My scorn for Scalia is not for his beliefs but for the way he insults those who disagree with him.

Let me repeat what I said in the heading:   I do not scorn Justice Antonin Scalia for what he believes about the Constitution (though I strongly disagree with him).   Rather, I scorn him and find him repulsive because of his contempt for those who disagree with him and the hypocrisy he displays in thinking that his biases do not influence his decision, while others' biases do.

Perhaps even more, I disrespect the man because of his rigid certainty that he is right and those who disagree with him are wrong.    The philosopher Bertrand Russell said:  "The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts."

Scalia made headlines again last week when he told an audience at Colorado Christian University that the Constitution allows for the government to favor religion over non-religion.   He further declares that it protects "freedom of religion, not freedom from religion."

In other words, an evangelical fundamentalist is entitled to preferential treatment over an agnostic or atheist. 

Well, he's certainly entitled to his opinion.   What he is not entitled to is the respect of citizens whose intelligence and decency he insults, just because they do not agree with him.   He has insulted not only people like me but his liberal SCOTUS colleagues, repeatedly.

Here he is in his own words, quoted in the conservative Washington Times:

“Our [the Supreme Court’s] latest take on the subject, which is quite different from previous takes, is that the state must be neutral, not only between religions, but between religion and nonreligion.  That’s just a lie. Where do you get the notion that this is all unconstitutional? You can only believe that if you believe in a morphing Constitution.”

I thought perhaps he was becoming senile.   But I found this quote going back to Febuary 6, 2006, in an article on CBS/AP News blog.  He was denouncing the concept of the "living Constitution."

"That's the argument of flexibility and it goes something like this: The Constitution is over 200 years old and societies change. It has to change with society, like a living organism, or it will become brittle and break.

"But you would have to be an idiot to believe that.  The Constitution is not a living organism; it is a legal document. It says something and doesn't say other things."

Now it's pretty clear that some of his colleagues on the Court, and many legal scholars, do very much believe that the Constitution has to be interpreted according to current societal realities that the Founders had no knowledge of -- and that they intentionally left some clauses general and vague enough to accommodate change.

So, to be very specific.   Scalia seems to be saying that Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonya Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and probably Stephen Breyer as well, are idiots.  That's very different from destroying a legal argument.   He does not take the time -- or have the facts -- to explain why he thinks they are wrong.   He simply asserts that they are not only wrong, they are idiots for thinking this.

That, my friends, is one of many reasons I have such a low opinion of this man.  And there are many more.

Ralph