Finkelstein, Norman. “Typical Bullshit Remark before the Commencement of the Course” (April 2018) BKPL.

  What we’re doing here today and for the next roughly eight to ten weeks is an exercise in Thinking. It doesn’t mean that I agree with anything I’m saying, it doesn’t mean that even you agree with anything you’re saying, it means we’re trying to think, trying to reason through an Argument and we’re trying to find the Errors, Holes, Gaps in the Arguments that are made by the Court. I hope nobody here is going to be restrained or constrained by Political Correctness. There’s no question here about offending.

  The first week we’re going to be doing today, the issue of Segregation. The second week we’re going to be doing the issue of Abortion. The third week we’re going to be doing the issue of Sodomy. The fourth week we’re probably going to be doing the Flag-burning case. Everybody has a right to strong Opinions but what we’re going to be doing in the class is not registering strong Opinons. We’re going to try to think and whether the Judges are making convincing Arguments or not. I had a chance to read several of the Decisions, and so far I found the Reasoning of the Court wholly unconvincing and wholly inadequate. And we’ll begin right now and see.

  Formats are going to be as follows. Number one, I’m going to severely edited version of the Decisions. I’m removing all the technical Aspect of the cases. For example, large part of these Decisions deal with the question of whether the Legislative Branch of the Government or the Judicial Branch of the Government should be deciding these cases. Should it be the Legislative Branch, the Congress or should it be the Judicial Branch, the Supreme Court, which decides whether Abortion is Legal. Should it be the Legislative Branch or the Judicial Branch which decides whether it is Permissible to burn a Flag. I’m not going to be discussing those issues. It is very technical how to evolve the division between what is the Jurisdiction of the Legislative Branch, what is the Jurisdiction of the Judicial Branch. That’s something [of interest to you], go to Law School. [Emma Caterine. Martin Garbus & Michael Ratner & Vince Warren & Katherine FRANKE. Dima Khalidi & Liz Anderson. R.B. Ginsburg & Kagan & That Spic Cunt from the Bronx. Glenn Greenwald & Anthony Romero & Hina SHAM-Shi & Kade Crockford]

  I’m just interested in seeing kind of, as I said, the Moral reasoning of the Courts. The way we’re going to be doing is, the format I’ve elected on after thinking it through is we’re first going to read each Decision, what’s called at the top, the Syllabus, and that’s just the Case Summary, what is the issue the Court is trying to resolve. After we read the Summary, we’re going to go around and ask the class where do you stand on the particular issue the Court is confronting and we’re going to hear out your Arguments. Why you think A or why you think anti-A on that particular issue at hand. Then we’re going to read the Majority Opinion. If there is a Minority Opinion, which in general there will be, we’ll do Wade [vs. Roe]. No, no, no, no, no, Brown vs. Board of [Education] was unanimous. But in general we’re going to find Minority Opinion and we’re going to go through them. That having been said, we’re going to begin now….