as you listen to all these folks - conservatives, i suppose - talk about how we need a supreme court justice who does not decide cases based on her own emotions or opinions, but on the letter of the law and the text of the constitution, keep in mind that in virtually every case, you know before the arguments which way which justices will vote. keep in mind that the conservatives vote as a block. keep in mind that the social agendas of the presidents who appointed them are, by and large, reflected in virtually every decision. then see that this idea that i can decide a case without regard to my own personal opinions/commitments is, obviously, jive, and it's also not what these politicians actually want. and then think about what, exactly "the rule of law" means, if it's supposed to mean that the opinions of the people enforcing the law or deciding matters of law are out of play. the idea is slop. and it's dishonest.

it's not me, doing this to you. it's an abstract object operating in space and time. this opinion i'm giving is not my opinion, it's the opinion of an abstract object, etc. i have no subjectivity, i'm just a telescope trained on this abstract planet. i am not a human being, having under the auspices of law transcended the human condition. and the fact that this appears to reflect my actual political positions is just a bizarre coincidence, which happens over and over, every session.

now an ontological confusion, or a metaphysical error, is one thing. but if these people ever fucked over an actual human being and then said: i can see that what we did to you is wrong, but it is what the law requires, then substantive ethical difficulties are in play: actual evil justified on the basis of a sheer mistake or impossibility. it is, among other things, a way that lawyers and judges pretend not to be responsible for what they're actually doing.