Merrick Garland: Obama's New Supreme Court Justice

[onejayhawk]

That seems like precisely the opposite of his post above, which hinges on Hillary having an almost certain chance of being elected.

I did not say he said Clinton was unelectable. In his case it Trump.

J

 

[Arakhor]

I'm still waiting.

 

[Camikaze]

Fortunately, in the absence of Scalia the SCOTUS recognized that everyone is governed, whether they are a registered voter or not. Undoubtedly Scalia would have found some way to twist his ruling in favor of the GOP, but since he's dead J and his Republican Texas Independents for the GOP are left sucking eggs.

The Court in 2014 had a higher rate of unanimity (two-thirds) than it has had in decades. What makes you think this case would've been an exception if Scalia were around?

 

[Leoreth]

Simply that the Court is considered better as it sits than it was before Scalia died. Democrats can have a Court the prefer to the old status quo and still make political hay.

So what, it's not a secret that Scalia is universally regarded as a right wing activist judge by Democrats. The court certainly is better off with one less partisan judge.

Yet here you are insinuating that happiness about this circumstance is somehow equatable to the current behavior of the Republican party. You can be happy about Scalia not being on the court anymore and still want to follow the constitution and restore a nine member court as soon as possible through the prescribed process.

Not to mention that Garland is even if arguably left of center still far from being as partisan as Scalia.

The false equivalency to the GOP that is in clear defiance of the constitution and also behaves childishly and irresponsibly by multiple other standards is so daring I almost have to admire that you can put it out here with a straight face. But what else to expect from a Republican partisan.

I wonder how they would feel if Trump were to nominate Ted Cruz.

They would think that Trump made a terrible (and out of character) choice. Then government would proceed as normal.

I agree with the decision. If you want to force words into my mouth, try to get a reasonable idea of how I think. Actually reading posts has been known to help.

Kind of hypocritical considering you just spent the rest of the post mischaracterising the general political position of democrats on SCOTUS.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

The Court in 2014 had a higher rate of unanimity (two-thirds) than it has had in decades. What makes you think this case would've been an exception if Scalia were around?

Because this case was clearly partisan. High rate of unanimous decisions is a fine statistic, but most cases are not really political. In a case where the outcome could directly transfer power to the Republican party did Scalia ever let them down?

 

[Cutlass]

So what, it's not a secret that Scalia is universally regarded as a right wing activist judge by Democrats. The court certainly is better off with one less partisan judge.

Yet here you are insinuating that happiness about this circumstance is somehow equatable to the current behavior of the Republican party. You can be happy about Scalia not being on the court anymore and still want to follow the constitution and restore a nine member court as soon as possible through the prescribed process.

Not to mention that Garland is even if arguably left of center still far from being as partisan as Scalia.

The false equivalency to the GOP that is in clear defiance of the constitution and also behaves childishly and irresponsibly by multiple other standards is so daring I almost have to admire that you can put it out here with a straight face. But what else to expect from a Republican partisan.


They would think that Trump made a terrible (and out of character) choice. Then government would proceed as normal.


Kind of hypocritical considering you just spent the rest of the post mischaracterising the general political position of democrats on SCOTUS.

Even conservatives considered Scalia an activist. The ones who are honest on the subject, anyways.


http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2013/02/voting-rights-act

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-06-26/antonin-scalia-judicial-activist

 

[dutchfire]

Will the Republicans start acting now that their primary is over?

 

[Cutlass]

Obama's still in office. And they can still hope that Hillary will self-destruct over the emails thing so that Trump will win and appoint an anti-textualist political hack activist who will legislate from the bench.

 

[BvBPL]

I don't think anyone knows who Pres. Trump would appoint, including Mr. Trump himself.

 

[Cutlass]

Not the name. Just the type.

 

[Archbob]

Wouldn't be hilarious if he nominated Bill Clinton?

 

[rah]

Obama would be more hilarious.

 

[Flying Pig]

Obama's still in office. And they can still hope that Hillary will self-destruct over the emails thing so that Trump will win and appoint an anti-textualist political hack activist who will legislate from the bench.

If they're hammered in the general election, that could be taken as a sign that they need to tone back on the extreme, divisive, Tea Party-ish tendencies and move back towards a more sane and reasonable way of doing politics - they may conclude that the party of throwing its toys out of the pram is simply unelectable. Of course, they may also do the time-honoured Republican trick of deciding they need a 'proper' conservative candidate and swing even further to the Cruz end.

 

[Cutlass]

If they're hammered in the general election, that could be taken as a sign that they need to tone back on the extreme, divisive, Tea Party-ish tendencies and move back towards a more sane and reasonable way of doing politics - they may conclude that the party of throwing its toys out of the pram is simply unelectable. Of course, they may also do the time-honoured Republican trick of deciding they need a 'proper' conservative candidate and swing even further to the Cruz end.

The latter. What gets lost focusing on the presidential election picture is that the Republicans, taken as a whole, are winning with the strategy of getting ever more radicalized. They are losing some battles, sure. And their long run prospects aren't too bright. But the insane radicalization has won them the control of most of the state governments, with major inroads on many of the other state governments. Their destruction of sound budgeting has won them rollbacks on welfare and social spending everywhere. Their embracement of servicing 'job creators' at the expense of the needy has won them the fact that crony capitalism is a driving force for both parties. They are winning on abortion rights. They are winning on increasing racial segregation. They have won too much, and are still in competition to win too much more, for them to back off, just because they can't win everything.