Supreme Court Roundup
Who’s the most influential man in America right now? If you answered Anthony Kennedy, go to the head of the class.
The Court handed down its most important decisions of the term in the past two weeks, each by a 5-4 margin but really by 1-0. In all four cases, Justice Kennedy was the determining vote. He sided with the so-called liberals (Stevens, Souter, Breyer and Ginzburg) in the Gitmo habeas corpus and child-rape death penalty decisions and with the more conservative block (Scalia, Roberts, Alito and Thomas) on the DC gun ban and public financing–millionaire’s amendment cases.
Only Justice Kennedy voted in favor of the First, Second, Fourth and Eighth Amendments while the others chose the ones they wanted to uphold based on political rather than constitutional considerations.
Serf City 
Is this enough to forgive him for his votes on Kelo v New London and Gonzales v. Raich?
Absolutely not.
Kennedy was nominated by Reagan as a strict constructionist, conservative jurist. But then again, so were Souter (Papa Bush) and Stevens (Ford).
Both Sunday’s NY Times and Washington Post have articles on the Court, highlighting the influence of Justice Kennedy.
But those in the know read it here first on the Serf City blog!