Friday came with great anticipation, the Supreme Court day. The class had written, screened, and gave a chronological order to a set of questions in preparation for meeting with Justice Scalia.

Friday morning started early with a breakfast at the Capital Club. Congressman Dan Lungren from the 3rd district of CA, and former CA Attorney General, had invited us to meet him there (thank you Bains family). Congressman Lungren is a mesmerizing speaker who talked about health care, immigration, water and partisanship (our big themes of the week). We could have listened to him all day.

Next on the docket was Ruth McCormick who informed us on clean energy policy. As Ruth said, the rest of the nation is behind California in this area. Ruth gave us some ideas on what might be the new national policies in this area.

After Ruth, three high ranking officials from the Army Corps of Engineers met with us to talk about mainly water issues. While they realize there are some issues in CA, they had no commitments or resolutions. We did have a thorough 30 minute tutorial on the formation of their 6 billion dollar budget.

After lunch, we met up with class 21 alumnus Congressman George Radanovich. He recently decided to retire from office, which was disappointing to many of us because he is genuine and sincere. He hinted he may be writing a book about how to improve our government, so we will be watching.

Congressman Radanovich's office set up our meeting with Justice Scalia so he and his staffer accompanied us to the Supreme Court. As mentioned before, we had prepared for our meeting with the Justice because of his public persona of occasional gruffness and lampooning humor. What we saw yesterday was instead a brilliant, funny man who loves this country and the Constitution. After our Q&A, he gave a brief monologue on why stagnation in government is good and why our country is the best in the world. Many of our classmates have a new hero; Justice Scalia said it was insane that some believe the delta smelt and Kangaroo rat have the same rights as farmers. While he has never stepped foot on a tractor, yesterday he was our honorary farmer of the day!!!

The conclusion of the day was David Martosko. While none of us had heard of him before, he made us question the moral character of the Humane Society of the US- see humanewatch.org. He also gave us a few ideas on how to sway public opinion on the CA water issue.

Overall, this was a day that will not be forgotten by any of us, as all six meetings were outstanding! As we pass the midway mark on our trip, we just want to let everyone know we miss you. Off the Gettysburg tomorrow; charge!!!