Maid Marion on her tiptoe feet

I must begin today's post by saying the lovely Magnoliajem wrote me to help correct/explain/clarify some of my musings on the Constitution and the Supreme Court. (See, she be a lawyer, and all around kick ass woman.) I would like to share her brilliant explanations and analogies with the rest of you for the sake of clarity lest anyone in cyberspace accept my word as gospel. *g*

In all likelihood the founding fathers didn't intend to build in any ambiguity. No more than our present-day Congress and state legislatures intend to write in ambiguity to laws and constitutional amendments passed today. The fathers were only human, however. I suspect that, in drafting the Federal Constitution, the founding fathers, acting much like our present-day legislators, became so embroiled in debate and focused on the minutiae that they did not realize they had created a somewhat ambiguous document.

Because the Constitution does contain ambiguity, Chief Justice John Marshall, in the case of Marbury v. Madison in 1801, led the Supreme Court in asserting that the doctrine of judicial review gave the Court the power to review the constitutionality of congressional legislation. In other words, Marbury v. Madison established that the Court has the authority to interpret the Constitution and also to interpret the laws enacted by Congress. There is no question today that the Court has that authority, so I think you are right when you say that ultimately the Court decides how much control the federal government has over the states.

Also, just to give props, the hubby also told me that there was no intention of ambiguity. :)

Anyway, my bestest legal-ease politico homeboy in Queens also tried to respond but, (like many other before him as has recently been brought to my attention) his post did not file. That said I would just like to take this opportunity to provide some basic Blogger instructions to those who may be confused.

You do not have to have a blogger ID to reply. You do not need to register with Blogger to reply. I must say that the page is unclear that way. The default for responses "Anonymous" You can say whatever you want in that little box, and no one will know you you are, unless of course you put in the field, "Hey G! It's Sally here, I want to tell you you rock girlfriend!" HA! The other option is to click the little circle next to "name" and type in any name you want. The third is if, and only if, you already have a Blogger account. If you click that one, it will ask for your user name and password.

The only thing that now is tricky is that you must type in the letters you see displayed in the box to prove you're a human being before you hit "login and post". (It says login and post I guess just for the fact that if you are a blogger user, and filling that info in, this will log you in. Get it?) I activated the prove your human thing because I got spammed.

It sounds complicated but it really isn't. 1) Type what you want in the box. 2) Leave it Anonymous, free text your name in, or log in as a blogger user. 3) Type the funky letters the program has generated for you. 4) Hit "log in and post".

Ok, now that that's all done, I have to say that I had a great time with the gurls. It was quite an adventure just getting there. I have to start by saying that New Jersey roads are just f*cked. Seriously. The signs all tell you how to get to a road, but never that you are actually on the road. They have all these U-turns and jughandles because people constantly have to turn around because they went the wrong way or missed their turn. And the New Jersey Turnpike? The words I would use to describe it I won't even use here and I generally don't censor my language, and I learned to drive in Boston traffic! Yikes.

So, I leave Boston a little after 1:00 and land in Woobridge, NJ at 6:45. Eeew. Granted that was with horrific traffic on the Tappan Zee bridge and two quick bathroom stops, but I thought I'd be the last one there. I was the first, and one of the girls was coming from Jersey City! LOL T from VA got there shortly after. Her three girls are sooooo cute! She is in so much trouble in 5 or 6 years. *snort*

The first room we went to was not cleaned. ICK! We called down, and they gave us another. The clean room was not so clean in the fact that there was a roach in the bathroom. ICK!

Anyway, I went to Pathmark (despite more bad directions from the hotel) and picked up junk food, frozen appetizers, and booze, and we just hung out talking and reminiscing all night. Very fun. We went to breakfast after getting up way to early because the stoopid crappy hotel had not changed any of the clocks ahead last week. HA!

I drove C back to Jersey City, and after driving around it for 40 minutes we found her house. LOL (C doesn't drive.) Then I took T to Manhattan where we were going to park my car and walk around and shop a while, but the stars were against us. There was a Ranger game, and every lot I tried was either full or $30 to park. We moved east and uptown, and ran smack into a Greek street fair. I aborted the mission, as the rest of her family was now there and on line at Radio City. (Yes, it's on line, this is NYC) I went shopping in Queens, on Steinway Street and got a killer dress for the Snow Ball, along with some tops from Express.

I had an amazing meal at Ponticillo's, and then met my brother and his girlfriend for Dim Sum Sunday morning. His girlfriend is Chinese, and we go to the best places and she orders. I love it!