Discussion for article #246048
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I’m not getting what the beef is. Seriously, the Republicans are attempting to use Schumer’s old remarks to delay, delay, delay? Nothing in Schumer’s remarks–at least, from what is printed here–is even relatable. These aren’t even straws for which they grasp–as there’s nothing there that even makes sense to attempt to use in this manner.
(Confounded Look on Face) Proceed, Republicans … please proceed.
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Republicans are in full, unified disinformation mode now (what else is new?). This morning, NPR’s David Green interviewed Orrin Hatch who sumptuously lied about the history of confirmation of justices in a president’s final year in office. In stating that the last time this was allowed was in 1916, Hatch conveniently “forgot” about Kennedy’s confirmation by a Dem Senate in 1988 and Green, in pure NPR fashion, let the lie pass unchallenged.
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These types of pronouncements-- push-backs–
need to be coming directly on the heels of the distortions by ®s.
And they need to be coming from the source–
the individuals whose comments are being used out of context-- to make the point.
Over and over. Keep pushing back (D)s.
jw1
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Nom Nom Nom
Okay, sorry, just had to get that out of my system.
Do you think it’s remotely possible that when Mitt Romney ran against Barack Obama in 2012, he warned that a consequence of the election would be that the chosen President would have the power to appoint Supreme Court Justices? And after that warning, the voters re-elected Barack Obama? Tell me again why President Obama should be blocked from his nominee having a full and fair hearing and vote this year.
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I found this: http://www.propublica.org/article/reading-guide-where-romney-and-obama-stand-on-the-supreme-court
Not much said about it at the time.
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Quibbling here–Kennedy was confirmed in the election year, but nominated in November prior.
THANKS. As Turtle and the other Republiscum have asserted, the public should be able to vote. And they did. And Barack Obama is not a one-term president. And his second term has the same four years as his first term.
I DEFINITELY agree with others who have stated that decent people should push back against lies vigorously and promptly. Something that the Democratic establishment has not bothered to do for the past seven years.
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Republicans aren’t merely trying to delay – they are trying to run out the clock on Obama’s presidency, in the hope that a Republican will win in November, and thus will be able to name the new justice.
It is certainly true that both parties have, at times, either blocked the nominations of particular individuals, or have voted nay on the confirmation of particular individuals, in either case based on some stated objection to that individual. And both blocking, or refusing to confirm, individual nominees, can be arguably justified as part of the Senate’s advice and consent role. But McConnell’s announcement, made in his capacity as Senate majority leader, amounted to a prior block (i.e., a refusal to even hold confirmation hearings for) ANY nominee the President might name to fill this particular position, based not on any specific objection (indeed, there can be no specific objection when there have been no nominations yet made), but rather based solely on the identity of the President who happens to make the nomination. And that is new (and an outragous new low).
In response to the flurry of criticism McConnell’s announcement sparked, Republicans dug up these remarks by Schumer in an effort to lessen the outrage over McConnell’s statement by saying, “See, this proves Democrats have done it, too.” But in fact, no, Democrats have not done it. As I’ve pointed out to several folks in the last several days, a lone senator, expressing his opinion (and in a very specific context) about what he thought Democrats should do in the wake of Alito’s and Roberts’s dissembling during their confirmation hearings, addressed not to a specific, actual vacancy, but to hypothetical vacancies, is not at all the same thing as the Senate Majority Leader, in the face of an actual, current vacancy, announcing what his party will do (or rather, won’t do).
So, the “beef” is that Republicans are trying to draw an invalid equivalence between McConnell’s announcement and Schumer’s expression of his opinion, in an attempt to make their shameless obstruction appear to be just “business as usual,” when it is nothing of the sort.
Personally, I don’t think Senate blocks on nominations should be permitted at all. They arise not from the Constitution, but from the Senate’s operational rules. While it is true that the Constitution allows each house of Congress to set its own rules, I seriously doubt it was ever the framers’ intent that the operational rules of the Senate could effectively supplant and override the Constitution’s express provision that, in the event of a vacancy on the Supreme Court, the Senate will give fair consideration of, and vote to confirm or to not confirm, a nominee named by the sitting president pursuant to the procedure the same Constitution provides. At a minimum, they should be required to conduct confirmation hearings for any nominee the President puts forward.
I totally agree with your comments. The phrasing of my original post wasn’t very clear – my point was I believe the GOP (McConnell, in particular, being the top senator) are moving the goalposts in what we would normally consider the “grieving time.” Everyone with a brain expected these jerks to politicize Scalia’s death – after all, it’s just what he would have wanted. He must be looking up from Hell right now, belly-laughing at how well McConnell, Cruz and the others seem to be playing this event to their advantage. Only time will tell how well. I’m hoping the general population will get nauseated over how the GOP is acting in the face of the death of someone so beloved–granted, by nothing more than haters–on their side. I couldn’t stand Scalia, but he has a family – and they deserved to have at least a few more days while his corpse cooled without this major sideshow.
Again, we are in total agreement. The idea that a sole member of this elite body has the power to block a nomination by the President – the President that (presumably) the majority of voters chose – is not an idea with which I agree nor support, even though technically the Senate writes its own rules.
Great post, by the way.
Thanks – and thanks for clarifying your position also! Yes, we are in agreement here.
Cheers!