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Merged Scalia is dead

wareyin said:
Torture is not merely "unpleasant", and torture is also a war crime. Torture is also different from force used to prevent a crime, or shooting an enemy soldier during war. In fact, torture is so different from every example you have provided that I cannot see how your analogy works.
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It's not an analogy, it's a distinction: Unpleasant things governments do to people as punishment for their crimes, distinct from unpleasant things government do to people for other reasons. In my opinion, the 8th Amendment puts a loose constraint on the former category, and says nothing at all about the latter category.

And in my opinion, torture should be prohibited in the former category. In the US, this seems to be handled at the constitutional level by 8th Amendment. However, I think it could be morally permissible in some circumstances in the latter category, provided certain conditions are met. Generally, though, it's prohibited as you say--a war crime according to many jurisdictions and treaties.
 
Another example(s) of Scalia's questionable behavior. In March 2006 a case involving the rights of alleged terrorists held at Guantanamo Bay was about to come before the Supreme Court. In the weeks just prior to the case being heard Scalia made a series of public comments disparaging the idea the detainees had any rights other than those already granted. He also referred to his son's military service in Iraq. A group of retired U.S. generals and admirals filed a 'friend of the court' brief asking Scalia to recuse himself, arguing that his recent public comments on the subject make it impossible for him to appear impartial.
At the University of Freiburg in Switzerland. Scalia reportedly said it was "crazy" to suggest that combatants captured fighting the United States should receive a "full jury trial," and dismissed suggestions that the Geneva Conventions might apply to detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

[It was stated in the brief that] Scalia's remarks "give rise to the unfortunate appearance that, even before briefing was complete, he had already made up his mind" about issues in the case, the lawyer, David H. Remes, wrote. Noting that Scalia reportedly had discussed the rights of accused terrorists in the context of his son Matthew's recent tour as an Army officer in Iraq, Remes wrote that this creates an appearance of "personal bias arising from his son's military service." link to article
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The above is from a Washington Post news story which also reported:
This is the third time in recent years Scalia has faced pressure to recuse. In 2004, he recused from a case on the constitutionality of the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, after speaking out on the case at a rally in Virginia.

Last year, he faced calls for his recusal from a case involving Vice President Cheney after it became public that they had gone duck hunting together. In that case, Scalia refused to step aside.
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Despite the pleas of the retired military officers, as well as widespread criticism, Scalia refused to step aside in the Guantanamo Bay case, Hamdan v Rumsfeld. Though the Court eventually ruled 5-3 (Chief Justice John Roberts did recuse himself) that use of a military commission to try terrorist suspects violated both the U.S. Code of Military Justice and Geneva Conventions, Scalia (along with Alito and Thomas) dissented.
 
newyorkguy said:
Another example(s) of Scalia's questionable behavior. In March 2006 a case involving the rights of alleged terrorists held at Guantanamo Bay was about to come before the Supreme Court. In the weeks just prior to the case being heard Scalia made a series of public comments disparaging the idea the detainees had any rights other than those already granted. He also referred to his son's military service in Iraq. A group of retired U.S. generals and admirals filed a 'friend of the court' brief asking Scalia to recuse himself, arguing that his recent public comments on the subject make it impossible for him to appear impartial.



The above is from a Washington Post news story which also reported:



Despite the pleas of the retired military officers, as well as widespread criticism, Scalia refused to step aside in the Guantanamo Bay case, Hamdan v Rumsfeld. Though the Court eventually ruled 5-3 (Chief Justice John Roberts did recuse himself) that use of a military commission to try terrorist suspects violated both the U.S. Code of Military Justice and Geneva Conventions, Scalia (along with Alito and Thomas) dissented.
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Supreme Court justices are not judges and are not subject to judige requirements to recuse. No legal training actually required.
 
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Every single justice on the court, dating back to John Jay, has been a lawyer; each one either attended law school, took law classes, was admitted to the bar, or practiced law. Link
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wareyin said:
Torture is not merely "unpleasant", and torture is also a war crime. Torture is also different from force used to prevent a crime, or shooting an enemy soldier during war. In fact, torture is so different from every example you have provided that I cannot see how your analogy works.
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Indeed.

Mark Twain said:
How can one know which it is they are telling? For under endurable pain, a man confesses anything that is required of him, true or false, and his evidence is worthless.
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The president desires to know in the fullest and most circumstantial manner all the facts, ... for the very reason that the president intends to back up the Army in the heartiest fashion in every lawful and legitimate method of doing its work; he also intends to see that the most vigorous care is exercised to detect and prevent any cruelty or brutality and that men who are guilty thereof are punished. Great as the provocation has been in dealing with foes who habitually resort to treachery, murder and torture against our men, nothing can justify or will be held to justify the use of torture or inhuman conduct of any kind on the part of the American Army.
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Now who was that? Ah yes the noted liberal Theodore Roosevelt.

Curiously when Roosevelt dismissed General "Hell-Roaring Jake" Smith from the US Army for encouraging the torture of Filipinos his actions were supported by Republicans and Democrats. Different times...
 
Back in 2013 a federal jury awarded a group of small manufacturing firms $400 million in damages after they had sued four producers of urethane (used in the manufacture of foam for, mostly, furniture products) in 2005 for charging inflated prices by colluding to fix prices rather than compete with one another. The trial judge, complying with anti-trust law, then tripled the damages award.

Three of the companies agreed to settle; Dow Chemical did not. Instead Dow announced it would appeal the decision, contending the jury had acted improperly, that the plaintiffs had not proven their case. Apparently anticipating lower courts would rule against Dow, the company said it planned to appeal "all the way" to the Supreme Court. But less than two weeks after Antonin Scalia died Dow announced it had changed its mind and would instead settle. In the statement the company released they actually cited changes on the Supreme Court.
“Growing political uncertainties due to recent events with the Supreme Court and increased likelihood for unfavorable outcomes for business involved in class-action suits have changed Dow’s risk assessment of the situation,” the company said in an e-mailed statement. News link
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Bloomberg News reported that Scalia's death makes a big difference for corporations fighting class action suits.
Scalia wrote the 5-4 ruling in 2011 that said Wal-Mart Stores Inc. couldn’t be sued by potentially a million female workers. Two years later, Scalia was the author of a 5-4 ruling that freed Comcast Corp. from having to defend against an $875 million antitrust lawsuit on behalf of Philadelphia-area customers.

“Companies whose positions are based more on political philosophy than on interpretation of the law worry when the majority philosophy in sway at the court changes,” said Erik Gordon, a professor at the University of Michigan’s business and law schools who teaches classes on mass torts and class-action cases.
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That link doesn't shed much light on any deep constitutional dispute, just on some nuts and bolts findings and procedures.
 
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