Feingold writes: "While Russia's involvement in our elections is unquestionably horrible, and it will likely take many more drip, drip, drips before we know the full extent of it, our democracy is facing an equally devastating threat much closer to home."
'Republican senators abandoned their constitutional responsibilities and blocked Judge Garland’s nomination last year.' (photo: Carolyn Kaster/AP)
If Gorsuch Is Confirmed, the Legitimacy of the US Supreme Court Won't Recover
20 March 17
Never before has Senate leadership so openly and intentionally played political games with our highest court. The consequences are staggering
hile Russia’s involvement in our elections is unquestionably horrible, and it will likely take many more drip, drip, drips before we know the full extent of it, our democracy is facing an equally devastating threat much closer to home.
On Monday, when Judge Gorsuch’s confirmation hearing is scheduled to begin, the Republicans will attempt to complete their cynical political takeover of the US supreme court, launched last year when they failed to confirm or to even give a hearing to Judge Merrick Garland.
Never before has Senate leadership so openly and intentionally played political games with our highest court. Already, the legitimacy of the supreme court has taken a severe blow because of it. But, if Gorsuch is confirmed, it would lock in a dangerous precedent from which the legitimacy of our highest court might never recover.
Republican senators abandoned their constitutional responsibilities and blocked Judge Garland’s nomination last year, for 293 days, leaving the court without a deciding vote on critical issues. They offered no legal justification for their actions, fully admitting that their sole intention was to orchestrate a coup of the supreme court by betting that a Republican would win the White House.
Some even pledged to keep the seat vacant for four more years in the event that a Democrat won the White House. The severity of this action and what it will mean for the court if Gorsuch is confirmed cannot be understated.
Confirming Gorsuch would endorse and normalize unconstitutional political games. It would encourage both parties to use and expand this strategy in the future, at the expense of our highest court and its critical role in our judicial system.
This time it was the last year of a president’s term, next it will be the year before midterm elections. It won’t be long before it extends to the whole two-year presidential campaign, amounting to three years of any presidential term where a supreme court seat cannot be filled.
And it is not just the supreme court that will be affected, as the strategy will be used to block appointments to lower courts. This is a slippery slope that ends with decimating the legitimacy of an entire branch of government, and the resulting checks and balances on which our democracy depends.
I have always considered the supreme court our country’s safety valve. When everything else fails, the court is there to protect the constitution and protect our civil rights. But today, the most important safety valve is the US Senate, specifically those senators with the conviction to fight for the legitimacy of the supreme court.
Judge Gorsuch might be qualified. He might be a fine judge. But the vacancy on the supreme court does not belong to him.
When President Trump took office, he had three options for filling the vacancy. He could have renominated Judge Garland, rectifying the wrong committed by the Republican party last year. He could have worked with both parties to nominate a consensus candidate, at least recognizing the need to reaffirm the legitimacy of the court by not validating the Republicans’ coup. Or he could do what he did – nominate a partisan judge, completely validating the Republicans’ coup and locking it in as a precedent.
Preventing this precedent and its resulting slippery slope now falls to the Senate. Democratic and independent senators, and any Republicans who still care about the legitimacy of the supreme court, must filibuster Gorsuch’s nomination.
They must demand that Judge Garland be renominated, or at a minimum, that a consensus candidate be selected with input from both parties – a nominee that will restore confidence in our nomination process, our judicial branch and our system of checks and balances.
Merely delaying Gorsuch’s hearing until after an investigation into Russia’s involvement is completed is not enough. His nomination represents a completely separate threat to our country from Trump’s troubling ties to Russia. The Republicans’ judicial coup spat in the face of our constitution, and a nomination that locks that in as a precedent cannot be accepted under any circumstances.
It is not hypocritical to try to right this wrong. It would be unconstitutional not to. The Senate, specifically Senate Democrats and independents, and any Republicans who care about our constitution, must do everything in their power to block Gorsuch’s nomination and demand the legitimacy of our supreme court be restored through the nomination of a consensus candidate.
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That aside, if Trump and campaign officials' collusion is proven, why wouldn't that moot Gorsuch's nomination?
No to mention that the Trump/Russia thing is all bullshit. They things the Dems are harping on are not crimes and are not at all unusual.
The Missing Logic of Russia-gate
https://consortiumnews.com/2017/03/20/the-missing-logic-of-russia-gate/
"It's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard rain gonna fall" to the cheering crowds. It's time to admit there has been a full on coup.
First, "proven" is in the eyes of the beholder to some degree, and Republican eyes will be averted from any evidence that the Rump may have been involved in a criminal conspiracy with a foreign government to subvert the 2016 presidential election in his favor.
And second, even if Trump were impeached and removed, President Mike Pence would probably go ahead with the Gorsuch nomination.
Not really a surprise.
If you look at the source before reading any given article on RSN, a goodly % are by "The Guardian", which publishes "controversial" (by US censored standards) correspondence that the US owner-media wouldn't touch with surgical gloves, so intertwined are they with the corrupt government.
Obama should have nominated a progressive and Democrats should have done whatever was necessary to force a vote.
Trump could have nominated Merrick Garland, who is a basically a moderate Republican, and if he truly wanted unity he would have nominated Garland.
Watching the hearings one is struck by Gorsuch's pleasant manner. Conservatives know what plays. They just don't intend to follow through with reason. This guy is toxic and should not be approved.
Democrats should fight him tooth and nail, otherwise they are complicit, as they have been so often in the past.
- don't fall for the myth that neocons want to drown gov't in a tub - neocons crave to rule the planet as its only superpower - it is taxes on us 90% that fuels all neocon ambition
It is tempting to despair and give up but the stakes are too high. We DO have some advantages. First we are right. Most Americans agree with us on the issues. Secondly, we have Bernie Sanders, the most popular politician in the nation. Thirdly, we have the energetic, bright young people on our side. They're not as tired as we are ;-) Also, we have social media, a resource that wasn't available to generations of activists before us. It seems we can count on some members of the judiciary. We do outnumber the villains.
I understand your despair but please don't give up hope. Things will change for the better eventually. If you look at history even the most horrific times come to an end, and the more each of us participates the sooner it will happen.
We need whistleblowers. We need to organize. We need to convince Independents and non-voters .. we need better politicians.
- rip van Femihumanist?
Key Democratic Officials Now Warning Base Not to Expect Evidence of Trump/Russia Collusion
https://theintercept.com/2017/03/16/key-democratic-officials-now-warning-base-not-to-expect-evidence-of-trumprussia-collusion/
The Democrats' Anti-Russia Campaign Falls Apart (Updated)
http://www.moonofalabama.org/2017/03/the-democrats-anti-russia-campaign-falls-apart.html
Dermokratiya, USA
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/03/russia-us-clinton-boris-yeltsin-elections-interference-trump/
The Missing Logic of Russia-gate
https://consortiumnews.com/2017/03/20/the-missing-logic-of-russia-gate/
NYT’s ‘Tinfoil Hat’ Conspiracy Theory
https://consortiumnews.com/2017/03/19/nyts-tinfoil-hat-conspiracy-theory/
Second, the Supreme Court has been delegitimized since the 2010 Citizens United decision. That slippery slope started with the abysmal, absurd 1886 Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad decision which supposedly declared that corporations had the same rights as human beings.
That 1886 decision was further worsened by the 1976 Buckley v. Valeo decision which declared that money equaled speech.
I believe it's the only decision Justice O'Connor publicly said she regretted.
There seems to be a pattern emerging:
Progressives try to maintain reason and talk sense.
Progressives are attacked and vilified -- by Democrats.
Progressives are proved right.
Repeat.
There are some fine legal minds in the SCOTUS, no doubt, but it has the reputation of being excessively partisan, and that did not start only when GWB was put into office by 5 people. (Some democracy that!) The Feingold whine does not come close to touching the fundamental issue, which seems to me to be that the moneyed interests, or the M-I-C, control all three branches of your government.
The much-vaunted "democracy" is a patina. It would have been more than that with a President Sanders.
These guys just sit around thinking up ways to surrender.
To paraphrase Gandalf: He should not pass!
This is what is happening. There are enough un-informed, uneducated and non-critical thinking people who listened to a con man selling snake oil (Trump) and voted for a madman to "govern" America and have his finger on the nuclear button.
Greed, corruption and ignorance have taken over our nation. Now we just have to work harder to take it back for our kids.
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