With Republican Congress and Supreme Court, Rand Paul says Activist Judges not so bad after all.

It’s strange how power can change your entire “supposed” principled ideological philosophy. For an authoritarian based Republican Party, reversing itself for strictly strategic reasons is political opportunism at its finest.

"Activist Judges" are GOOD!!! That’s right, after decades of bashing supposed liberal activist judges for legislating from the bench, our Republican majority is rethinking that position. Rand Paul is already testing this “sales pitch;” take “activist” liberal wins like Roe v Wade and Brown v Board and show how Republicans can repeal the Affordable Care Act and fight presidential overreach with their own activism. That would appeal to the deep conservative fear that liberals are getting something they’re not from the courts.  

National Journal: Speaking at the Heritage Action Conservative Policy Summit, Paul … took pains to explain his own legal philosophy, and to push back against what he referred to as the "tyranny of state government." He argued that it was judicial activism that struck down "separate but equal" schooling in Brown v. Board of Education. He defined Roe v. Wade—which has its 41st anniversary next week—as a competition between the rights of a mother and her child. And, naturally, he said it would take judicial activism to strike down the Affordable Care Act at the state level.

Judicial restraint—the idea that courts should only uphold or strike down laws on the strict basis of their constitutionality—is one of the cornerstones of modern conservative thought. Justice Antonin Scalia has ... has in turn been called a judicial activist for helping to strike down Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act for seemingly political reasons.

Again, here’s the rationalization...the spin we might be getting in the years to come, if they maintain their majority:

As Paul's argument goes, judicial activism can be necessary, as a check against other branches of government overstepping their constitutional authority—a break-the-glass-in-case-of-emergency situation. So, why try to make such a tough sell—to redefine an entire concept that has been considered unpalatable to conservatives for years … Brian Darling, a spokesman for Paul, told National Journal. "I think that he's trying to educate the crowd that there's a conservative case to be made for activism, if it's tied to spreading liberty."

Judicial activism as Paul defines it is an idea he thinks conservatives can get on board with…