Burton

He was the geeetttar player for

Ricky Nelson and later

For Elvis himself

…after Scotty Moore of course…

Then you’d be right.

Anyways…gotta go…

So, for Rufus, GURU, Suzi

… and, if he’s around here somewhere

Buck

I’m Stony Riva

Yinz are the best

Thanks for listen’

Thanks for watchin’

Until next time

Goodnight

And remember…

…don’t let the bed bugs bite.

————————————————-

END NOTES:

All links to all videos are to offsite URLs. Some factual background was provided by

articles on the various artists, the linked tunes and other topics discussed herein by the associated articles in Wikipedia and/or by Chat GPT.

However, no part of this blog article was actually written by artificially intelligent software.

Please note that the names and descriptions of all characters are fictional and any similarity with any actual person is totally unintended and coincidental.

[Clarence Thomas portion of post was amended on 6/17/24]

*Copyright claim herein applies only to the content contained in this article/blog post that originated with the David Dixon Lentz and not to any quoted or referenced material originating from another source and the like. It does not apply to any music, lyrics, videos or other content contained in or on any linked site, including any of the words, lyrics and/or the performance of any music or videos contained on the sites linked.

All questions, comments and/or objections to anything contained herein should be directed to the ownership of www.reasonandbalance.com on the “contact” or “contact us” page.