Something I noticed about the opinion is that sure, we have checks and balances, but what good are they if the Judiciary is not subject to the checks placed upon it? "Three distinct" branches is one thing, but they ALL have power over the OTHERS. If the Judiciary can ignore the Executive and Legislative, where are the checks and balances?
What was given can be taken and what was taken should be nullified.
...and you get the door prize of the day! The root problem here is that no check has been exercised against the judiciary by the legislative and executive branches for many decades now - deliberately. The reason there are three braches is that they would tend to constrain each other against government officials' natural inclination towards tyranny. As originally designed, the individual states represented a major firewall against the leviathan state as well.
We have a de facto Kritarchy/Oligarghy. The judges impose the agenda while the other two branches dissemble to a dumbed-down electorate how they really can't do anything about it. McCain's law "thrusting a dagger into the heart of the 1st amendment" (Congressman Billybob's fine description) offers the perfect example: Bush signed the law and had the white house spin machine float the ridiculous story that he expected the SC to strike it down. If he really thought the law was wrong, he wouldn't have signed it to begin with.
Grand Ayatollah O'Connor subsequently penned the brilliant decision banning political speech in advance of primary and general elections, something that one would expect to find from a court in such bastions of freedom as Zimbabwe and Suadi Arabia. There haven't been any calls for repeal coming from the white house or Republican leadership, either. Instead, we have seen support for "closing the loopholes" - like blog sites on the internet.
The upcoming eminent domain case before the Supreme Court is very important. If the lawless gang of six rule according to their usual pattern, private property rights will be effectively abolished - goverment entities and corporate concerns granted eminent domain will start siezing property full tilt. Our liberties are being legally eviscerated one by one.