[Huck]

So how will Ashcroft v. Raich come out? I don’t know. I got a sense that O’Connor, Ginsburg, and perhaps Stevens were quite sympathetic to the respondents. Based on his questions, Justice Kennedy seemed quite favorable to the government. One would guess that Justice Thomas will be the hardest member of the Court for the government to win. One might also guess that it will be hard for the petititoners to win Souter or Bryer, who both are very skeptical of Lopez and Morrison. Justice Rehnquist is hard to call. We didn’t hear from him. One suspects he is both pro-federalism/state power and pro-federal regulation of drugs. One can imagine this case coming out 5-4 either way. Before argument, I would have said it could be 9-0 either way, but if I allow myself the dangerous pleasure of reading the tea leaves, I now think that is unlikely.

He left out Scalia. Interesting blow by blow account. Wow. That was cool. I can't ever tell what is going to happen based on the oral arguments.

[Sandy]

A couple of doozies:

Clement: [U]nder the commerce clause, there can be no as applied challenge.

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Clement: It would not be a good idea for the courts to second guess Congress.

[HiTech RedNeck]

From the excerpts, Scalia seemed to be a tad skeptical of Clement.