Party in the West Wing! You're not invited.

Is the New York Times shilling for SCOTUS? Back in 2000, a Los Angeles deputy prosecutor discovers dirty tricks used by his peers to achieve a prosecution; he complains, his concerns are dismissed, and he ultimately ends up testifying for the defense. As a result, the prosecutor's career is squashed and he sues, asserting that he was punished for his apostasy. Six years later, in a fantastic return on Bush's investment in Roberts and Alito, the Supreme Court defends the government's "right" to punish civil servants for speaking out about corruption. But it's not all bad, as David Stout of the Times points out:

The ruling noted the enormous variety of factual situations involving relationships between public employers and their employees, and it suggested that the particular facts of a case must be closely examined.

I bet it did. But the ruling's black ugly heart is this: "When public employees make statements pursuant to their official duties, they are not speaking as citizens for First Amendment purposes, and the Constitution does not insulate their communications from employer discipline." Leave it to Justice Kennedy to put the "servant" back in "civil servant."

Fred Barbash of the WaPo rightly notes that:

The decision enhances the ability of governments at all levels to punish employees for speaking out, shielding officials in many instances from lawsuits for violating the right to free speech.

Neither paper, however, stops to wonder whether and how this ruling fits into BushCo's larger goal of stopping the release of any information regarding governmental behavior not already summarized in an official talking point. Unnoted by either story is the fact that even though the case involved a county-level prosecutor and his superiors, the Court deliberately chose to apply its reasoning to all levels and agencies of government. This is a massively important ruling for the development of free speech law and employer relations in this country, but neither the Times nor the Post seems very anxious to make that point.

Also important to note is that Supreme Court did not challenge the sequence of facts alleged by the complainant, i.e., that the prosecutor in question was punished for his decision to go public with what he saw as his colleagues' wrongdoing. With this ruling, the Supreme Court has explictly afforded government not only the right to disregard the First Amendment rights of its employees, but has allowed higher-ups to punish underlings using literally any method they see fit. The prosecutor was not formally censured or disciplined, merely relegated, with no explanation, to a less desirable position. No paper trail, no evidence, no solid ground on which to dispute.