Posted on 03/21/2016 7:07:20 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
In his latest column, George Will charges that Senate Republicans have had an “incoherent response to the Supreme Court vacancy” that “is a partisan reflex in search of a justifying principle.” But it’s Will’s attack on Senate Republicans that lacks coherence:
1. Will purports to present five reasons that Senate Republicans have provided for their determination to keep the vacancy open until after the election. But his presentation of those supposed reasons isn’t at all fair.
For starters, Will entirely omits what I understand to be the predominant reason: that filling the Scalia vacancy with an Obama pick would drive the Court markedly to the Left on a vast range of issues and that the impending elections ought to give the American people the opportunity to decide whether we want to go down that route to perdition.
Of the reasons that Will does attribute to Republicans, his first (“right to be obdurate”–Will’s tendentious casting of the fact that the Constitution does not require Senate action), third (Joe Biden’s 1992 comments), and fourth (Democrats would do the same)–are responses to Democratic claims, not the affirmative reasons for the Republican course. And his fifth–the one he condemns as “most contradictory and least conservative”–is one that I don’t recognize and don’t recall hearing anyone make: that “the court’s supposedly fragile legitimacy is endangered” if the vacancy is filled before the election.
Will’s second reason is closer to the mark: that President Obama’s “demonstrated contempt for the Constitution’s explicit text and for implicit constitutional manners” justifies the Republican course. But here again Will presents the reason in a hostile manner (“Republicans reciprocating with contempt”) and fails to connect it at all to the broader purpose of preventing the consolidation of a liberal Court majority that would display the same contempt for the Constitution.
2. Will opposes the “judicial restraint” that he thinks Merrick Garland would practice as a justice. Set aside that Will lumps together the very different matters of deference towards congressional enactments and deference to the regulatory state and that he doesn’t even explore whether Garland could plausibly be expected to break from the four liberals on the Court by practicing judicial restraint on constitutional questions.
If Will thinks that Garland would move the Court in the wrong direction (a conclusion that flows from Will’s positions but that Will never acknowledges), why is he faulting Senate Republicans for not moving to confirm him? Or is it just that Will would prefer that they ground their opposition entirely on arguments against Chevron deference?
3. Much of Will’s criticism (as the column’s title “Do Republicans really think Donald Trump will make a good Supreme Court choice?” indicates) is directed against Republicans “who vow to deny Garland a hearing and who pledge to support Donald Trump if he is their party’s nominee.” Well, what about those of us who ardently criticize Trump and are hoping that Ted Cruz will win the nomination? Further, if, God forbid, Trump is our next president, there is indeed a substantial prospect (reasonable people can debate the percentages) that he would nominate someone for the vacancy who would not drive the Court decisively to the Left. That’s reason enough to work to keep the vacancy open.
In short, it makes no sense for Will to translate his disgust for Donald Trump (a disgust I fully share) into an attack on Senate Republicans.
This gutless quisling said yesterday he would vote for a Republican third party. Maybe he’ll throw a going away party for Obama, to round out the welcoming party he threw for him.
It is really hard to believe that Will is a conservative.
It there a ‘self-serving party’.
He’d be a perfect fit.
The start of National Review and George Will going at each other? Nice, idiot globalists eating their own. Let’s have more of this.
Will is mistaken in his belief that Republicans need some other cogent and principled explanation for their seeming reticence to act on Obama’s third bite at the USSC apple. The truth is that as the majority party they NEED NONE! It is that simple, George.
What George is trying to do is to keep this debate in HIS home field, his bailey-wick, HIS turf where pundits gather every Sunday on TV and talk about how all us stupid Americans out here in drive-by America “just don’t get it.”
George, and Bill and Charles and all the other quisling incessant pustules of pomposity sat there for YEARS on those damned TV sets all hovered round talking about Obama as a legitimate, well-intentioned president and not the America-destroying Muslim that he is. They sat there Sunday after Sunday, month after month, year after year telling us idiots out here what ‘conservatism’ is about and how we had to go-along to get-along.
I’ve got news for you, George - go f@ck yourself. And take the rest of those a$$holes you klatch with every Sunday with you. Putz.
In the fall of 2011, the Pennsylvania legislature had a bill introduced to allocate our presidential electors on the same basis as Maine and Nebraska: 2 for the winner of the state, 1 for the winner of each congressional district. At best, it could have changed the electoral math for the entire country. At worst, it would have at least ensured that we get more than cameo campaigning during a national election.
There was solid GOP majorities in both houses and a GOP governor pledged to sign it if passed. A column from George Will and opposition from the state GOP chairman ensured it never made it out of committee.
The GOP in the Senate should move as quickly as the DoJ is on indicting Hillary. Bring Hillary up on charges of violating the Public Records Act of 1950 - keep it simple - she failed to “take care” of public documents. Don’t get bogged down in secret, sensitive, top secret...they are simply public records hidden from the State Department in her duties as SoS. The concrns at NSA, treason, and espionage charges will fall in line, but INDICT! Then, and only then, should the Senate take up the SCOTUS vacancy. Blocking the prosecution of Hillary has become equally indefensible. A violation of the Act prevents her from running for office. The Senators also have pens and phones, and if the President’s AG wouldn’t Act, maybe the Senate shouldn’t act either. Pretend the pens are dry and the phones are busy.
It is nice to see ‘tit for tat’ for once. Usually the Pubies get all indignant and refused to do what the democrats have done in the past because it is beneath them.
I guess Will thinks that Supreme court appointments are the way they used to be - the prez would nominate someone, and unless something horrible was found in his past, he got approved by the senate in rubber-stamp fashion. That all changed with Bork, and it is useless to pine for the good old days of civility that are long gone.
You don't confirm the Supreme Court nominee of a President who openly refuses to faithfully execute the laws of the country. Congress is perfectly right in trying to restore the checks and balances that are the core of our political system, and if using the power of the purse to shut down the government is too drastic, then freezing judicial nominees is a perfect middle ground.
I could believe that Will once had a brain. However, he has had it marinating so long in the Beltway Cocoon that he is no longer capable of coherent thought. When you live, eat, breathe, read, and think only in the DC Beltway your brain always turns to mush. The only issue is how long it takes.
Your comment was repeated in this mind as well. Is the new norm a writer making foolish remarks and another from the same gang follow to contradict those stupid opinions? It is an entirely different MO. And Will did need a ‘slap down’ Will, you’ve not only lost your pedestal, you’ve lost your standing location as well.
I don’t like Will one bit (never have) but he is spot on abot one thing ...have the damn vote.
Not even voting is having an unquestionable effect on vulnerable GOP Senators. Have the hearings, have the vote ... and vote him down.
This is an horrific strategy decision that has zero upside. You STILL don’t need to put him on the bench but this strategy is the strategy of cowardice.
They can’t have the vote BECAUSE we have to many pubbies who will NEVER stand their ground!!! McCain, Graham, Collins, will all vote him in they ALL know these spineless idiots have NO GUTS to fight ANYTHING!!!
If there is a vote he will be confirmed. The GOP (opposition party?) simply can’t hold the line. On anything.
George Will knows Trump is going to be President and doesn’t want them to confirm a conservative.
It is really hard to believe that Will is a conservative.
It there a ‘self-serving party’.
He’d be a perfect fit.
It’s a beltway careerist party. “Conservatives” like Will have far more in common with leftist Washingtonians than the unwashed GOP base in flyover country.
George Will is a parody of George Will, Bezos will have him opposite of a blue hair Social Justice Warrior twink who got her start blogging on Tumblr against fat shaming. Will is a SNL skit in the making, it will be him sitting opposite a Keith Olbermann character that is spewing insane rhetoric while Will mumbles on about 18th century British philosopher/statesmen. Will became a millionaire by legitimizing the crazy left, what a fraud.
Very little that he’s said in the last few years rises above mush.
We should require them to carry a ‘careerist crony card’.
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