[Orin Kerr, July 30, 2007 at 8:51pm] Trackbacks
Chief Justice Roberts:
CNN.com reports:
  Chief Justice John Roberts suffered a seizure Monday, causing him to fall while at his summer home off the coast of Maine, the Supreme Court said.
  Chief Justice John Roberts was taken to a hospital in Maine after a fall at his summer home.
  Roberts has "fully recovered from the incident," and a neurological evaluation "revealed no cause for concern," the Supreme Court said in a statement.
  Doctors called the incident a "benign idiopathic seizure," similar to one suffered by the chief justice in 1993, the court statement said. An idiopathic seizure is one with no identifiable physiological cause.
  We don't know much in terms of the details -- to the extent they are knowable -- but Lyle Denniston has a bit more at SCOTUSBlog.
Thinker:
I'm no doctor....but....it would be logical to assume it is an epilepsy variant since he was near the water. Periodic reflected light brings on epileptic seizures.

Let's all hope the CJ is well and returns soon. I have to say I had a moment of dread when I first read the NEWS FLASH on my blackberry. The image of the young, healthy, bemused Roberts was completely incongruous with the news story.
7.30.2007 10:18pm
Ex-Fed (mail):
And now, the inevitable: a few losers wish for his death, either sincerely or in a fatuous attempt at edgy humor; the right blogosphere jumps to condemn that as typical of the left; the left blogosphere jumps to condemn the right for hypocrisy because it does that all the time; and back and forth until their hands are transluscent.
7.30.2007 10:24pm
Syd (mail):
If he has one of these every 14 years, I'm not going to worry about it. I'm on the left but he seems like a very good person and I'm happy to have him as Chief Justice.
7.30.2007 10:48pm
OrinKerr:
Ex Fed writes:
And now, the inevitable: a few losers wish for his death, either sincerely or in a fatuous attempt at edgy humor; the right blogosphere jumps to condemn that as typical of the left; the left blogosphere jumps to condemn the right for hypocrisy because it does that all the time; and back and forth until their hands are transluscent.
Seems pretty accurate so far.
7.30.2007 10:53pm
neurodoc:
If he has one of these every 14 years, I'm not going to worry about it.

The fact that he had such an event 14 years ago does not mean there is no possibility of a serious underlying condition (e.g., brain tumor), but it makes very unlikely anything of truly serious nature very much more unlikely. They will almost certainly do an MRI and maybe start him on an anticonvulsant. (How many justices decamp each summer for Nantucket?, for Martha's Vineyard?, for Maine?, or Cape Cod?, other New England destinations?)
7.30.2007 11:30pm
Dave N (mail):
I am very happy to have neurodoc's comments. I have always assumed he is a law-trained neurologist (great CV for an expert witness) and while his comments are almost always thoughtful, here is an area for his expertise to be helpful to those of us with little or no scientific knowledge--if, of course, I am right about my initial assumption.
7.30.2007 11:51pm
c.f.w. (mail):
Seizure causes a lucunae - hole in the brain.

Not a good sign that he ended up in the hospital.

First seizure at 39-troubling.

Was this 1st event disclosed?
7.31.2007 12:22am
EH:
If he's never seized on the bench I couldn't care less.
7.31.2007 1:04am
smarish:
Sounds like something that could possibly be corrected with a little research into the stem cell area.
7.31.2007 3:05am
rarango (mail):
It is sad the state of american politics as decended so low that a medical event becomes a point for mindless and unfeeling rhetorical garbage. Best wishes to the CJ for a speedy and uncomplicated recovery.
7.31.2007 7:53am
Tim Dowling (mail):
God bless the Chief Justice with a long and joyful life.
7.31.2007 9:52am
Dave N (mail):
I second rarango and Tim Dowling.
7.31.2007 10:37am
Steve2:
I think what's worried me most about this coverage is that they were saying Rehnquist was fine just a few months before he died. So now they're saying Roberts is fine, and that makes me think he isn't fine and is about to die. Whereas if they said he isn't fine, and they're keeping him in for tests and treatment for awhile, then I'd be thinking, "Oh, the doctors are being super cautious 'cause it's the Chief Justice, not that they need an excuse to want to keep people prisoner for a few days to jab them with needles and take tissue samples and zap them with radiation. It's totally overblown, he's going to be fine." I know it's perverse and backwards, but... all the announcements are he's fine and and already out of the hospital, and that's making me nervous about his health.
7.31.2007 5:01pm
BGates (www):
Steve2, that was a completely lucid and rational comment. I find it very unlikely that you have any neurological problems at all.

Ex-Fed: Yes, that is the pattern, but have you noticed it never happens in reverse? Bill Clinton had surgery a couple years ago, and I'm sure there were commenters on Free Republic and LGF who wanted him to die, but there was no such behavior from the big names on the right. The death wish for Roberts was posted on what I must imagine is still a prominent left-of-center blog (based on the fact that its previous proprietor is now working for Time).
8.1.2007 4:48pm
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8.2.2007 11:18pm