Maybe, after careful study & deliberation, their decisions are wiser than
you give them credit for. Many people criticise Justice O'Connor for her
unwillingness to overturn 'Roe vs Wade.'


Gene Kearns wrote:
Justice O'Connor was the progenitor of a number of wise decisions and
she could clearly see beyond pop-politics.


Agreed... and add that it's rather difficult to criticise most Supreme
Court decisions, much less individual SC judges opinions on them,
without careful study. OTOH it's really easy to holler insults because
the outcome isn't what one might prefer at a glance.


The current terms "liberal" and "conservative" are, in my mind, merely
dogmatic, counterproductive, inaccurate pop-politics terms for groups
for which one either wishes to (1) assign as a reference group or (2)
assign as a group to hate that espouses a belief system of wrong
positions.

Yes, it's particularly funny to see the labels being flung about as
insults when the flinger has no clue... last year, Pat Buchanan was
giving an interview on NPR in which he was quite critical of President
Bush, and some of my ditto-head co-workers were calling him a liberal
whacko.


Doug Kanter wrote:
Sounds to me like she trusts MOST people to make the right decisions for
themselves, with the least amount of government "help". Wait...that sounds
familiar. Isn't that a pillar of conservative thinking?



No, it isn't. It might be an interesting dictionary assignment to look
up "conservative" and see if it means this. Forget the pop-politics
talking points of recent years.

Here's a start:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative

Excellent link, although not such a good starting point IMHO because
it's rather complex.

I identify myself as a political conservative because of my belief in a
few conservative core values:

The status quo of social and economic order should
be maintained, or adjusted very slightly, to
meet certain demands. (Note: the corresponding
liberal belief is that the social and
economic order of society is secondary to the
needs of individuals, and that the
status quo should not be respected.) This is
probably the core divider between real
conservatism and liberalism.

Morals are not relative, and principles are not a
matter of inconvenience. In the same light,
hypocrisy regarding morals, ethics, and principle
is one of the most repugnant human failings.

The gov't should be fiscally restrained. The 'power of the purse' shoudl
be held by representatives directly responsible to the citizens (note:
300 years ago this was a dangerously liberal belief).


Every right comes at a cost, and every priviledge
carries a corresponding obligation.

The country's military should be maintained or
increased in strength to the extent of
being able to defeat any realistic threats.

Criminals guilty of certain heinous acts deserve
the death penalty.

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/...767265668660c4

DSK