Mr. Ruby goes to the Supreme Court, part 2
Posted on June 18th, 2013 –
You may remember a couple of months ago that Clayton Ruby, the lawyer who took Rob Ford to court on conflict of interest charges (and won), was planning to take the subsequent appeal (which allowed Ford to walk away on a technicality), to the Supreme Court.
Well, on Thursday he’s to learn if his appeal will be heard. He’s not optimistic, but others are more so.
The question Ruby is seeking to answer is a simple one: what’s the purpose of having things like conflict of interest laws when no public official can so much as be looked at funny when they break them? At least that’s the gist of it.
Of course the thing has to do with Rob Ford who has subsequently demonstrated exactly why the public needs to be able to throw out criminal politicians. And even if, perish the thought, you actually support Rob Ford, then at least it’s worthwhile to consider this for someone you don’t care for much — someone like Miller, maybe?
Most troubling about this, however, is the tiny fact that the Supreme Court only heard 12% of appeals last year (while typically hearing an average of 60%). This, it’s said, because the courts only choose cases of “public importance”, and I guess last year must not have been really very worthy, certainly nothing the public would care about.
What's on your mind?