southchild

Have you noticed how the left is suddenly accusing conservative judges of “judicial activism”? Perhaps you heard this somewhere, shook your head and chuckled, and continued on with your day. Fortunately Ann Coulter has looked into this latest example from “The Leftists One World Dictionary” — that sacred tome where meaning, like morality, is relative and where words are redefined when leftists can’t win arguments with the old definitions. Ann’s article, Actually, ‘judicial activism’ means ‘E=mc2’ has all the details on the new definition of “judicial activism”, presented with typical Coulter wit. She writes,

If Americans loved judicial activism, liberals wouldn’t be lying about what it is. Judicial activism means making up constitutional rights in order to strike down laws the justices don’t like based on their personal preferences. It’s not judicial activism to strike down laws because they violate the Constitution.

But liberals have recently taken to pretending judicial activism is – as The New York Times has said repeatedly – voting “to invalidate laws passed by Congress.” Invalidating laws has absolutely nothing to do with “judicial activism.” It depends on whether the law is unconstitutional or not. That’s really the key point.

That’s why we have a judicial branch, Mr. Sulzberger, publisher of The New York Times. It’s not a make-work program for the black robe industry. It’s a third branch of our government. You’ll learn more about this concept next year when you’re in the seventh grade, Pinch.

That’s a pretty good start. She continues,

The left’s redefinition of judicial activism to mean something it’s not allows liberals to claim they oppose judicial activism and to launch spirited denunciations of conservative judges as the real “judicial activists.” This is the Democrats’ new approach to winning arguments: Change the definition of words in mid-argument without telling the guy you’re arguing with. Chairman Mao would approve.

Thus, The New York Times prissily informed its readers: “There is a misconception that so-called activist judges who ‘legislate from the bench’ are invariably liberal. In fact, conservative judges can be even more eager to overrule decisions made by elected officials.”

That statement has as much intellectual content as saying: “There is a misconception that so-called activist judges who ‘legislate from the bench’ are invariably liberal. In fact, conservative judges can be even more eager to play tennis.”

This is highly recommended reading.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 15th, 2005 at 9:36 am and is filed under General, politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.