I for one will never forgive Roberts for screwing up the Swearing In

[SamCooke]

Another one of W's many gifts to this nation. Is it a way for Obama or congress to change the rules? I think members of the court should get to pick who they want to serve as Chief Justice.

[gcomeau]

1. Welcome to the future!

I assume you just arrived here after stepping into a time machine in late January... a lot of things have happened since the inauguration, you'll want to hit the news archives and get yourself up to speed.

[Marsala]

2. Everybody else already forgot about it

Really, no one cares about that.

[Sequoia]

7. I haven't forgotten it.

He either did it on purpose or he's just...a f' up. I don't lose any sleep over it, but the other nations watching must think we're a bunch of idiots.

[SamCooke]

8. At last. Thank You. I knew I couldn't be the only one

That event is in history. I want to watch it over and over again, yet have to skip the most important part. The speech may have been the most important part, but u get where I'm coming from.

[Sequoia]

11. I agree.

I didn't want him in the SC to begin with. I don't trust him.

[Name removed]

3. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Occam Bandage]

4. I assume this post got lost in transit on Jan. 21st, 2009,

and has only now emerged blinking out of the underbrush.

[TheKentuckian]

5. I'm a lil poutraged about it but its so on the backburner that it is still

at the store.

[SamCooke]

6. So I'm the only one? I have to skip past that part on my Inaugural DVD

Is sickens me every time. I've been holding this in for a while. I'm shocked that I'm getting bashed

[PopSixSquish]

13. No Bashing Here My Friend

It irritated me too, but then the Chief Justice also apologized profusely to President Obama and took responsibility. He came over to the White House the next day to administer the oath again.

I honestly don't think it was intentional. He tried to do the oath from memory without notes and screwed it up.

[Uzybone]

15. I agree with your thoughts on this

Smarty pants Robetrts wanted to show off and ended up looking like a fool. But he apologized so that flub is forgiven. He is still a conservative bastard.

[HopeOverFear]

9. I still cringe whenever I watch it. Fuck Roberts. I'm still mad at him also

He ruined a perfect moment.

[firedupdem]

10. One thing I always remember....at noon that day, Barack Hussein Obama

became President of the United States. That flub reflected poorly on Roberts and not Obama.

[kestrel91316]

12. I will always believe that either Roberts deliberately messed it up to

ruin the moment for posterity, or he was so completely unnerved at the very idea of a BLACK MAN in the White House that he accidentally messed up.

Either way, it was an EPIC FAIL on Roberts' part, and a WIN for Obama when he insisted on doing it right.

[NYCGirl]

20. Maybe he was just unnerved by the fact that most of the world was watching

him at that moment. The Supreme Court pretty much functions without the TV eye most of the time.

[onenote]

14. Arguably, Congress could change the rules. They won't but they might have the power to do so

The Office of Chief Justice is referred to only once in the Constitution: in Article I, Section 3, dealing with impeachment trials, wherein the task of presiding over the trial is assigned to the "Chief Justice". THe number of Justices and the designation of one of them as CJ, is dictated by statute. While the Constitition assigns power to the President to nominate justices and justices serve for life, its quite plausible that Congress could enact legislation saying that there are nine Justices on the Supreme Court one of whom shall be designated Chief Justice for a set term.

It will never happen for two reasons: one, its been the way it is now since the beginning of the nation and it would be considered very bad form to break with over 200 years of tradition and, two, both sides would have something to lose.

[rustydog]

16. Wow, I didn't know it was that big a deal to be human and make

a mistake.

[Captain Hilts]

17. Not a big deal. nt

[Dreamer Tatum]

18. Grow up nt

[Political Heretic]

19. It's not a big deal. Especially five months later. (nt)

[Undercurrent]

21. .

Unable to "forgive" an ordinary human mistake?

Good grief! Give it up already.

[ecstatic]

22. I forgot, but I won't forgive nt

[madamesilverspurs]

23. Roberts' flub - intentional or otherwise -

might have been dismissed as clumsy at worst. What made it notable for quite a few of us was that the person administering that oath was in position to do so precisely because he had been rewarded with that job for his part in putting W in the White House. I honestly hadn't thought about the flub in months, but at the time it was very much adding insult to incalculable injury to the nation.

[Raine]

24. I honestly believe he was nervous

and it was an accident. Anyway I don't think it's that big of an issue and most people have forgotton. I admit the moment of the swearing in was ruined for me at the time but I've gotten over it now.

[Princess Turandot]

25. Ditto..

If Fat Tony in his Medici hat had been the Chief Justice, I too would wonder if it was intentional. But this wasn't Fat Tony. While I don't agree with virtually any of Roberts' views, the man appeared clearly nervous to me. Being officially involved with the installation of only the 44th of a very rare club is a very big deal; he likely memorized the oath in advance. Given that there would be less than a zero impact on P. Obama because Roberts muffed the oath - even if they never did 'round 2' - I don't believe that it was done intentionally. And at the luncheon afterwards, as soon as the president came near his table, Roberts jumped up and spoke to him. At least to me, it was clear from the president's reaction that the guy had apologized to him.

[mwb970]

26. If only he'd used a teleprompter.... /nt

[Cresent City Kid]

27. I wish I could have seen it

I had a 5 minute power outage that just happened to occur while Obama was being sworn in.

[LynneSin]

28. I agree. The rule wouldn't remove Roberts from the court - just switch positions

Give it to someone who has vision we can believe in.