John Oliver offers to pay Clarence Thomas $1M a year if he quits Supreme Court | Hacker News Reader

John Oliver offers to pay Clarence Thomas $1M a year if he quits Supreme Court

theguardian.com

16 pointshakunin12 comments

18 U.S. Code § 201 - Bribery of public officials and witnesses

[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/201

> the term “official act” means any decision or action on any question, matter, cause, suit, proceeding or controversy, which may at any time be pending, or which may by law be brought before any public official, in such official’s official capacity, or in such official’s place of trust or profit.

I don't believe that retirement is covered under that section; Oliver isn't trying to alter a judgment of Thomas', he's simply trying to get him to retire. That appears to be perfectly legal.

The stems from:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/dec/18/clarence-tho...

>> Clarence Thomas told a Republican congressman that US supreme court justices should get a pay raise or “one or more” would quit, prompting “a flurry of activity” among rightwingers because his “importance as a conservative was paramount”, ProPublica said in its latest hard-hitting report on questionable ethics at the high court.

And the actual offer was in addition to live in a tour bus:

>> The host suggested that Thomas could upgrade his “favorite mode of travel” by signing a contract requiring him to step down from the supreme court in exchange for $1m annually from Oliver along with the tour bus, which is outfitted with a king-sized bed, a fireplace and four televisions.

The Babylon Bee's title for this one was: "Another Democrat Attempts to Purchase A Black Man"

Did they not know that Crow has already claimed him?

https://www.propublica.org/article/clarence-thomas-harlan-cr...

>> The purchase put Crow in an unusual position: He now owned the house where the justice’s elderly mother was living. Soon after the sale was completed, contractors began work on tens of thousands of dollars of improvements on the two-bedroom, one-bathroom home, which looks out onto a patch of orange trees. The renovations included a carport, a repaired roof and a new fence and gates, according to city permit records and blueprints.

Hey, that's pretty good. The Bee is generally very bad at satire.

It would have been better without the word "Another", which is over-selling the joke. They succumbed to the need to lash out at the entire group rather than tightening the joke. The gag is already on tenuous grounds since obviously this isn't "purchasing", but it's at least a real thing rather than their usual fashion for just inventing stuff out of whole cloth.

John Oliver was much funnier when he was a kooky correspondent on the Daily Show.

No offense to Mr Oliver but stunts like these are bullshit. They cloud that water and ultimately don't further the conversation. It's polarizing. Tho' Oliver would be the last to admit it.

I lean left...I'm no longer laughing.

oliver is an entertainer. like cnn or fox are news entertainment. it would spoil the act to admit his real motivation.

polarity is profitable. until it isn’t.

> oliver is an entertainer

Is he? How come I'm not entertained?

Yeah, I also find this distasteful.

That said, following the Merrick Garland nomination debacle, it's hard to imagine what "taste" even means any more. Not only did they hold up a nomination for many months in order to derail it, the voters rewarded them for it.

So yeah, it's polarizing. But it's already maximally polarized, and I don't see any point in pretending to take a "high road" that nobody cares about.

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