I guess the jury's out on whether Scalia is obscene or not....

"BOSTON, Massachusetts (AP) -- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, in a scathing letter to the editor of the Boston Herald, accused the newspaper's staff of watching "too many episodes of 'The Sopranos'" for interpreting a hand gesture he made at a cathedral as obscene.

The Boston Herald reported Monday the justice made "an obscene gesture, flicking his hand under his chin" in response to a question about whether lawyers might question his impartiality in matters of church and state.

The incident occurred after Scalia attended Mass at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross. (Full story)

But Scalia said in his letter the gesture is not obscene at all, but dismissive. Scalia said he had explained the gesture's meaning to no avail to the reporter, whom he referred to as "an up-and-coming 'gotcha' star.""

http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/03/29/scalia.gesture.ap/index.html

Hmm. I already know that what comes outta his mouth is obscene. I'm not sure about the hand gestures. But I think he's been getting some heat over it or he wouldn't have bothered to clarify.

What do you guys think?

The hand under the chin thing?

Could've been more tactful but I've never known that gesture to be obscene.

I can't imagine him doing this stuff even 10 years ago.

Something's going on with him, something that's disinhibiting him. It's either organic brain disease or booze disease.

My guess is he won't last a whole lot longer. He's more than just a threat, he's an embarrassment to the court.

Poor lil' Fat Tony :rofl:

Let's say you or I decided to flip off/bone a police officer....would the officer consider it dismissive and let us on our merry way....

or

would the officer confront us and want to know why we made an obscene gesture to him/her?

Yea...Scalia, like * and the rest of them are creating rules as they go....

In some communities you can get arrested for the gesture....

and how does he get off with being able to exercise that kind of power, anyway?

I know he had reporters' tapes seized, which is obscene in itself

this is the guy they should impeach

...the photos?

in certain neighborhoods will get the crap beaten out of you?

I don't know what it may mean, but I've always equated it with the finger or slapping the forearm or, in Britain, the backwards V fingers.

Rude, at the very least.

I'm surprised he doesn't ride around in a monster pickup truck with the electronic horn playing "Dixie" while he farts and grins at onlookers. The guy is just an obnoxious jerk through and through and has no place being on the Supreme Court.

or ethics

Italian friends in school having parents that came here from Italy used that gesture along with a facial expression that could mean only one thing-total disregard for you and yours.

It is comparable to Bush's "Who cares what you think."

It is nasty.

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