[j.havenfarm]

I don't get your objection to the amendment. Sure as shootin' one of the circuits (my bet's on the 9th) is going to rule the 1996 DOMA unconsitutional. Whether or not judicial lawlessness SHOULD exist, it does exist, and the amendment is the best way I see of putting a stop to it on this issue. Whether or not the act you posted, Ms., is the way to achieve it, Congress has a powerful tool because, under the constitution, it has the right to define the courts' jurisidiction. The Republicans in Congress are way too spineless to ever use that tool, though. Just like they'll never impeach renegade judges. Finally, I am an attorney in California, and I work for a trial level court. Judges in this state live in fear of the California Commission on Judicial Perforamnce like you would not believe.

[inquest]

My objection is that amending the Constitution involves a tacit admission that the judges had the correct interpretation of the Constitution prior to amendment. The implication will be that every bad ruling they make is now to be considered completely valid unless we amend the Constitution to change it.

It's no response to say that Congress doesn't have the political will to impeach, because they better get the political will if judges are to ever be restrained. We simply cannot keep up with their misrepresentations of the Constitution by amending each and every time they do it. It'll make a mess out of the Constitution and turn it into a political football.

The republic can survive a temporary period of judically-imposed gay marriage, until we summon up the conviction to deal with these judges properly. It can not survive an unstable Constitution.

[Ms12Gauge]

Is the Judicial Performance Commission in CA a Citizen Panel? Here, in CO, we have the Supreme Court Judicial Disciplinary Counsel, and we have the Performance Commission. The Performance Commission is the Citizens Review Panel. They don't HEAR about the complaints. (a fact that I am working hard to change, plastering the information about how to properly file a formal complaint about a judge to them)They had FIFTEEN COMPLAINTS last year. Most of those were simply people who wanted to complain that Judges were rude and nasty to them. NO cases of intentional error, although we KNOW there are hundreds of valid complaints lodged every year to the Judicial Disciplinary Counsel. They received 3300 complaints last year, and sanctioned... NONE!