During the Obama years, when Democrats were in charge, the NY Times was very much against the GOP using the filibuster, and very much approved of using the nuclear option. Of course, that belief changed when Republicans took over the Senate, and, suddenly, filibusters by Democrats were great examples of Democracy!!!! in action and the nuclear option should never be used.
Well, now the Democrats plan on filibustering Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch. It was just a little under two months ago that the NY Times was telling Democrats not to filibuster Gorsuch, because it could cause Republicans to use the nuclear option. But, now….
Editorial: A Roadblock to the Court for Neil Gorsuch
Senate Republicans had to know there would be a price for their unprecedented theft of President Barack Obama’s final Supreme Court pick last year.
On Thursday, Chuck Schumer, the Senate minority leader, named it: Either find 60 votes to overcome a filibuster of President Trump’s extremely conservative nominee, Judge Neil Gorsuch, or find another, more moderate choice. (snip)
Judge Gorsuch is clearly qualified for the court, and for the most part he handled himself smoothly over 20 hours of mind-numbingly predictable hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee. There’s also no question he would be a conservative vote on many of the most pressing issues facing the court, including abortion and reproductive rights, gay rights, religious liberty, gun-safety legislation, protections for workers and the environment, the flood of private money into political campaigns and more. Despite his insistence that he would approach every case with an open mind, his record strongly suggests he would rule the way Republicans would like in most, if not all, cases. Over three or four decades on the court, he would help push the law further to the right in many areas.
So, clearly qualified.
The best rationale for the filibuster, however, is the outrageous behavior of Mr. Schumer’s Republican colleagues, who refused even to consider Judge Merrick Garland, Mr. Obama’s highly qualified choice to fill the vacancy created by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, in February 2016 — solely to hold the seat open for a conservative judge.
While eliminating the filibuster would pay off for Republicans salivating for Judge Gorsuch right now, they might keep in mind that one day, perhaps sooner than they expect, they will be in the minority again, and then they’ll be stuck with one rule of politics they can’t change: What goes around comes around.
So, in essence, the NY Times Editorial Board is telling Democrats to go ahead and filibuster because they’re whiny little children who didn’t get their way in the rough and tumble world of politics. Crying baby party.
Crossed at Right Wing News.
Wow, the NYT is very much a creature of the Left, aren’t they?
Like the Left (well, the NYT IS the Left, but you get the idea), they project everything they are onto others.
The Repubs stole Obama’s pick? No, I’m certain there is NOTHING in the Constitution about a sitting President getting a Supreme Court pick, even if he was half-black and the Lightworker and all.
I DO recall said Lightworker saying something about “I won,” and how “elections have consequences.” Maybe someone should tell the NYT about that, since the shoe is on the other foot, and all.
And let us call “going nuclear” what it is, “the Reid rule.” See, NYT and other doltish Leftists, you ALREADY set precedent for eliminating the filibuster when it suited you. Whining about it now shows that you are not only babies, but lying, hypocritical babies.
Shill, NYT! Shill with ALL YOUR MIGHT!
assplug typed:
Even Negro Presidents are entitled to a fair evaluation of their picks, except in Repug world.
The Dems should use every trick they can to delay the Gorsuch vote.
Even the affirmative action lazy black guy who spied on the duly elected incoming President is entitled to a fair evaluation of his picks…
Don’t think so…
And the result will be that Mitch McConnell will then exercise the so-called ‘nuclear option,’ and be able to invoke cloture with 51 votes.
It will be claimed that the GOP would be shooting itself in the foot by doing so, but the record is clear: if this were a Democrat nominee being considered by a Democrat-controlled Senate, the Democrats would invoke the nuclear option, just as they did for cabinet members and lower-court nominees. If that sad situation ever occurs again, they’ll do it, so the GOP might as well beat them to the punch.
Considering the age and health of Ruth Bader Ginsberg, and the hoped-for resignation of Anthony Kennedy, the last thing that the Democrats want is the nuclear option extended to Supreme Court nominees. My guess is that there will be eight Democrats who will be designated to vote for cloture at sixty votes, who will then vote against confirmation. Being the full-service type of blogger that I am, I even have a handy-dandy chart for you, here, showing you the nine Democrats who have said they’ll vote for cloture. It’s an interesting chart: four of them are from secure blue states, and are not up for re-election in 2018, while the other five are from red states, and are all up for re-election in 2018.
My conclusion: Senator Schumer arranged these votes, to preserve the sixty-vote threshold, by asking Democrats who either needed to vote for cloture or were secure in their re-elections to do his dirty work. That way, Senator Schumer can have his filibuster, for political reasons, yet not get the nuclear option exercised.
Jeffrey wrote:
Shouldn’t the word be Mulatto, not Negro?
The ‘fair evaluation’ was that the Republicans were not going to allow the seat formerly held by probably the greatest conservative justice in history be taken by a liberal. They gambled that Hillary Clinton wouldn’t be elected, even though that was what the conventional wisdom said would happen, and they won.
The truth is that these nominations have become wholly political, at least since the unfortunately failed nomination of Robert Bork.
The appointment of Judge Gorsuch shows that the Republicans are still trying to live up to the farcical mirage that these nominations are all about judicial temperament. If Senator McConnell has to invoke the ‘nuclear option,’ then, if there should happen to be further Supreme Court vacancies during Mr Trump’s term, we can dispense with that and get Ted Cruz and Mike Lee on the Supreme Court!
Were Justices Kennedy, Breyer, Ginsburg, Sotomayor and Kagan to leave their seats before 2020, President Trump would have a real opportunity to Make America Great Again.
Jeffrey, where did I say he didn’t get an EVALUATION? He did, nowhere does it say the Senate needs to vote on it. I only said he doesn’t get an automatic pick.
I suppose not putting in ‘automatic’ must have confused you, or more likely given you the excuse to do what you always do, name-call and lie.
I’m terribly sorry that, aside from being a horrible and grotesquely dishonest person, you are also illiterate.
Like the NYT, SHILL, Jeffrey! Shill with ALL YOUR MIGHT!
We should hope he gets on. Judging by the questions from the Dem senators on the panel, his IQ seems larger than all of them combined.
Let us”SUPER not forget that Oboma was in his last year of his presidency.
According to the Biden Rule (early 90’s), the present administration can not nominate a replacement to a vacancy on the Supreme Court.. The rule was made when there was a republican in office and a vacancy became available.
Democrat BS about not filling the vacancy with Mr.Garland is just that “SUPER BS”.
We just followed the dictates of the demoncrats and their rules. Now they complain about the rules. YOU MADE THEM—– NOW LIVE WITH WHAT YOU WANTED!
Let us not forget that Oboma was in his last year of his presidency.
According to the Biden Rule 9 (senator, later VP) got passed inthe early 90’s that the present administration IN IT’S LAST YEAR can not nominate a replacement to a vacancy on the Supreme Court.. The rule was made when there was a republican in office and a vacancy became available.
Democrat BS about not filling the vacancy with Mr.Garland is just that “SUPER BS”.
We just followed the dictates of the demoncrats and their rules. Now they complain about the rules. YOU MADE THEM—– NOW LIVE WITH WHAT YOU WANTED!
corrected errors
Mas,
You’re confused by the facts.
Lie #1: No “Biden Rule” was ever passed. Senator Biden suggested that President’s not nominate and the Senate not consider SCOTUS picks during the last year campaign season, but that after the election was actually OK.
Lie #2: There was no vacancy.