Kagan Unqualified To Be on Court

The new Supreme Court pick, Elena Kagan, has never been a judge. She's never seen a courtroom from the bench. She's never had a judge's responsibilities. Elena Kagan has never instructed a jury or ruled on a point of law—any point of law. She's never tried a criminal case, a civil case, or even a traffic case. She has not decided even one constitutional issue.

We don't know whether or not she believes the Constitution is the foundation of American law or whether she thinks, like many, the Constitution constantly changes based upon the personal opinions of Supreme Court justices. But either way, Elena Kagan has never had to make a constitutional call in a court of law in the heat of a trial.

She has never impaneled a jury. She has never instructed a jury on a reasonable doubt or sentenced a person to the penitentiary. She has never had to decide whether a witness was telling the truth or not. As a judge, she has never heard a plaintiff, a defendant, a victim, or a child testify as a witness. She has never made that all-important decision of deciding whether or not a person is guilty or not guilty of a crime.

Elena Kagan has never made a judgment call from the bench—not a single one. Yet, as a Supreme Court justice, she would be second-guessing trial judges and trial lawyers who have been through the mud, blood and tears of actual trials in actual courts of law. How can she possibly be qualified to fill the post of a Supreme Court justice?

Kagan is an elitist academic who has spent most of her time out-of-touch with the real world and with the way things really are. Being a judge would be an exercise to the new Supreme Court nominee. She has read about being a judge in books, I suppose. She might even have played pretend in her college classroom, but she has never held the gavel in a courtroom. Her first time to render judgment should not be as a member of the United States Supreme Court.

Aside from never being a judge, she has never even been a trial lawyer. She has never questioned a witness, argued a case to a jury or tried any case to any jury anywhere in the United States. Real-world experience makes a difference. Reading books about something and actually doing it are two completely different things.

People's lives and livelihoods are at stake in these courtroom decisions, particularly when they reach our highest court. Courtroom experience is fundamental to being a judge on the Supreme Court. As anyone who has been through the court system can testify, a courtroom is a whole different world.

Putting Elena Kagan on the United States Supreme Court is like putting someone in charge of a brain surgery unit who has never done an operation. She may be qualified for the classroom, but she is certainly not qualified for the courtroom. She should stay in the schoolhouse since she has never been in trial at the courthouse. The Supreme Court is no place for on-the-job training.

I generally don't think any woman is qualified to sit on the court. Call me a misogynist, but there are fundamental differences between men and women, differences that are pertinent to being in a position of parsing law.

Reagan appointed O'Connor, a supposed conservative, and the result was disastrous with numerous rulings that pushed the US unconscionably left. Not one woman on the current Supreme Court now has even a scintilla of conservative, originalist bent.

Not to say that men can't be leftist Marxists on the Court, but if we had maintained a court of only men, the climate in the United States would be markedly different now, for the better.

The lawyer in me is making me play devils advocate:

Neither have 36% (40 out of 111) of the Supreme Court Justices who proceeded her. The list includes both liberals (Douglas), conservatives (Rehnquist), and centrists (White and Powell). Even our favorite son -- Justice Thomas -- never instructed a jury or tried a criminal, civil, or traffic case.

But either way, Elena Kagan has never had to make a constitutional call in a court of law in the heat of a trial.

If we use this as the standard, then something like 90% of the prior justices would have been unqualified. Indeed, IIRC the only current justice who has served as a trial judge is Ginsburg.

She has never admitted evidence or ruled out evidence or ruled on the chain of custody regarding evidence. She has never made even one decision regarding any rule of evidence. She has never ruled on the exclusionary rule, the Miranda doctrine, an unlawful search and seizure allegation, a due process claim, an equal protection violation or any constitutional issue. She has never impaneled a jury. She has never instructed a jury on a reasonable doubt or sentenced a person to the penitentiary. She has never had to decide whether a witness was telling the truth or not. As a judge, she has never heard a plaintiff, a defendant, a victim, or a child testify as a witness. She has never made that all-important decision of deciding whether or not a person is guilty or not guilty of a crime.

Same as above.

Yet, as a Supreme Court justice, she would be second-guessing trial judges and trial lawyers who have been through the mud, blood and tears of actual trials in actual courts of law. How can she possibly be qualified to fill the post of a Supreme Court justice?

The constitutional role of the SCOTUS is not to "second guess" trial judges. They have completely different roles within our judicial system. Indeed, in 99.99999999999% of the cases, the SCOTUS is not reviewing the the decisions of the trial court, but rather the circuit court of appeals or the highest appellate court of a state.

The most important reason to oppose Kagan is not her lack of judicial experience (which would not be an issue if she was a conservative), but rather her liberal, if not marxist ideology and her refusal to disclose documents that would objectively affirm who she is, how she thinks, and what kind of judge she will be (as if we don't already know).

You might as well say that Jews shouldn't sit on the Supreme Court because they tend to be liberal justices. Or that only Catholics should be selected because Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, and Roberts are all conservatives.

Apples and bowling balls, Non.

To say that there are no differences between men and women that matter is to join in with the radical feminist leftists and homosexual activists who say it doesn't matter whether a child has a mom, a dad, two dads, two moms, four dads, etc. They're all interchangeable.

What makes women unfit for the Supreme Court makes them uniquely fit for other roles. I'll let you figure those out.

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