Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli's Growing Legal Losing Streak

As regular readers already appreciate, I view Virginia Attorney General Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli to be a dangerous, delusional menace to the Commonwealth of Virginia.  Worse yet, he's a religious extremist.  And if one is an LGBT Virginian, the man should send shivers down you spine and scare the living day lights out of you because this man wants to be Governor of Virginia.  Kookinelli would make Bob "Taliban Bob" "Governor Ultrasound" McDonnell look like a flaming liberal.  Yet Kookinelli's record as Virginia's top attorney has been one of a growing list of legal debacles where he has filed lawsuits based on lunatic far right ideology only to go down in flames every time.  Thursday's health care ruling but the U. S. Supreme Court is yet the latest example of Kookinelli being flat ass wrong on his legal analysis.  Based on Kookinelli's continually flawed legal skills, he should not be attorney general much less governor.  A piece in the Washington Post examines Cuccinelli's trail of failed lawsuits. Here are excerpts:

When it comes to high-profile legal cases, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli II reminds me of Teddy  .   .  .  .   the oversized, foam-headed Teddy mascot who “competes” against other presidents in fourth-inning footraces at Nationals Park.  Teddy, famously, has never won. With two new, major court defeats last week, Cuccinelli’s record is almost as woeful. 

With these latest reverses, it’s clear that Cuccinelli’s legal crusades serve primarily to win him right-wing acclaim and not to actually roll back the allegedly tyrannical liberal legislation he decries.

The ambitious Virginia conservative, who’s running for governor, lost big on Thursday when the Supreme Court upheld President Obama’s health-care reform act. Cuccinelli (R) had become a nationally known tea party champion by rushing in 2010 to be the first state attorney general to file suit against the law, acting just minutes after the president signed it. 

He suffered another setback on Tuesday when a federal appeals court in the District slapped down a legal case against the Environmental Protection Agency.

[Cuccinelli's]  he’s had a remarkable number of losses on closely watched cases [suits against UVA on climate change and a lawsuit against Mellon Bank] .   .  .  .  .  The twin defeats last week, however, were landmarks. For Cuccinelli and other conservative legal activists, health care and climate change have been marquee issues in which they sought to portray the Obama administration as trampling on the Constitution and threatening American liberties.  Now they’ve had their day in court – and lost. 

The reverses feel particularly dramatic because the tea party’s rhetoric about the stakes has been so apocalyptic. In his initial response to the health-care ruling, Cuccinelli called it “a dark day for the American people, the Constitution and the rule of law.”

Consider the extremity of that statement. A Supreme Court decision written by a conservative chief justice supposedly threatened “the rule of law” just because it upheld a moderately liberal social program that Cuccinelli viewed as unjustified.  

“It’s a nice spin, but a loss is a loss,” said Carl Tobias, a constitutional law professor at the University of Richmond. 

The setback in the EPA case was even more resounding. Cuccinelli argued that the EPA was wrong to rely on outside scientists to help it conclude that human activity is leading to global warming.

The court mocked that contention.

So far, regardless of the legal outcomes, Cuccinelli’s courtroom drives have worked for him politically. He’s the darling of the Virginia Republican conservative base.  .   .   .   .    At some point, though, symbolism alone will not be enough. It may work at the ballpark for Teddy, who’s celebrated as lovable. But for a politician, in the long run, voters aren’t going to respect a loser. 

What is truly disconcerting is the amount of state resources Cuccinelli has squandered in pursuing frivolous lawsuits which do not sxcite anyone outside of the Kool-Aid drinking, Bible beating GOP base.  Meanwhile, legitimate issues go unaddressed.  Cuccinelli has in effect been using state funds to run a de facto GOP primary campaign.  He ought to have to reimburse Virginia for these squandered resources.