Pretty weak sauce. Just proves to me your integrity is malleable according to your politics.bear2be2 said:First, I was 2 years old when Bork was rejected. Second, I don't have a problem with someone who opposed the Civil Rights Act and other anti-discriminatory legislation being rejected -- particularly given that he was the only nominee to be so in a span of 16 supreme court confirmation hearings dating from 1970 to 2010.Oldbear83 said:I'd be a lot more impressed if you spoke up like this and defended qualified nominees like Bork. Far as I am concerned the Democrats' conduct during the Kavanaugh hearings and the impeachment trial told me they are to be opposed and defeated at every turn.bear2be2 said:This is a long thread, so I understand if you haven't read the whole thing. But I'm pretty sure I already addressed this and agree with you on both the ethics and prudence of changing senate rules for partisan purposes.Osodecentx said:bearbear2be2 said:Like so many other things that both parties have tried to normalize in recent decades, this is not typical senate behavior. To paint it as business as usual just isn't accurate.Sam Lowry said:On the contrary, of the thirty-five Supreme Court nominations that have failed, only twelve received a vote on the floor. Two of John Tyler's nominations were tabled for almost a year.bear2be2 said:There is no precedent one can point to for McConnell's decision to ignore a duly appointed supreme court nominee without so much as a vote on the senate floor. The only thing anyone can throw out there is the so-called Biden Rule, which was never actually tested ... and which McConnell/the Republicans have refused to make official senate policy.Sam Lowry said:I know you're genuinely concerned about fairness and the Constitution, but I couldn't disagree more with this post. McConnell didn't change anything. In these circumstances it has always been difficult for a president to appoint a justice when his party didn't control the Senate. When they do control the Senate, it's a completely different matter. Like it or not, the Republicans are acting consistently and according to precedent.bear2be2 said:The constitution was interpreted the same way on this issue from its ratification in 1788 until Mitch McConnell unilaterally decided to change it in 2016. To pretend or suggest otherwise is willful ignorance.FWBear said:bear2be2 said:Bull**** . He was never presented. The constitutional process was not followed and you guys know it. You just don't care.BornAgain said:
The Senate must not have approved of his selection. So the nomination wasn't presented. It's that simple
Having a hissy fit doesn't change that the Constitution doesn't say whatever you think it says.
If the Republicans had voted and chosen not to confirm Garland, which they had the votes to do, it would have been one thing. Still wrong IMO, given that he was both duly appointed and extremely well qualified, but it would have been consistent with the senate's constitutional duties. To ignore the appointment entirely as though it never happened with eight months remaining in a sitting president's term and leave the court short a justice for more than a year was an unprecedented (and IMO chicken****) move by a chicken**** politician who has done as much as anyone in either house of congress to create the toxic partisan climate that has paralyzed and essentially delegitimized our legislature.
So while, yes, it is always difficult for a president to appoint a justice without control of the senate, we have never seen a senate majority leader act as childishly as McConnell did in 2016 -- a move that is all but guaranteed to make an overt hypocrite of him and his fellow Republican partisans.
And if you look at the confirmation vote tallies of justices before and after the Merrick Garland incident, I don't see any way one can conclude that McConnell's actions in 2016 have done anything but further partisanize the supreme court appointment process -- a development that will have devastating consequences for this country.
There is one course of action that would be truly unprecedented, and it happens to be the very one that Democrats are insisting on. Never in our history has a president simply refused to fill a seat when his party controlled the Senate.
I'm not trying to convince you to support Trump or his nominee to SCOTUS. I am trying to convince you that the rules of the US Senate do not equal the Constitution. There is a difference.
The Senate rules exist to facilitate the execution of the Constitutional duties assigned to the Senate.
Harry Reid changed the Senate rules concerning the confirmation of federal judges. I didn't like it then and I suspect you didn't like them as McConnell used them to confirm Kavanaugh or kill Obama's nomination of Garland. "Advise and Consent" isn't defined in the Constitution. Advise and Consent is defined as the Senate wishes it and no court can overrule it because of the Separation of Powers in the Constitution.
The powers of the Senate majority leader were radically changed when LBJ became the Leader. The powers of the Leader are not enumerated in the Constitution, but rather in the rules of the Senate. Same thing applies to the filibuster. It isn't in the Constitution.
I didn't like the way G.W. Bush's judicial nominees were treated by the Democrat minority. They used the filibuster rules to kill good nominees, but senators used the Senate rules to accomplish that. They were not guaranteed an up or down vote.
Schumer is talking about changing Senate rules to do away with filibusters. I don't like that.
He who laughs today weeps tomorrow.
But perpetuating this tit for tat because "they started it" all but ensures that it will never end, and we'll be stuck with the ****ty brand of partisan politics that has put us in our current situation.
I don't care who's more responsible for the current toxic state of our congressional politics. I despise both parties. I just want it to end. And as long as the electorate is content to allow their team to bend or break the rules because (or before) the other team does it, that will never happen.
It's about the bridges burned, and too damn bad if you want to rethink that move now.
Reagan's other nominees were confirmed by votes of 99-0, 65-33, 98-0, 97-0. Bork clearly had red flags that O'Connor, Rehnquist, Scalia and Kennedy didn't.
That which does not kill me, will try again and get nastier