It's a Trap

That's what the Supreme Court is - ah, fuck it: that's what the courts are:

"The Supreme Court on Monday threw out a huge class-action lawsuit against Wal-Mart Stores Inc. that contended the retail giant had systematically discriminated against 1.5 million of its female workers.

By a 5-4 vote, the high court said the suit could not go forward as a class-action claim because the plaintiffs could not show Wal-Mart had a common policy of discriminating against women. Instead, the company allowed individual store managers to decide on pay levels and promotions, the justices said..."

When a national chain centrally manages shelf leasing, marketing roll outs, floor layouts, on-time delivery, warehousing, employee codes of conduct, anti-union campaigns, advertising output and benefits packages, it's a single entity. But, according to the Roberts Court, when its various outlets hire and manage women, it's a thousand separate entities.

Huh.

I wonder if I can use that argument the next time the tax man comes for his bill. See, while I'm sleeping, eating, shitting or talking with my wife, I'm a single entity. But, when I owe taxes, I'm sorry to say, I'm dozens of separate organs and organ systems. Too bad for the tax man, but he's going to have to take up his argument with the export end of my digestive tract.

And in case you have any doubts about how much time and energy are wasted by groups and persons seeking sanction and validity on the way to court costs, legal fees and inevitable co-optation:

"The Supreme Court blocked a federal lawsuit Monday by states and conservation groups trying to force cuts in greenhouse gas emissions from power plants.

The court said that the authority to seek reductions in emissions rests with the Environmental Protection Agency, not the courts. The ruling was 8-0.

EPA says it will decide by next year whether to order utilities to cut emissions of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas. The lawsuit targeted the five largest emitters of carbon dioxide in the United States, four private companies and the federal Tennessee Valley Authority..."

Courts: good for telling women to fuck themselves, and for rolling back rudimentary labor protections; not so good for keeping people from choking on the toxic waste of capital's energy sector.

But, it's not like we're getting the message, since it seems like our friends in the trade unions are getting ready to waste even more of their diminished clout and vanishing treasure, in order to "recall" a few token Republicans in Wisconsin. I'm sure their Democratic benefactors will reward them generously.

Sigh.

You want to win a struggle or two?

Give them sleepless nights, already.

Goddamn it.

 *

Post Script:

And while I personally find phrases like "war on women" troublesome (because, well, war is actually war and what's being done to women is far less obvious, and considerably more insidious), I understand why so many of them feel the way they do.