S02.E03: Elected Judges

[Athena]

The vast majority of US judges are elected, forcing many judges to pander to the electorate and accept campaign money in order to keep their jobs. This seems slightly troubling...

The UK's Labour Party has painted a campaign van pink in an attempt to attract women voters. We are glad they didn't keep going with that strategy.

[Traveller519]

I'm guessing the lack of comments so far is due to this episode being DVR'd while the Oscars were watched last night. Here's hoping they come trickling in this week.

 

Judges needing to run campaigns does seem to be a massive conflict of interest and submits them to the politics of caving to popular opinion. But as John raised, appointing them isn't always the best process either. I'd prefer that judges go through a peer review process on set terms, but John seemed to leave the normal, "what to do" call to action out here, like he didn't have a better solution. It left the segment feeling kind of hopeless.

 

The "You can't distinguish what this country in South America is" bit is gold. God help us if he uses this on Africa or former Soviet Bloc countries.

[MichelleAK]

Judges running for office just seems so weird to me.  How can you maintain objectivity when you are actively seeking money from groups and attorneys who may appear before you?

 

I'm in Alaska.  Here, when a judgeship opens up, candidates are vetted by a panel, which passes those it recommends on to the governor, who makes his decision from those recommendations.  He can't pick outside that group.  Then, the judges have retention elections (during general elections) every 10 years, but there is no campaigning.  In almost every instance, judges are retained, unless there is some report of malfeasance.  I can only remember one instance where a judge was not retained. 

 

There are rumblings from the Republican legislature about changing the process (they think the governor should have more power), but it hasn't gone anywhere yet, as there is still a lot opposition to any change.

[peeayebee]

Besides all the issues John pointed out about judges running for election/re-election, I hate voting for them because I have no idea what their qualifications are. I'd prefer them to be appointed. The idea of a panel vetting candidates sounds good to me.

[Lantern7]

Yeah, I DVRed the episode. All I know now is that LWT must have gotten one heckuva deal on puppets. Also: how hard is it to get a pony into a princess costume. "Very" would be my guess.

 

I don't think I've seen a judge's political ad. I wonder how hard the LWT staff had to dig to find the stuff they showcased.

[Chaos Theory]

Now *I* want a pony in a princess costume. Internet make it happen.

We should all be more like Bolivia. (Wherever it is)

Judges commercials are awesome! I think they only appear when they don't run unapposed and they mostly do.

Appointing is also a problem though it reaks of politics. Do you think a right wing Governor is going to appoint a left wing judge even if they are exceeding well qualified especially during years when things like gay rights are being voted on?

Edited February 24, 2015 by Chaos Theory

[stillshimpy]

It truly isn't as if there is an area of any ballot that gladdens my heart.  I'm almost always desperately trying to keep some right-wing, scary-assed, barely-disguised-misogynist from being voted into office or desperately plugging what seems to be a lost cause, so voting is never one of those "Yippee! Let's do this thing! Woooop!" type of activities for me.  It's more like dental cleanings.  Must do it for the greater good of the governmental body and the older I get, the more depressing the state of affairs seems to be. 

 

So up until now the judges have been the easiest ones on the ballot because politics shouldn't actually matter in judges.  I know that it often does, but it isn't supposed to matter.  Voting for judges never seemed  fraught with peril and it was the easy section of those long assed ballots.  Easiest thing on the menu except, for perhaps county coroner, although they campaign like crazy and at least I know their names.  

 

See that tattered thing  the floor?  Yeah.  That's the remains of the last of my idealism.  Rest in peace, you poor beleaguered sod.   

 

 

 

We should all be more like Bolivia. (Wherever it is)

 

And Good night, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are, while we're at it.  

 

I so desperately want to watch that Chinese New Year broadcast.  I want a time machine, a pot brownie and to sit around and watch that broadcast after giving my (then) youthful Idealism a firm talking to, "Listen Kid, there are some things you should know.  Now, eat the brownie and watch this.  You'll feel better."  

 

So...what the hell, UK?  Between Scotland's "No, thanks."  ad geared towards women with a cup of tea, talking about how it was just so overwhelming and the  Pink  Van of Suffrage, I feel like burning a bra, just 'cause.  

Edited February 24, 2015 by stillshimpy

[Victor the Crab]

The only thing that would have put that fake Labour Party election ad, about the pretty pony, over the top is if the pony took a shit in that woman's kitchen.

[attica]

The most campaigning I've ever seen for judges in my neck of the woods is the odd yard sign. And then again, they mostly run unopposed, so what's the choice we're supposed to be making?

 

What kind of lady-voodoo goes on inside that tampon-applicator-pink van?

[khyber]

Also: how hard is it to get a pony into a princess costume. "Very" would be my guess.

Its hard enough to get a horse to wear a Santa Hat :).

[Hanahope]

Yeah, Judge elections are fraught will peril, but I think in general, its still better than appointing.  But there should be some competition, or a vetting process before getting onto the ballot.  And judges do more than judge criminals, they can have a lot of influence on non-criminal matters.

 

Great bits on the Labour Party (pink van, seriously?) and the Chinese New Year.

 

So great for John to shine a light on these issues.

[peeayebee]

BTW, in the segment with the disgruntled weatherman, what did he say over Anderson Cooper?

[dcalley]

BTW, in the segment with the disgruntled weatherman, what did he say over Anderson Cooper?

"Could you wait 'til I'm done?"

 

I loved this guy's "boo-hoo" motion:

[attica]

I suppose it's possible the CNN weatherdude could be playing at being a douchebarge, but that's not the kind of character you love to hate. You just straight up hate him.

[izabella]

Also: how hard is it to get a pony into a princess costume. "Very" would be my guess.

 

My guess is velcro was involved.

 

The last time we voted for judges, the woman in the booth next to me used her phone to select her judge picks - I assume she was looking at recommendations the local papers put out or similar.  I never know who those judges are unless they've done something seemingly egregious in the previous year and opponents run ads about it, so I vowed that next election, I'd look up the judges, too.  I hate just mindlessly voting for judges, but, I think you have to or your ballot is incomplete.

[dcalley]

I never know who those judges are unless they've done something seemingly egregious in the previous year and opponents run ads about it, so I vowed that next election, I'd look up the judges, too.  I hate just mindlessly voting for judges, but, I think you have to or your ballot is incomplete.

Undervoting is allowed.

[NextIteration]

I gave up filling in circles for judges a few elections ago.  They are almost always incumbent only so to me there is no purpose.  This past election the spouse came out of the polling station and scolded me for being finished so quickly "you skipped the judges didn't you!?!" he accused, I just laughed.  I know that there is now a lot of conservative money involved in some areas of the country and if that were the case I'd do the research and vote in contested races, but that's just not the way it is where I am.

 

I was blown away by the pink nonsense by the Labour Party, how unfortunate.

[attica]

Here's news: The Roberts court decides on Oliver's side. Okay, maybe not technically JO's side, and more with the liberal wing of SCOTUS and reasonable people everywhere, but I think John can take credit.

[Kel Varnsen]

Besides all the issues John pointed out about judges running for election/re-election, I hate voting for them because I have no idea what their qualifications are. I'd prefer them to be appointed. The idea of a panel vetting candidates sounds good to me.

I'm Canadian and the amount of positions that are actually voted on in the US always kind of blows my mind. I mean we will visit the US a few times a year and it seems crazy that judges, sheriffs and prosecutors are all elected positions (on top of politicians who you would expect to be elected). How is that not a massive conflict of interest?

[OneWhoLurks]

Quote

 

Santa Clara Judge Aaron Persky is still feeling a fierce backlash for sentencing Brock Turner to six months in jail (three, assuming “good behavior”) and three years of probation for sexually assaulting a young woman at Stanford University. Jurors are refusing to serve under him. Santa Clara prosecutors have successfully pushed to have him removed from a separate sexual assault case. More than a million people, inspired by the victim’s harrowing public account of the rape, have signed a petition to put him up for a recall election, a rare move that isn’t even allowed in most states.

But the judge is finding support from a number of public defenders, who argue that punishing him will ultimately hurt their own clients — most of them, unlike Turner, poor people of color.

[...]

The new letter stemmed from a blog post by Sajid Khan, a deputy public defender in Santa Clara County, who wrote that “the culture of mass incarceration has so shaped our minds” that “we still insist on arbitrary, lengthy terms of incarceration as the response to crime.” He points out that Turner will register as a sex offender for life, and if he violates his probation he could go to prison for 14 years. “Not exactly lenient.”

After Khan’s post was reprinted by the National Association of Public Defenders, other lawyers around the country contacted him to say they agreed that the backlash against the judge plays into a larger tendency, born out in judicial elections around the country, to reward punitiveness and punish mercy. As John Oliver pointed out last year, the U.S. is one of very few countries that leave judicial appointments to the ballot box. And as The Marshall Project has reported, judicial elections tend to favor candidates who are most vociferously “tough on crime.”

Critics of Persky’s sentence in the Turner case say that people without the young man’s status — privileged, white, a promising athlete — are sentenced more harshly. But Khan points out that Persky’s reputation among public defenders (a group closely attuned to racial inequities in the courtroom) is that of a fair-minded jurist. “No one has been able to cite an example so far of him where a similarly situated minority client has been treated harshly by him,” Khan said.

 

Could Removing Brock Turner’s Judge Hurt Poor and Minority Defendants?