Moving on a Supreme Nominee

[ConvenientParking]

Why do you oppose the Constitution?

I don't. I oppose blatant hypocrisy. But nothing I can do about it. So keep on with the new justice.

 

[83Hawk]

We are a nation of laws, not "might makes right".

So you support Trump putting forth a nominee and the Senate voting on it? Because.....that’s the law (see the Constitution).

 

[Nipigu]

No. And I think that is nothing but a copout to justify the hypocrisy.

So much for honesty.

Try to imagine the reaction of Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi and their Hallelujah Chorus in the media if a conservative Supreme Court justice had died weeks before the re-election bid of a Democratic president while that party also controlled the Senate.

“It is our solemn duty to set aside our ambition to remake the court and patiently await the outcome of the people’s decision,” says Sen. Schumer, demonstrating once again why he has a glowing reputation for devotion to selfless virtue over ambition and political self-interest.

”Though we strongly believe this is a matter of the greatest importance for our nation, for life, liberty and the pursuit of our agenda, it would be wrong to fill this vacancy with just a few months left of this presidency,” says Speaker Pelosi, emerging perfectly coiffed from a locked-down hair salon to denounce hypocrisy and double-standards in politics.

Opinion | Supreme Court Succession Battle Shows Hypocrisy Is an Enduring Norm

One exception is Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, whose position in 2020 is consistent with 2016’s.

www.wsj.com

 

[mstp1992]

And Kennedy voted with the liberals plenty. He was a very moderate pick.

He was a moderate pick. However, why wasn’t Garland given the same opportunity for an up or down vote?

All I want is consistent application of the rules, especially from the same senate leadership.

 

[joelbc1]

The wsj editorial board? You’ll have to research it. I don’t know if I have access to archives that far back. But as I recall historical precedent shows the Senate doesn’t confirm a nominee in an election year when the White House and the Senate are controlled by opposing parties.

Justice Kennedy was confirmed in 1988 by a Dem Senate and Grover Cleveland had a nominee confirmed by a GOP Senate back in the day.....so, NIp.....both sides have done it before and suddenly McConnell/Grassley invented a non-existent precedent and made the SC pure politics. Well guess what Nip....the Dems can play this game too. Their turn is coming.

 

[joelbc1]

*cited

And Harry was the first one to go nuclear, so.....

You are incorrect.

 

[Nipigu]

Well if a Democrat would do it. It must be truly horrifying agree. Don't care they're not the ones doing it and claiming some sort of unwritten rules.

Of which there is no doubt. And there are no rules prohibiting it and history bares it out.

 

[mstp1992]

So you support Trump putting forth a nominee and the Senate voting on it? Because.....that’s the law (see the Constitution).

Not if the application of the law is different with different contingencies.

Apply it equally, and there should be no argument.

 

[83Hawk]

I don't. I oppose blatant hypocrisy. But nothing I can do about it. So keep on with the new justice.

Good to know you support Trump putting forth a nominee (as prescribed by the Constitution), and good to know you will be calling out all forms of democrat hypocrisy.

 

[83Hawk]

Not if the application of the law is different with different contingencies.

Apply it equally, and there should be no argument.

When was the law not applied? You do know the Senate has NO OBLIGATION under the Constitution to put a nominee to vote, don’t you?

 

[BioHawk]

And Kennedy voted with the liberals plenty. He was a very moderate pick.

And that's how it is supposed to work.

 

[Nipigu]

Attempts to do What-about-isms where they don't even have any examples they can cite. The imaginary Democrats in your head are not evidence for any assertions you want to make about Democrats in the real world.

See post 43.

 

[IamHawkeye]

A full Court of nine Justices could settle election disputes.

Republicans are moving with dispatch to nominate and vote on a successor to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, perhaps before the Nov. 3 election. This is within their constitutional authority, and it also makes the most sense for the courts and any post-election controversy.

Lamar Alexander, a senior member of the Senate GOP conference, put the argument as succinctly as anyone on Sunday:

“No one should be surprised that a Republican Senate majority would vote on a Republican President’s Supreme Court nomination, even during a presidential election year. The Constitution gives senators the power to do it. The voters who elected them expect it. Going back to George Washington, the Senate has confirmed many nominees to the Supreme Court during a presidential election year. It has refused to confirm several when the President and Senate majority were of different parties. Senator [Mitch] McConnell is only doing what Democrat leaders have said they would do if the shoe were on the other foot.”

Mr. Alexander is leaving the Senate at the end of this Congress and thus has no personal political stake in a confirmation. But he is an institutional-ist who cares about the reputations of the Senate and the High Court.

President Trump says he’ll announce his nominee at the end of this week following some days honoring Justice Ginsburg at the Capitol. The names being floated are all qualified, though Judge Amy Coney Barrett has been the most thoroughly vetted and has demonstrated her intellectual chops in some 100 opinions on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Based on that and other evidence, she’d be a worthy addition to the Court.

As for the argument that this is all moving too fast, there are 43 days until Nov. 3. John Paul Stevens was confirmed in 19 days, Sandra Day O’Connor in 33, and Justice Ginsburg in 42. The Senate can do the job in a month if it focuses on the task.

One good argument for a vote before Nov. 3 is having a full Court of nine Justices in the event of a contested election (see nearby). The country would not be well served by 4-4 votes that allow disputes to be settled by a cacophony of lower courts. The Court itself will suffer if it looks dysfunctional on the crucial legal questions surrounding the legitimacy of an election. If Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has the votes to confirm, the case for doing so before Nov. 3 is compelling.

By The WSJ Editorial Board
September 21, 2020 07:03 p.m. EDT

Supreme nominee? Is this another music thread?

 

[The Tradition]

Not if the application of the law is different with different contingencies.

Apply it equally, and there should be no argument.

Psst... interpretations of the law change over time.

Example: LGBTQ is protected under the Civil Rights Act of 1964's prohibition against discrimination on the basis of sex.

Obviously, the Congress in 1964 intended this to mean discrimination against women. Not people who insist on being referred to as "they" instead of "he" or "she"....

 

[Jerome Silberman]

Except that the political discourse is just that; based on political considerations. At some point in time, with any election one moves from making political decisions to making decisions based on laws, statutes, and various underlying documents.

The future of the nation is in the balance; one must follow the law scrupulously. The voters said the Donald J. Trump was to have the right to make Supreme Court appointments for four years ... No one ever mentioned that other part ... the stuff about the losing party getting to propose a do over through another trip to the polls.

No, the voter have apparently, and will from now on, have only ever voted for a POTUS to make nominations to the Supreme Court if and only to the extent that the Senate is held by the same party. This is an aggressive destruction of precedence, and will bite all of us in the ass at some poibt.

 

[Nipigu]

It was within a year of the election.

The hypocrisy can't be clearer in this case but republicans just don't care. Whatever it takes to retain a grasp on power. Whatever it takes.

Read the thread again.

 

[Jerome Silberman]

So you support Trump putting forth a nominee and the Senate voting on it? Because.....that’s the law (see the Constitution).
[/QUpoint.
No, that is not the law, as the Senate Majority showed us in 2016.

 

[Nipigu]

Of course and I answered.

Nope. You never addressed the question.

 

[ConvenientParking]

Good to know you support Trump putting forth a nominee (as prescribed by the Constitution), and good to know you will be calling out all forms of democrat hypocrisy.

I did not say I support Trump putting forth a nominee.

 

[Nipigu]

Bullshit. That “precedent” was invented by Grassley and McConnell in 2016. The “precedent” was sighted by GOP Senators based on an off handed comment made by Joe Biden in a Judiciary Committee hearing.

Nope. I think the National Review reported it.

 

[83Hawk]

Joe Biden is on record in 201
Might want to read the Constitution again, Bucko. The senate is NOT REQUIRED to vote on a nominee. And I hate to tell you this......2016 isn’t the first time the senate refused to vote on a nominee.

Facts are pesky things.

 

[Nipigu]

Justice Kennedy was confirmed in 1988 by a Dem Senate and Grover Cleveland had a nominee confirmed by a GOP Senate back in the day.....so, NIp.....both sides have done it before and suddenly McConnell/Grassley invented a non-existent precedent and made the SC pure politics. Well guess what Nip....the Dems can play this game too. Their turn is coming.

See post 26.

Indeed the Democrats do play this game. Their time is coming in January.

 

[Formerly Rockymtnole]

I do not understand why this is so controversial or so difficult to understand. The Democrats are going to always attempt to narrow the window so that at some point, they will seek to deny a Republican President his right to make an appointment after say, his first two weeks in office. That cannot be allowed to happen.

The only constraint should be what is written in the Constitution. The President has from the date of his inauguration until his last day in office to make appointments. In short, for a full four years, he has this power. This should not even be in question.

Ok....I asked someone else and I’ll ask you, did you sleep through 2016?

 

[83Hawk]

I did not say I support Trump putting forth a nominee.

Then you at least support his right to do so.

 

[RileyHawk]

*cited

And Harry was the first one to go nuclear, so.....

Not on Supreme Court justices.

 

[Nipigu]

Supreme nominee? Is this another music thread?

Kinda catchy, huh?

 

[ConvenientParking]

Then you at least support his right to do so.

Of course. I don't blame this on him at all actually. Nor Mitch. I'm expecting to be disappointed by my Senators based on their past words/actions. Senator Graham has also done an incredible 180. Nothing I can do about any of it. Wish those of you who support it would stop trying to pretend it's not hypocrisy. But you know it is in your heart and need another hundred reasons to feel fine about it, which I also can't help with so carry on.

 

[RileyHawk]

Good to know you support Trump putting forth a nominee (as prescribed by the Constitution), and good to know you will be calling out all forms of democrat hypocrisy.

WTF - you won't even call out this blatant hypocrisy you freaking hypocrite.

I have no issue with Trump putting forth a nominee.

 

[IAHawk2011]

If your response to this situation is “tough shit, Republicans have control of the Senate and can do what they want...”

Surely you would have no issues if Donald Trump won re-election in 2020, appointed a SCOTUS nominee in March 2021, and a Democrat-majority Senate refused to vote on the nominee for the entirety of Trump’s second term?

 

[Jerome Silberman]

Joe Biden is on record in 201

Might want to read the Constitution again, Bucko. The senate is NOT REQUIRED to vote on a nominee. And I hate to tell you this......2016 isn’t the first time the senate refused to vote on a nominee.

Facts are pesky things.

I didn't say the Senate was required to do anything. Nice job with the strawman.

It's no surprise that the point is lost on you.

 

[Fijimn]

When was the law not applied? You do know the Senate has NO OBLIGATION under the Constitution to put a nominee to vote, don’t you?

Implicit in the express duty is the obligation to execute the duty. The Framers never thought that the nation would succumb to your AM Radio-support mouth-breathing philosophy that any branch can just elect not to do their job. That’s why the constitution consists of 4 pages and isn’t a Napoleonic Civil Code.
It’s the same thing when these troglodytes argue that there is no constitutional right to vote. Well that’s because voting is so fundamental to the foundation of a republic that the Framers didn’t think they had to specifically state it.

 

[Titus Andronicus]

So you were upset when Mitch held up the Garland confirmation?

That could come back to bite the Republicans at some point. We are not at that point. Don't forget that Mitch has the power to hold this one up as well. The rules he followed then are the same ones that are extant at the present time.

In any case, given the genetic immorality of the Senate Democrats, and the total commitment to never keeping their word, this is not the time for gentlemanly and Senatorial conduct by Mitch and Company. Mitch should never forget that Schumer, Pelosi and Company are vipers of the first order.

 

[mstp1992]

That could come back to bite the Republicans at some point. We are not at that point. Don't forget that Mitch has the power to hold this one up as well. The rules he followed then are the same ones that are extant at the present time.

In any case, given the genetic immorality of the Senate Democrats, and the total commitment to never keeping their word, this is not the time for gentlemanly and Senatorial conduct by Mitch and Company. Mitch should never forget that Schumer, Pelosi and Company are vipers of the first order.

Anyone who supports Trump cannot be trusted.

 

[RileyHawk]

That could come back to bite the Republicans at some point. We are not at that point. Don't forget that Mitch has the power to hold this one up as well. The rules he followed then are the same ones that are extant at the present time.

In any case, given the genetic immorality of the Senate Democrats, and the total commitment to never keeping their word, this is not the time for gentlemanly and Senatorial conduct by Mitch and Company. Mitch should never forget that Schumer, Pelosi and Company are vipers of the first order.

So..... no. You support the hypocrisy. Got it.

 

[Chishawk1425]

 

[JRHawk2003]

If I am Pelosi I simply dont fund the courts. Forget packing it. Just defund it. Since its all politics now.

 

[haw-key]

You act like Trump got in with a mandate. You psychopath, you realized he lost the popular vote by millions?

All
Of whom are living in one state out left.

 

[haw-key]

He was a moderate pick. However, why wasn’t Garland given the same opportunity for an up or down vote?

All I want is consistent application of the rules, especially from the same senate leadership.

Because the Rs controlled the senate by virtue of prior elections.

 

[ottumwan in tx]

Anyone who supports Trump cannot be trusted.

he is doing a wonderful job and he is president of the usa and is going to be re-elected in a landslide. millions of americans support him.

 

[Chishawk1425]