Hey Nino! Who needs yah?
by digby
Dr Ben Carson, who oddly calls himself a conservative had this to say about the third branch of government:
Carson said Sunday “we need to discuss” the court’s long-held power to review laws passed by Congress. That authority was established in the 1803 landmark case Marbury v. Madison.
Carson was asked on “Fox News Sunday” whether the executive branch is obligated to enforce laws that the Supreme Court declares constitutional.
“We need to get into a discussion of this because it has changed from the original intent,” he said.
Carson has said a president is obliged to carry out laws passed by Congress, but not what he called “judicial laws” that emanate from courts.
Justice John Marshall, the 4th Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, was as close to original intent as you can get. The originators were all right there, still alive and arguing over what it all meant. If Carson is pressed for time, what with all the campaigning, he could just look up Marbury vs Madison (yes, one of the “originators” himself…) on Wikipedia for a quick primer on the whole thing.
Carson is actually proving a conservative movement trope about pointy headed elites not being all that. Here we have a man who achieved the highest level of accomplishment in a very, very difficult field. You cannot be an internationally acclaimed pediatric neurosurgeon and not be extremely intelligent. But he certainly shows that you can be uneducated and foolish in many other ways.
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