In 1987, the Senate rejected Judge Robert Bork’s nomination to the Supreme Court in light of Bork’s long record of extremism. Bork once described the federal ban on whites-only lunch counters as “unsurpassed ugliness.” He claimed that it is “utterly specious” to suggest that women have a constitutional right to use contraception. And he believes that the Constitution does not protect women from gender discrimination. Nor has Bork moderated his views in the twenty-five years since he was denied a seat on the Court. Bork said it was “silly” to say that women are discriminated against as recently as last October.

Mitt Romney, however, apparently finds this kind of outlook quite appealing, because he selected Bork to co-chair his “Justice Advisory Committee.” At a recent campaign event, Vice President Biden went after Romney for his poor judgment in selecting Bork for this role:

[Biden] addressed specifically the issue of contraception, saying that he “noticed today” that Judge Robert Bork, “a fine man, and a man who I disagree with a lot,” had been named as the Romney campaign’s “justice coordinator.” (He appeared to have read an editorial in today’s New York Times which addressed this fact. Bork was actually named as a chair of Romney’s “Justice Advisory Committee” last August, a Romney spokesperson confirmed.)

He discussed the Bork confirmation hearings, which he oversaw as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and the discussion of Griswold vs. Connecticut.

“So we’re kind of returning to the past. You know that movie, ‘Back To the Future?’ It feels like to me that we’re going Back to the Future,” he said.

Not too long ago, of course, the Romney campaign spent days pretending to believe that President Obama’s own view of motherhood was somehow in question because someone who has no association with his campaign said something dumb on CNN. Meanwhile, Romney continues to trust Bork as one of his top legal policy advisors — even after Bork claimed that there’s no such thing as discrimination against women and that women who think there is are “silly.”

The John Birch Society is best known for touting conspiracy theories about how the United Nations is plotting to eliminate everything from paved roads to the game of golf, so all of their claims need to be taken with quite a few grains of salt. Nevertheless, their official magazine contains a very plausible report about Tea Party U.S. Senate candidate Dan Liljenquist (R-UT) that raises serious questions about his judgement if it is true. According to this report, Liljenquist told them they he will work to repeal the Constitution’s guarantee that voters — and not state lawmakers — get to elect United States senators:

[I]n a surprising answer to a question, Liljenquist informed The New American that he supports the repeal of the 17th Amendment. Regarding , [sic] Liljenquist explained his opposition to tthe [sic] popular election of the U.S. Senate that was effected by the ratification of the 17th Amendment to the Constitution:

“There is a disconnect between the state legislatures and the state delegations in Washington, D.C.” “I commit that if I ever lose the support of the Utah State Legislature, I will come home and not return to Washington,” he continued.

If this report is accurate, it is disturbing not just because of its content, but because Liljenquist decided to talk to this extremist group in the first place. Moreover, Liljenquist, has a well documented history of attacking the Seventeenth Amendment’s promise of democracy, so it is reasonably likely that the Birchers are telling the truth here.

At a campaign event in Morgan County, Utah, Liljenquist lamented the fact that, as a state lawmaker, the Seventeenth Amendment prevented him from imposing his will on his primary opponent Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT):

Liljenquist also talked about Senator Hatch. He said, “As a state legislator it has been very disappointing. We have almost no working relationship with our Senior Senator…It was supposed to be that the senate would represent the state and work with the legislature to make sure state’s rights were protected. Last year we passed a bill and we said, ‘Hey, we know that the seventeenth amendment is in place, we can’t tell you what to do, but come and consult with us, come and speak with us.’ Mike Lee said I understand that’s my role and Orrin Hatch said I don’t report to you.

Earlier this month, Liljenquist also claimed that there need to be term limits on Senators to help counteract the effect of the Seventeenth Amendment. And Liljenquist’s past digs on the Seventeenth Amendment are also part of a larger record of hostility to the Constitution. Indeed, a centerpiece of Liljenquist’s campaign against Hatch is Liljenquist’s belief that Hatch should not have voted to provide health care to children because Liljenquist believes a national program to heal children is unconstitutional. Indeed, his proposal for senatorial term limits is also unconstitutional.

Liljenquist also would not be the first prominent conservative to embrace the ludicrous idea that Americans should not be able to elect their own senators. Justice Scalia once slammed the Seventeenth Amendment, as has Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX).

Liljenquist’s campaign did not return a request to confirm or deny the John Birch Society’s claim that he wants to make his own senate election unconstitutional. Nevertheless, in light of Liljenquist’s long pattern of hostility towards the Constitution, and his record of strange statements expressing suspicion about the Seventeenth Amendment itself, it seems reasonably likely that the Birchers’ reporting is accurate.

Casino billionaire and right-wing activist Sheldon Adelson has already given at least $10 million to Republican-Allied Super PACs so far this cycle… and he plans to make at least one more Super PAC donation. But, he told Las Vegas Sun political reporter Jon Ralston, after that he plans to keep his massive political spending secret.

Ralston writes:

“I’m going to give one more small donation – you might not think it’s that small – to a SuperPAC and then if I give it will be to a c4,” a reference to 501c4 nonprofits, which are tax-exempt and also exempt from disclosures. I opined that surely meant Crossroads, which would allow him to indirectly help Mitt Romney and Sen. Dean Heller [R-NV], who is running against Rep. Shelley Berkley [D-NV]. Berkley used to work for Adelson, but they had a falling out in the mid-1990s and he surely would love to see her lose.

“Do you know how many c4s there are?” Adelson retorted, as if to try to indicate he had more choices than Crossroads. Indeed. But I can’t think of too many that will influence who controls the White House and the U.S. Senate. And did he telegraph where his money is going with the Rove comments? I think so.

Adelson also declined to tell Ralston which Super PAC he intended to support with that final “small donation.”

The casino mogul seemingly conceded that he didn’t want his future political “speech” to be transparent because voters might take that information into consideration when evaluating his message.

Adelson said he believed the media’s inevitable use of the phrase “casino mogul” whenever his donations became public “is not helpful to the person .”

So, thanks to the Supreme Court’s stream of rulings against political spending limits and the unwillingness of the Republicans in Congress and on the Federal Election Commission to even mandate disclosure of independent political ad funders, billionaires like Adelson can simply hide their massive donations through (c)(4)s when they get tired of the media and public scrutiny. And rather than letting the voters decide how much credibility to give an ad bankrolled entirely by an anti-union gambling magnate — he can just choose to keep them in the dark.

While Ralston seems convinced Adelson’s support will go to Karl Rove’s secretive Crossroads GPS, the most famous right-wing (c)(4), the truth is he and we have no idea. Adelson could give the money to former Sen. Norm Coleman’s (R-MN) American Action Network. Or to the Koch Brother’s Americans for Prosperity. Or some totally unknown 501(c)(4)s that could be collecting hundreds of millions of dollars without any footprint, waiting to pounce with a barrage of shady attack ads. Or, given his billions, all of those.

Voter ID laws disproportionately disenfranchise low income, minority and student voters, all of which tend to vote for Democrats. So it is no surprise they’ve become the darling of Republican state lawmakers interested in making it easier to keep their jobs and elect other Republicans to office. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R), however, will not benefit from the voter suppressing law he signed — at least during his own upcoming recall election — thanks to a pair of decisions handed down by two state appeals courts:

A pair of appeals court rulings this week make clear the state’s new voter ID law will remain suspended through the May and June recall elections.

One of the opinions, released Thursday, said there was “no realistic possibility” the case would be decided before the June 5 recall election against Gov. Scott Walker and some of his fellow Republicans.

Walker and Republicans in the Legislature last year approved a new law requiring voters to show photo ID at the polls, but Dane County Circuit Judge David Flanagan issued an order temporarily blocking the requirement in a case brought by the Milwaukee branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the immigrant rights group Voces de la Frontera.

A week later, Dane County Circuit Judge Richard Niess permanently blocked the photo ID law because he said it violates the state constitution. That case was brought by the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin.

These decisions are good news for democracy in Wisconsin. Scott Walker has every right to remain governor if he faces the entire Wisconsin electorate and wins fair and square, but trying to rig the game by disenfranchising your opponent’s likely voters is beneath contempt.

It is also possible that Walker’s voter suppression law could even remain suspended through the November election. According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Wisconsin appeals courts typically take nine months or more to decide cases. Moreover, it is likely that the lower courts’ decisions striking down voter ID will be upheld by the courts of appeal. The text of the Wisconsin Constitution provides unusually strong protections against voter disenfranchisement, and Walker’s voter suppression law conflicts with at least 132 years of state supreme court precedent.

There is, of course, some risk that the increasingly partisan Wisconsin Supreme Court will ignore the state constitution, but even that is unlikely to happen until after the November election takes place. Earlier this month, the state justices turned down a request to fast-track the challenges to voter ID.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) is obsessed with drugs. Since coming into office, he signed a law requiring welfare recipients to undergo drug tests — a law that was subsequently halted by a federal court — and he issued an executive order mandating random drug tests for state employees. This executive order has now been declared unconstitutional by a George H.W. Bush-appointed judge:

Miami U.S. District Judge Ursula Ungaro Thursday morning ruling that random, suspicionless testing of some 85,000 workers violates the Fourth Amendment ban on unreasonable searches and seizures also raises doubts about a new state law quietly signed by Scott this spring allowing the governor’s agency heads to require urine tests of new and existing workers.

“To be reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, a search ordinarily must be based on individualized suspicion of wrongdoing,” Ungaro wrote in her order issued this morning, citing previous U.S. Supreme Court orders which decided that urine tests are considered government searches.

Judge Ungaro’s decision should not be controversial. As she correctly notes, “suspicionless” searches of people who are not individually suspected of committed a crime are rarely acceptable under the Constitution. Nevertheless, these kinds of unconstitutional bills have become the darling of many conservative lawmakers. Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA) proposed forcing the unemployed to undergo drug tests in order to receive benefits, and Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) signed a similar drug testing law in his state.

It’s important to note that these drug testing laws are not just unconstitutional, they are also completely unnecessary. Only one percent of Florida workers who took drug tests tested positive, and only two percent of state welfare recipients subject to Scott’s other drug testing law failed their drug tests.

Yet, while these tests are both unconstitutional and a solution in search of a problem, there is still some risk that they could be upheld by an increasingly partisan Supreme Court. Current law is clear that these drug laws are unconstitutional, but the Constitution even more conclusively favors the Affordable Care Act. If the justices are willing to put partisan politics ahead of the law and strike down President Obama’s signature accomplishment, there is good reason to fear they will again put politics before the law if Rick Scott’s drug tests come before them.