The Fifth took another hit today from the Supremes-5 to 4 was the predictable score with the usual jurists casting their usual barb filled votes. Far be it from me to quibble.
They be the ones who are right because they be the ones who be right, not that they are right or have an interest in being right. It is because they are who they are that they are right. Don’t mess with them. They have too much to do, even if they take fewer cases. Stare decisis be damned. Change the law and let them change it back. Cannot wait for them to act. They don’t want the cases. This bullshit about judges interpreting the law and not making it has taken over the process. Everytime a judge interprets the law, they make the law. Laws are made to be interpreted, expanded, explained. It just depends on who is doin the splaining, spanding, and terpreting.
So, in the most recent past Term, the warnings have been loosened and the time covered by the invocation of the right to remain silent have been reduced. You don’t actually have to give the proscribed warnings, so long as you get your thoughts across. And if you assert your right to counsel or the right to remain silent, so long as law enforcement waits two weeks (a timeframe smelling of middle class values), they can talk with you again. Now you have to say you want to remain silent to invoke the right. Sitting still and not answering questions isn’t enough. At least, the cops still have to say that there is a right to remain silent, but not in so many words.
