ProPublica revealed that Justice Clarence Thomas had accepted luxury vacations from Harlan Crow, a Texas billionaire, for the past two decades and never acknowledged these gifts on his financial disclosure form. Justice Thomas said in a statement that he thought these lavish trips on a private jet and a super-yacht fell under the category of “personal hospitality,” like having dinner at a friend’s home. ProPublica estimated that a recent trip to Asia, involving both the jet and the yacht, was worth about $500,000.
ProPublica consulted seven ethics experts, and all agreed that his defense was unreasonable. For one who claims to take the letter of the law literally, his failure to report the multiple gifts of free luxury travel is nonsense.
Will there be any accountability?
Are Supreme Court Justices outside the law?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“Just Us” for the wealthy and powerful. Justice for the rest of us.
It’s the American Way.
“Paid justice” for the wealthy and powerful. Justass for the rest of us. No actual justice for anyone. . . just bought legalities for the wealthy and powerful and cheapass leftover illegalities for the peeons.
Yup. All the little nobodies from nowhere who followed their leader Trump to the Capitol are going to prison. He’s teeing off on the 18th hole before going in for some cheesburgers. Because justice in the United States is a joke. A bad joke. A mockery.
cx: cheeseburgers, ofc
Cheeseburgers at the golf course would be teesburgers.
Clarence Thomas has often spoken of the lessons he learned while dealing with Jim Crow when he grew up. I guess one of those lessons was that there is no such thing as ethics?…
Apparently, SCOTUS is above the law and accountable to no one. We are seeing this time and again from this band of scofflaws. Term limits should be implemented along with ethics guidelines. I think Anita Hill and Christine Blasey Ford would agree with me.
So. Well. Said.
The Supreme would just declare term limits and ethics restrictions unconstitutional.
That’s the beauty of being the Decider of laws.
I’m sorry, I don’t need any expert on ethics or otherwise to tell me this is wrong. Whether it’s legal or not I’ll leave to others. But on the basic right/wrong meter that 98.9% of people likely live or at least claim to aspire to do so, this one is easy to interpret.
…don’t need… Calgon, take me away!
Thank goodness the 11 Dems on Senate Judiciary recognize the problem in a letter to Roberts to get his act together or they will do it for him. Thomas’s conduct, “that is plainly inconsistent with the ethical standards the American people expect of any person in a position of public trust…”
Roberts is as bad as Thomas.
Worse, because he doesn’t say a word about what Thomas does or about what Alito and the rest of the majority do.
Roberts has no respect for the Court and no respect for the law.
And Robert’s wife makes a good living as a head hunter for top law firms that often go before the court. The corruption is complete.
What ever happened to the leak investigation , by the way?
Didn’t Roberts say he was appalled by the leak and would get to the bottom of it?
Oh right, that was before he learned who was behind it.
They investigated everyone who worked for the court but not the judges. It was obvious Alito leaked the brief. Hear no evil, see no evil.
Hear no Alito
See no Alito
Feinstien’s incapacity is putting a profound hold on the work of the Senate Judiciary Committee
Feinstein should resign.
She is preventing confirmation of Biden judges.
In her absence, the Judiciary Committee is tied 10-10.
No nominees move forward.
She has missed 58 votes in the floor.
She’s 89.
It’s an open secret that she suffers from dementia.
Her staff must be manipulating her to save their jobs.
The same thing happened with Strom Thurman years ago, but somehow his minions continued to get their initiatives through. I think the same thing is happening with Chuck Grassley, his presentation to Jim Jordan’s committee serving as evidence. I ‘m afraid that Feinstein seems unable to to understand that she needs to resign. She was found unaware of her retirement announcement in an interview.
only thing necessary for Alito to triumph in the world is that John Roberts does nothing
Dependable Leaks
Alito leaked
From courtly brief
And chamber wreaked
Of common thief
It makes sense that Alito leaked his Dobbs’ decision because he knew that John Roberts was wobbly abd trying to persuade Kavanaugh. The leak locked them in.
The fact that the so-called liberal media normalized and legitimized the far right’s cockamamie “original intent”/”letter of the law” as a valid philosophical argument is Orwellian and an indictment of many journalists at the NYT who believe good journalists should never present anything a Democrat says as truth, nor ever present anything a Republican says as a lie – they should be presented instead as two possible truths, of equal validity.
Clarence Thomas wasn’t getting these lavish gifts BEFORE he became Supreme Court Justice. It does make sense that both he and his wife know that their value to right wing billionaires drops to zero once he steps down.
Thomas is no judge. He’s just another GRIFTER to the MAX! There are so many in the Repug-nI-CON party. So SICK.
exactly
Another tidbit to never forget. Thomas filled the seat opened up by the death of Thurgood Marshall. And Amy Coney Dog Barrett that of Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
IKR? Obscene
Sickening! What a travesty!
This just in. My grandkid’s gerbil heard about Thomas and scratched out “That’s just wrong” in his litter.
Even someone as stupid as, say, Clarence Thomass could figure that one out.
That gerbil is a gold mine, I’m tellin’ ya, a gold mine! Don’t make the mistake they made with Michigan J. Frog!
xoxoxo
Will there be any accountability?
I do not think so. The only way it will happen is if Thomas resigns. I do not think he will. If Thomas was a Democrat, the Party would force him to resign to safe face. Most of today’s elected Republicans and voters don’t care about ethics unless the target is a Democrat.
Are Supreme Court Justices outside the law?
They may be impeached by Congress. But as long as MAGA RINO dictator loving fascists control the Republican party, that will never happen… unless voters overwhelming turn against the MRR Fascist Party so the Democrats end up holding more than two-thirds of the seats in the Senate and at least a small majority in the House.
You’re not outside the law if there is no law. I think what Thomas did was breathtakingly unethical, but I’m not aware of any law or rule that he broke.
“Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe, the more often and steadily we reflect upon them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.”
–Epitaph on the tomb, in Kalingrad, of Immanuel Kant, taken from his Critique of Practical Reason
cx: Kaliningrad
We have truly entered an Orwellian twilight zone where conservative scholars are now arguing that the right of Supreme Court Justices to receive gifts of unlimited value from their “friends” who have a direct interest in their judicial decisions is now sacrosanct (soon Alito will decide it was the “original intent” of the founders that this be allowed.)
Talk about incentivizing the Justices. For all we know the 6 conservative Justices have also been lavishly rewarded, with Amy Coney Barrett again getting 24/7 live in help by mysteriously non-related “aunts” who just want to do 24/7 housecleaning and childcare out of friendship and love.
Maybe Chief Justice John Roberts did NOT get the kind of lavish gifts that Clarence Thomas got and that’s why he sometimes voted not to support what those rich billionaires giving so much to Clarence Thomas wanted. Maybe Roberts was just waiting for them to give lavish gifts to his own family, too!
We can assume that is so, because no conservative scholar is willing to stand up and say this is wrong and Clarence Thomas should step down as he is already compromised.
Kavanaugh got his debt mysteriously erased. No doubt a “friend” just offering a gift to their bestie.
It’s all good, because nothing is illegal when it comes to Republicans. One must never investigate nor indict Republicans, because they never ever break the law so it is always “political”.
However, William Barr sycophant prosecutor John Durham going after Democrat Michael Sussman and trying to throw him into jail was absolutely necessary to insure our democracy. What did Sussman do? Reported a potential crime to the FBI in 2016 that the Republicans did not want investigated. The FBI did a one day (at most!) investigation that was clearly the model for their 2 day investigation of Brett Kavanaugh. Whereby the FBI only talks to witnesses who will support the right wing narrative and studiously avoids talking to the witnesses who actually have evidence of wrongdoing.
The Republican Constitutional scholars have become parodies. They believe their job is to search the Constitution to rationalize whatever wrongdoing,impropriety, or outcome right wing billionaires want. They no longer worry they will look bad, because there are only lavish rewards for being wrong in service to the right wing.
They are already lining up to say ALL Justices should feel free to accept any lavish gifts they want, especially from rich people who might have business before the Supreme Court because it is legal and nothing except their own integrity is stopping them. The fact that right wing Justices have no integrity is not a problem, as they defend their right to have no integrity.
Is there a law against bribery? That’s what’s at issue.
I suppose the FBI could send agents to arrest Thomas and the DOJ could put an indictment together, but I don’t think it would work out well.
I thought that what was at issue was that Clarence Thomas DID NOT REPORT these lavish “gifts” because he decided that as long as he called people “friends”, he had the right to hide their lavish gifts and ignore regulations that every other Supreme Court Justice followed.
If Thomas wanted to accept lavish “gifts” from people who were very, very pleased at the decisions he made, he should have reported them. Just like the other Justices do.
That anyone is accepting Thomas’ ridiculous claim that the other Justices were reporting far smaller gifts because they misunderstood the regulations and Clarence Thomas knew better is ridiculous.
I recall a similarly ridiculous defense of the Harvard fencing coach when his defenders claimed there was absolutely nothing wrong with a parent of a potential recruit buying the coach’s home for $400,000 more than it was worth and soon after selling the home for a huge loss! Nor was there anything wrong with that father of a fencing recruit donating a million dollars to the fencing coach’s personal foundation! After all, like Clarence Thomas, the fencing coach would have certainly made the decision to make sure the kid of his very generous friend was admitted without the very nice “gifts”.
Most ethical and moral judges and justices want to avoid even the APPEARANCE of impropriety. The totally unethical ones claim that what is obviously improper simply “appears” to be improper because they just happened to greatly benefit from.
I love the Republican excuse that everything that is improper done by a Republican only APPEARS to be improper so it must never be mentioned again.
Orwellian.
Absolutely shameful and worst deceptive. What else should we expect from the misogynist who lied his way to selection? Thomas showed us his true colors while he was going through the confirmation process.
Disgraceful!
True, but this isn’t!
They police themselves so, yes; they are outside the law.
His buddy, Mr Crowe, has quite the collection of Nazi/Hitler paraphernalia and the statues that adorn a section of his property are angelic.
Oh…and Clarence’s spouse has benefited immensely from Crowe’s largesse. And, btw: she was working with Mark to overturn the election.
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
The Supreme Court decides whether laws are Constitutional, so they are pretty much outside the law by definition.
They do what they want and are effectively untouchable.
GPT4 (successor to ChatGPT) just scored in the top 10% on the bar exam and undoubtedly has higher ethical standards than some Supreme Court justasses.
Bring on the Courtbots!
I’d bet they would not have overturned Roe.
Especially if they decide to get rid of the humans. Opposing abortion would not be part of their plan.
I have just consulted seven ethics experts and they all said cold blooded murder is unethical.
But they also said if you do it for hospitality it’s OK.