Posted on 03/16/2016 8:49:06 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Crafty of O to wait until the morning after Trump’s backbreaking wins last night to stick McConnell with this. Now Senate Republicans will face maximum pressure from both sides.
If they cave and decide to give Garland a hearing after all, Republican voters who are still cool to Trump might decide to vote for him in a burst of “burn it all down” rage. A betrayal here hands Trump the nomination — assuming there’s any doubt that he’s already on track to win it. If, on the other hand, McConnell stands firm, he’s blowing an opportunity to confirm a nominee who’s likely to be more “moderate” than what President Hillary will offer next year. The conventional wisdom on Trump right now is that he’s a dead duck in the general election barring some sort of national crisis. I don’t agree with it, but it’s not out of left field: His favorable rating, for instance, is toxic and it’s an open question whether he could organize a national campaign capable of matching Hillary’s. If McConnell agrees with that CW, that Hillary’s a prohibitive favorite to win and that the backlash to Trump will hand Democrats the Senate, then refusing to confirm Garland now clears the path for Democrats to nominate and confirm a young hyper-liberal justice next year. Garland is already in his 60s and is no far-lefty; if Hillary wins big, liberals will insist that she exploit her mandate by engineering a new Warren Court. (Garland, ironically, clerked for the most liberal member of the Warren Court but he hasn’t followed the same trajectory as a judge.) So what do you do if you’re Mitch the Knife? Accept a quarter-loaf here by confirming a guy whose centrist credentials will be used to show just how unreasonable and obstructionist the GOP is in blocking him? Or risk having no loaf at all when Democrats win this fall and ram through whoever they want?
Another possibility: What if Trump wins the presidency but Democrats reclaim the Senate? Normally that would seem like an improbable outcome, but Trump could theoretically get enough Democrats and independents to cross over for him that he ends up beating Hillary even as those same Dems and indies hand a Senate majority to Chuck Schumer. In that case, even if Trump’s inclined to nominate a solid conservative, the nominee’s apt to get Borked. Trump may have no choice but to float a center-right justice, someone not wildly more conservative than Garland himself. And this assumes Trump’s true to his word that he’d aim for right-wing nominees for the Court. It may be that he wins the election and governs essentially as an independent, a la Mike Bloomberg in New York. How much better would his nominee be than Garland in that case, especially with Schumer exercising veto power?
This is why, contra my esteemed colleague, I think Garland will be confirmed. The question is when. At a minimum, McConnell won’t move on it until Trump’s nomination is assured; like I said up top, there’s too much risk of a voter backlash in the primaries to do it before then. He could move on it this summer, after Trump has clinched. Republican voters would still be outraged, but at that point the GOP establishment will quietly be working hand in glove with Trump to get him elected. If angry GOPers decide to “punish” McConnell by going to the polls for Trump in November, so much the better for the party. (It may even convince some #NeverTrumpers to give Trump, the supposed scourge of Washington Republicans, a second look.) The big wrinkle, obviously, is that angry Republican voters will also punish any GOP senator who’s up for reelection if they support McConnell’s plan to confirm Garland. But that’s no huge obstacle to confirmation: With 46 Democrats prepared to vote yes, McConnell would need just 14 Republicans to break a filibuster. Between blue-staters like Mark Kirk and stalwart centrists like Lindsey Graham, he should be able to find the votes. And if the whole thing proves simply too hot to handle before the election, there’s always the option of confirming Garland during the lame-duck session — although that could lead to some interesting strategizing too. Ahem:
Imagine December: a lame-duck GOP Sen rushing to confirm Garland & Dems filibustering so Clinton can choose someone younger, more liberal.
— Matthew Miller (@matthewamiller) March 16, 2016
Another version of that scenario circulating on social media this morning is that Obama will yank Garland’s nomination this fall if Hillary wins, precisely in order to deny Republicans the chance to confirm him. I don’t buy it. Unless Garland is a very, very loyal party soldier who agreed to be little more than a political pawn for Democrats in this battle, he expects to be given every opportunity at confirmation. The lame-duck session would be his best opportunity. I assume he’s sought Obama’s assurance that his nomination won’t be withdrawn for any petty political reason; that’s the least O can do for him in return for Garland accepting a nomination that’s more likely to end in failure than most would-be SCOTUS appointments. Democrats could filibuster him, although that’d be a bizarre ending to the coming seven months of “CONFIRM GARLAND NOW” propaganda from the White House and its congressional allies. (McConnell would need only six Democratic votes to break a filibuster, assuming all 54 Republicans vote to confirm.) Frankly, I’m not convinced that President Hillary wouldn’t feel obliged to re-nominate Garland if the GOP really did succeed in bottling him up all the way to January. Even as a center-lefty, he’d tilt the Court to a solid liberal majority and there are enough aging justices that she’d likely have a second opportunity soon to go full metal liberal with a nomination.
Bottom line: This guy’s going to replace Scalia, sooner or later.
It’s hard to listen to the arguments on Judge Merrick..
I have a Bork in my ear.
The guy is a shoe in. GOPe only has lies.
AllahPundit wastes an awful lot of words to say nothing except repeat Twitter and Facebook pronouncements from ignoramuses.
I can think of 5 RINOs without breaking a sweat who would confirm if there’s a vote.
All based on supposition.
That piece PERFECTLY illustrates why we have come to hate the D.C. Establishment with a white-hot seething hatred.
Really need the “Conservative” media to stop pretending they have a magic crystal ball and know what will happen in the remaining primaries and in Nov.
This habit they have of stating their emotion based opinions as if they were fact is irrational.
Merrick is definitely anti-gun. Just read some of his opinions.
This is a good test for Trump to see if he supports his nomination or not.
Allah pundit is usually an idiot.
He is right on this, at least in terms of the thinking of the R’s and D’s.
If they don’t confirm this guy, they will get a crazy über lefty nominee after Hillary wins.
But, that’s assuming the R’s lose the Senate. If they still have the Senate they don’t have to confirm anyone.
Or they know even with a majority they will fold to Hillsry.
“That piece PERFECTLY illustrates why we have come to hate the D.C. Establishment with a white-hot seething hatred.”
Amen to that, Brother.
READ THIS ABOUT JUDGE GARLAND’s BACKGROUND:
http://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/432716/moderates-are-not-so-moderate-merrick-garland
EXCERPT:
Garland has a long record, and, among other things, it leads to the conclusion that he would vote to reverse one of Justice Scalia’s most important opinions, D.C. vs. Heller, which affirmed that the Second Amendment confers an individual right to keep and bear arms.
Back in 2007, Judge Garland voted to undo a D.C. Circuit court decision striking down one of the most restrictive gun laws in the nation. The liberal District of Columbia government had passed a ban on individual handgun possession, which even prohibited guns kept in one’s own house for self-defense. A three-judge panel struck down the ban, but Judge Garland wanted to reconsider that ruling.
He voted with Judge David Tatel, one of the most liberal judges on that court. As Dave Kopel observed at the time, the “[t]he Tatel and Garland votes were no surprise, since they had earlier signaled their strong hostility to gun owner rights” in a previous case. Had Garland and Tatel won that vote, there’s a good chance that the Supreme Court wouldn’t have had a chance to protect the individual right to bear arms for several more years.
Moreover, in the case mentioned earlier, Garland voted with Tatel to uphold an illegal Clinton-era regulation that created an improvised gun registration requirement. Congress prohibited federal gun registration mandates back in 1968, but as Kopel explained, the Clinton Administration had been “retaining for six months the records of lawful gun buyers from the National Instant Check System.” By storing these records, the federal government was creating an informal gun registry that violated the 1968 law.
Worse still, the Clinton program even violated the 1994 law that had created the NICS system in the first place. Congress directly forbade the government from retaining background check records for law abiding citizens.
Garland thought all of these regulations were legal, which tells us two things. First, it tells us that he has a very liberal view of gun rights, since he apparently wanted to undo a key court victory protecting them. Second, it tells us that he’s willing to uphold executive actions that violate the rights of gun owners.
That’s not so moderate, is it?
READ THIS ABOUT JUDGE GARLAND’s BACKGROUND:
http://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/432716/moderates-are-not-so-moderate-merrick-garland
EXCERPT:
Garland has a long record, and, among other things, it leads to the conclusion that he would vote to reverse one of Justice Scalia’s most important opinions, D.C. vs. Heller, which affirmed that the Second Amendment confers an individual right to keep and bear arms.
Back in 2007, Judge Garland voted to undo a D.C. Circuit court decision striking down one of the most restrictive gun laws in the nation. The liberal District of Columbia government had passed a ban on individual handgun possession, which even prohibited guns kept in one’s own house for self-defense. A three-judge panel struck down the ban, but Judge Garland wanted to reconsider that ruling.
He voted with Judge David Tatel, one of the most liberal judges on that court. As Dave Kopel observed at the time, the “[t]he Tatel and Garland votes were no surprise, since they had earlier signaled their strong hostility to gun owner rights” in a previous case. Had Garland and Tatel won that vote, there’s a good chance that the Supreme Court wouldn’t have had a chance to protect the individual right to bear arms for several more years.
Moreover, in the case mentioned earlier, Garland voted with Tatel to uphold an illegal Clinton-era regulation that created an improvised gun registration requirement. Congress prohibited federal gun registration mandates back in 1968, but as Kopel explained, the Clinton Administration had been “retaining for six months the records of lawful gun buyers from the National Instant Check System.” By storing these records, the federal government was creating an informal gun registry that violated the 1968 law.
Worse still, the Clinton program even violated the 1994 law that had created the NICS system in the first place. Congress directly forbade the government from retaining background check records for law abiding citizens.
Garland thought all of these regulations were legal, which tells us two things. First, it tells us that he has a very liberal view of gun rights, since he apparently wanted to undo a key court victory protecting them. Second, it tells us that he’s willing to uphold executive actions that violate the rights of gun owners.
That’s not so moderate, is it?
“This is a good test for Trump to see if he supports his nomination or not.”
Yes. He will wait to see what Cruz says.
AllahPundit is a nasty liberal
If Republicans back track we BURN DOWN THE HOUSE and I am not kidding. Recall Senators and get Rid of any incumbent who votes for it. I doubt in this highly charged election season anyone is going to go out on a limb.
“Crafty of O to wait until the morning after Trump’s backbreaking wins last night to stick McConnell with this. Now Senate Republicans will face maximum pressure from both sides. If they cave and decide to give Garland a hearing after all”
Ridiculous. A hearing could stretch all the way through the elections and end up with a no vote. We could hammer this for months when we need the press the most. Obama was only crafty in knowing we would jump on the chance to be tough guys and end up looking like the “obstructionist part” which will feed right into their campaign. This tactic is absurd. A hearing does not equal an appointment. Let’s Bork the SOB. It took over a year for that horror show. THAT would be getting even.
Are 60 in the Senate needed to Confirm, or just a majority?
Priceless...
December 19, 2001 The American Prospect listed him as a “First Tier” pick for SCOTUS should Al Gore be President
http://prospect.org/article/contenders-high-court
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