The Brookings Institution's Russell Wheeler points out that when it comes to judicial nominations, "The president doesn't always get exactly who he wants." I guess that should make us feel better.by KenMy attention was grabbed by the story hawked in yesterday's washingtonpost.com "Post Most" which began:
Iowa Republicans obstructing the Supreme CourtIf I was a senator, I'd be predisposed to vote against Merrick Garland. He's just too conservative. I wrote about it on the day President Obama nominated him. But I would have not the slightest reticence about speaking with him and examining him in an open hearing.
On the day Obama announced his nominee to fill Scalia's job was Merrick Garland, we made it clear what our opinion of the nomination is: Yuck! The political gamesmanship yielded up the most conservative nominee a Democrat has proposed to the Supreme Court in many decades. Terrible choice... but politically strategic.
North Carolina Senator Richard Burr isn't all that popular back home and he'll have to face the voters in November in a race against former state Rep. and former North Carolina head of the ACLU, Deborah Ross. Last week, each won their respective primaries, Burr with 437,136 votes (61.9%) and Ross with 445,772 votes (63.3%). As of the February 24 FEC deadline Burr had spent $2,693,982 on his race and Ross had spent $635,999 on hers.
During a speech Sunday night at his Mar-a-Largo club in Palm Beach, Don Trump told the assorted sycophants in attendance that he's going to have someone-- far right crackpot Jim DeMint, it later turned out-- put a list of 5-10 judges together for him "and those are going to be the judges that I’m going to put in" [for Supreme Court nominations].
Despite fulsome praise from the carefully orchestrated Democratic lapdog organizations, progressives are anything but impressed with Merrick Garland... although many progressives are impressed with President Obama's revitalization of his multi-dimensional chess game against the Senate Republicans. The video from Fox News above is important to watch if you want to follow and comprehend this kabuki theater as it unfolds over the next few months.
We've mentioned that Republican obstructionism over the Supreme Court vacancy could hurt some of the Republican Senate incumbents, particularly Chuck Grassley in Iowa, who the DSCC had originally declared invulnerable.
Senatorial obstructionist clown show, Mitch and ChuckIf you've been following along with the news about President Obama replacing Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, you no doubt noticed that the Republicans have dragged us to the brink of an unprecedented Constitutional crisis. As far as I can tell, this is the first time in the country’s history where a hyper-partisan gaggle of right-wing senators are blatantly and explicitly refusing to do th
Is Miss McConnell losing his touch? Scalia's corpse wasn't even cold yet-- and the GOP conspiracy theories about his death barely formed-- when he screwed up big time by announcing that President Obama would be barred by the Senate from appointing a replacement to the Supreme Court. Any replacement.
In the video above, Ted Cruz is lying his ass off, not because he expects anyone sane will believe him, but because the South Carolina Republican presidential primary is coming up. McConnell, Jeb Bush, Rubio, Herr Trumph, Chuck Grassley and lots of other high profile Republicans have demanded President Obama not appoint a replacement for far right Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. Rubio was on Meet the Press Sunday either demonstrating his ignorance or just lying to the viewers. "Both parties have followed this precedent.
