" That power is unaccountable; if anyone in the US Government decides that SCOTUS is abusing judicial review (and many people frequently do decide that, which is what they mean when they say the courts are "legislating from the bench"), there's nothing they can do except to ensure that the next judges appointed to the courts are more congenial to their views"
This is theoretically true, and in practice, completely false.
Congress can control the number of supreme court justices, and thus, it can add (and reduce, though this is more complicated, the easy case being when there is a vacant spot) justices. Because it controls confirmation (though not selection), it can in effect, also control who is there.
I defer to you on this stuff, but my current sense is that Congress packing the Supreme Court is approximately as likely as Congress impeaching a Supreme Court justice.
Other than that, the number has fluctuated from five to ten, and there admittedly hasn't been overt court packing, though congress did drop the number from 10 to 7 in 1866 to avoid andrew johnson from naming any supreme court justices since he was about to be impeached.
Past that, the main reason they haven't is due to the approval rating of the supreme court being so high. Nowadays, there are recent rumblings about packing again, since the supreme court's approval rating has dropped.
Given the politics of today's congress, I wouldn't be shocked to see it happen.
This is theoretically true, and in practice, completely false.
Congress can control the number of supreme court justices, and thus, it can add (and reduce, though this is more complicated, the easy case being when there is a vacant spot) justices. Because it controls confirmation (though not selection), it can in effect, also control who is there.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/28/1