Libertarian or Populist, this is one reason to not vote Bush

SCALIA: "The tradition of having government funded military schools for men is as well rooted in the traditions of this country as the tradition of sending only men into military combat. The people may decide to change the one tradition, like the other, through democratic processes; but the assertion that either tradition has been unconstitutional through the centuries is not law, but politics smuggled into law."

Traditions are not set in stone. They come and go without politics or law being involved. The usual situation is that the tradition has died, and people are doing things in new ways that needs to be protected in a legal fashion because of the remaining deadbeats that cause so much trouble for those that refuse to honor the old tradition anymore.

We called this the American Revolution once upon a time, but we seem to have forgotten how we were willing to die to live life as we saw fit, instead of being kept in check by a tradition that had no meaning anymore, or else was becoming increasingly oppressive.

Scalia certainly doesn't have a clue here. He is denouncing freedom here by saying it is underhanded politics subverting traditions. Laws react to changes in traditions, they don't subvert traditions. Traditions subvert themselves, and laws evolve to sort out what was with what is.

Shocking that a supreme court judge could be so ignorant as to the realities of life and living, but there it is.