Episode SummaryThe Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson ending a national right to terminate a pregnancy came as an abrupt shock to millions of Americans. But if you had been paying attention beforehand, the verdict was no surprise at all. In fact, the repeal of Roe v. Wade was the culmination of a successful strategy that began in the 1970s to flood the American legal system with activist judges who would impose their viewpoints that were so radical that congressional Republicans didn’t even dare to try to enact them legislatively.As outrageous as the court’s recent rulings have been, what is perhaps even more outrageous is that the right-wing takeover of the judicial system took place almost entirely in full public view, as organizations like the Federalist Society and other deceptively named groups worked together to launder extremist viewpoints and disperse millions of dollars to everyone from law students to Supreme Court justices. It’s yet another instance where the sprawling Republican political ecosystem has overpowered neutral institutions with little resistance.David Brock, founder of Media Matters, is our guest in today’s episode and he lays out how this all happened in his new book, Stench: The Making of the Thomas Court and the Unmaking of America.Can anything be done about this dreadful situation? We discussed that as well. I hope you’ll enjoy. And if you get a chance, please do share this episode on social media to help spread the word. The video of this discussion is available, the transcript is below. Because of its length, some podcast apps and email programs may truncate it. Access the episode page to get the full text.Related Content—Democrats failed to create an advocacy ecosystem, Kamala Harris suffered for it—Trump’s re-election has permanently discredited timid Democrats’ approach to MAGA threat—Liberal law professors created a ludicrous cult of constitutional law while far-right Republicans were seizing control of the judiciary—Former Trump lawyer John Eastman says Satan is behind legal attempts to hold him accountable—Christian supremacists openly speaking about how they’ll use Supreme Court to install theocracy—The judicial system is rigged and it’s time Democrats told the public about itAudio Chapters00:00 — Introduction03:55 — The role of money in judicial campaigns04:48 — The Powell memo and its impact08:23 — The rise of false balance in media18:55 — The Christian Right legal movement's overwhelming Roman Catholic dominance26:24 — How the 1987 failed Robert Bork nomination was the catalyst for the Federalist Society33:33 — Why the current SCOTUS is “the Clarence Thomas Court”37:46 — Liberal leaders and donors have done very little to counteract the right's legal juggernaut44:47 — Brock’s personal relationship to the right-wing judicial takeover50:49 — Proposals for Supreme Court reform54:13 — The importance of media and institutions01:00:01 — ConclusionAudio TranscriptThe following is a machine-generated transcript of the audio that has not been proofed. It is provided for convenience purposes only.MATTHEW SHEFFIELD: I was saying before we recorded that it's a bit surreal for us to be talking [00:02:00] because the old me and the old you would have never imagined talking to evil apostates from the right that we both ended up being. But your book that we're going to be talking about here today, it is a really good illustration of how the right uses institutions to change politics, whereas the left uses institutions to make change, and the right is so focused on doing that from an institutional level and financial level. And your book just lays it all out there.DAVID BROCK: Yeah, absolutely. Beginning with a memo that Lewis Powell wrote before he went on the Supreme Court laying out what they want to achieve and then money moved.And you had a group like the Federalist Society, which was founded by three conservative law students that was founded as basically a debating society that over time became incredibly [00:03:00] powerful validator for-- essentially you needed their imprimatur to get a federal judicial nomination or in the George W. Bush administration, certainly any high-level executive branch positions. And they were able to do this having a sort of public facade of debating society, and then a kind of stealth operation where they were highly ideological, but people could be, appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee in a confirmation hearing and say that the parallel society, they didn't even know it had an ideology and so they could deny it and get away with it.And so this was a very persistent group of people that, from the outside, if you don't admire the results, you can admire the steadfastness. And the focus and the money. Money was critical. Once Citizens United came down, the Federalist [00:04:00] Society coffers on the dark money side exploded. Leonard Leo, who runs the Federalist ...
