As much as I'm happy about this the current USSC is insane these days and most of their verdicts are pretty crazy (and have little dissent).

Well yeah, only CA lawmakers could look at what they were proposing and honestly not see anything wrong with it.

Sorry, I should not have included the words lawmakers and honestly in the same sentence. It was wrong of me and I apologise.
I've been waiting for a story about the exploits of alcoholic hobo Thompson for some time now.

What's weird about this one is not only did it make sense, but Scalia of all people sided with the "liberal" judges on this one. There was still very little dissent (just Thomas and Breyer), though in this case, that would seem to be a good thing.

Considering they're all at or around the age of senility, what were you expecting?

To my state legislators who passed this, and any fellow Californians who supported this crap legislation I have only this to say: suck it!

Nice to see a sane decision from SCOTUS every now and then.

Score one for basic freedom.

While it is good to have dissenting opinions just for the sake of argument... I can't say that any of Clarence Thomas's arguments are relevant. They refer way too much on precedent that doesn't apply anymore, though I am not too surprised that Thomas would use those arguments.

Breyer's dissent is interesting. Part of it is that he does feel that California made the case for interactivity being different from passive viewing/reading/listening/etc... However the larger part of it stems from the fact that current obscenity laws allow nudity and other such sexual-objectional content to be banned (for the children) by state/fed government despite even less evidence for that affecting anyone than violence. As such, he argued how can 'ultra-violence' be any less vague than 'too-explicit' sex? Essentially he's arguing for the double standard for depictions violence and sex and saying that since sex depictions are allowed to be banned and there is less evidence (read practically no evidence) that it does any harm, violent depictions should treated the same.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6318632/violent-game-law-falls-in-supreme-court?tag=topslot;title;1

Thomas was well ... Thomas ... :/
Most of the really controversial ones have been 5-4 all on philosophical lines

Cool to see mostly positive comments here. I debated this on the PC Gamer UK boards a while back and almost everyone was in favor of goverment control over media.

They also favor a monarchy, no separation of church and state, and socialist medicine.

NO! not socialist medicine! Hide your women and children! They might get vaccinated!

I'm not talking about free clinics, jackass.

They don't even know what monarchy is.

My opinion is simple: the parents should be the only who are responsible for their children. This means e.g. what games they play.
Do not talk with socialists. They will try to drag you down to their own level. And then, they will beat you with their experience.

I know exactly what you're talking about ... and I'm calling you out on it. Reread your comment, hardly anything but being a jackass. Oh and btw I'm not even a socialist. I believe in the separation of church and state, that supreme court turning this law over is a good thing, that free market enterprise is good in many sectors of the economy, but that maybe we should explore other options for our health care system which clearly doesn't work as well as and is more expensive than those dirty socialist countries. One economic, cultural, or political system does not rule them all be it free market capitalism or socialism or anything else. Using labels as the means for arguing the rightness or wrongness of something, well that's just down right un-american. (yes that was intentional)