SCOTUS Limbo Is A Huge Gift For Liberals

[GoLeft TV]

Before Antonin Scalia’s death, the Supreme Court heard arguments on a string cases that will affect the future of public sector unions, the environment, immigration, and voting rights, and without that fifth conservative vote, these cases could spell disaster for both Republicans and corporations.

Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins discusses this with attorney Howard Nations.

[ffr]

1. Republis make me mad as hell!

I DON'T CARE that they’re going to pay a price for obstructing good traditional governing later. I want to picket Mitch McConnell and shame that bastard publicly TODAY! He and his Republis posse of do-nothings need to wear the Scarlet Letter of shame for disrupting our political system so badly.

Make him pay now and make him pay later after the election.

Dirtbag Rupublis!

[the zound of zilence]

2. And the Gift Keeps On Giving

GOP falls into Obama’s trap: Vetting a Republican for the Supreme Court was crafty — and confirmed the right cares about power above country

by Amanda Marcotte

Ever since Justice Antonin Scalia died, President Barack Obama has been handling the Republican freakout over filling his seat on the Supreme Court about as well as he can. While Republicans are climbing over each other to declare that they will never confirm an Obama nominee under any circumstances, Obama has mostly held back. He gave one news conference, ostensibly about other issues, where he struck exactly the right pose of chuckling paternal amusement at the Republicans’ childish behavior and making it clear that he will not stop being president just because they want him to.

But news leaked that Obama was vetting Brian Sandoval, a Republican governor of Nevada, for the job. This was troubling news because while Sandoval is an experienced judge and a moderate on issues like abortion and healthcare, he was not anyone a Democrat would have wanted on the court. Thankfully for Democrats, Sandoval withdrew his name from consideration on Thursday.

Moderate Republicans can be fine as judges on lower courts, but history shows they are a disaster on the Supreme Court. Sandra Day O’Connor and Anthony Kennedy, for instance, have ruled with the liberals on issues like abortion in the past, but they were also responsible for one of the worst decisions in American history, Bush v. Gore, a decision so bad that the justices denied that it should be used as precedent. Considering the disaster that was the Bush administration, that Obama should even consider putting the country at similar risk again seemed wildly irresponsible.

That said, there’s good reason to think that Obama was playing a game here. The source for the Sandoval story, according to the Washington Post, is “two people familiar with the process.” It’s entirely possible, likely even, that the Obama administration leaked this story not because they were seriously considering Sandoval but to gauge how Republicans in the Senate react to this news. Sandoval’s quick withdrawal of his name only adds to the suspicion that he was never a serious contender.

http://www.salon.com/2016/02/26/gop_falls_into_obamas_trap_vetting_a_republican_for_the_supreme_court_was_crafty_and_confirmed_the_right_cares_about_power_above_country/