Republicans Are Right. Delay nomination of Scalia’s successor
February 15, 2016

 
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I can’t remember the last time I said this and may never say it again, so listen up: REPUBLICANS ARE RIGHT. We should delay replacing Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia until after the election. I know how heretical that may sound, but bear with me for a moment while I explain and you may even agree.

The magnitude of this appointment is beyond words. Justice Scalia LED the conservative wing of the Supreme Court. It is difficult (if not impossible) to overstate just how much influence he had on “The Highest Court in the Land”. Of the remaining four Conservative justices on the bench, ALL have cited Scalia as their ideological role-model. Justice Alito supposedly told people that his friends called him “Scalito“, and I believe Justice Thomas only voted differently than Justice Scalia two or three times in his entire career (who will he copy off of now that Antonin is gone?). Roughly 30% of Supreme Court rulings under President Obama came down 5-4 split-decisions, and Republicans know full well that replacing Scalia with a “Liberal” justice would tip the scales in most of those narrow decisions should they be relitigated, so there is absolutely NO chance this Republican controlled Congress will approve a Progressive judge to replace him. And Democrats (including President Obama) know it.

TRIVIA: On stage before a college campus audience, Scalia once suggested that The Second Amendment arguably applied to “shoulder-fired Surface-to-Air Missiles” and even “cannons” if one were made small enough to lift. Any weapon that one could “bear in their arms” qualifies. That would however exempt things like “tanks” and “large mortar canons”, he assured skeptical students.

The most we could hope for is that President Obama nominates a mercurial “Moderate” swing-vote to the court, and even THAT will be a hard sell under this obstructionist Congress if it thinks it has a shot at winning in November.

Congressional Republicans will delay ANY nominee till the November election grows near, and if it looks like the Republican presidential nominee has ANY chance of winning, they will NEVER approve an Obama nominee… even an extremely Conservative one… prior to the election in November (maybe AFTER if they lose, happy to approve a Moderate than give the pick to Clinton or Sanders).

The Supreme court will be in recess most of the Summer and will not reconvene until “the first Monday in October”, so not having an appointed justice during that time won’t impact any rulings. And there is ZERO chance Republicans in Congress will appoint a new justice one month before the election.

I am very confident the Republican Party will not win the presidency in November. They are in total disarray, and the most Moderate candidates are despised by general Conservative voters. They have alienated every non-white non-Christian constituency there is, and Jeb Bush is doing the world a favor by reminding everyone how awful and incompetent his brother’s presidency was.

Yes, there is a chance Republicans could win the presidency and appoint the next Supreme Court justice, but replacing uber-Conservative justice Scalia with another Conservative doesn’t swing the balance of power from where it has been. And the next president is likely to get at least one more nomination.

Whether the Democratic nominee is Hillary (potentially the first woman president) or Sanders (potentially the first Jewish president), the chance to make history will already drive a huge number of Democrats to the polls in November. Knowing that a Supreme Court nomination is on the line as well will only raise the stakes.

I would MUCH rather have a President Sanders or even a President Hilary Clinton picking our next Supreme Court justice. It would be great for either of them to take office already knowing they will have the opportunity to appoint at least one, and it will be impossible for a Republican Congress to stop the appointment of a Supreme Court justice for four full years.

And who knows? Democrats could even retake the Senate in the next election and vote to approve an even MORE Progressive justice than any milquetoast Moderate President Obama could possibly get past this obstructive Republican-controlled Congress (and while I highly doubt he’d accept… nor do I desire it to happen… wouldn’t it be interesting if Obama went straight from the White House to The Supreme Court? If that’s what you’d like to see, your chances are greater if the vacancy is not filled before he leaves.)
 


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February 15, 2016 · Admin Mugsy · No Comments - Add
Posted in: Election, Politics, Seems Obvious to Me

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