Han wrote:

I seem to remember that the
Founding Fathers instituted something like the 3 branches of
government. Legislative, executive and judicial IIRC. If that is
indeed correct, the SCOTUS has ultimate power over what the
Constitution means. Etc, etc.

That's the current understanding, but irrelevant.

Now you've got me. I have NO idea what you really mean. The
Constitution is the foundation of the law. It can only be changed by
amendment, IIRC. So in my opinion it is ALL-important. Does that
mean I'm not left-leaning?

No, it means you are wrong. While ONE mechanism for changing the
Constitution is by amendment as you said, there are others. One trivial way
is for Congress to assert that a bill it passes is not subject to judicial
review. Fortunately, this is rare.

Another is by re-defining what the Constitution says.

The word "privacy" does not appear in the Constitution. The Court, however,
says that privacy exists in the "emanations and penumbras" of the document
itself.*

Words sometimes change their meanings. "Suffer the little children to come
unto me" does not mean children should be whipped before they go to church!
When the King James Bible was written, "suffer" meant "allow" (from whence
we get the word "suffragette"). "A well-regulated militia..." meant having a
firearm that works properly . We see remnants of that definition in a "well
regulated timepiece." There are those who would take "well-regulated" to
mean "organized and subject to military discipline and regulation," but they
fail to note that the 2nd Amendment was written BEFORE there were any
government "regulations" to speak of.

The interesting question, then, is whether the Court sticks to the ORIGINAL
meaning of the Constitution's words, or whether the Court applies the
CURRENT meaning of the words.

It's not trivial.

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* Interestingly, the Court has found that privacy exists only in matters of
sex. There have been only three cases before the Supreme Court that have
been decided on the basis of privacy:

* Griswold v. Connecticut on the issue of birth control,
* Roe v. Wade on the issue of abortion, and
* Lawrence v. Texas on the issue of unnatural sex acts.