Neil Gorsuch Confirmation Process Discussion (confirmed 54-45)

[Associate Justice PiT]

Unless Trump/Gorsuch withdraws Gorsuch's nomination, it's hard to imagine the Republicans going for a grand compromise after stopping Merrick Garland for an entire year.

The strategic advantage for the Democrats not to filibuster Gorsuch would be that they'd make the Republicans invoke the nuclear option in the middle of a hearing where they would be picketing in the streets at the thought of Roe being overturned. If the Republicans eliminate the filibuster for SCOTUS nominees for Gorsuch, it will be forgotten by then, and one less tool at the Democrats' disposal.  Then again, if the don't filibuster Gorsuch, they're base might blow a gasket.

     The Republicans have been feeling the heat lately, but the Dems also have their own tightrope act dealing with their base here. As is clear in this thread, many Dem partisans have different ideas from the Senate, and are not shy to voice it. Strategy has to fit into this somewhere.

[Associate Justice PiT]

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https://twitter.com/ChadPergram/status/847152430299168769


mimimi schumer is such a DINO mimimi

     I wonder if Schumer is trolling there. Any nominee would get this kind of treatment.

[Associate Justice PiT]

     I wonder if Schumer is trolling there. Any nominee would get this kind of treatment.

schumer is giving his base what it wants (after merrick-gate there was nothing to be done about that....the democrats are never going to forget this act imho) and i guess he suspects anyway that the filibuster is a thing of the past.

     I certainly understand why Schumer is doing this, which is what makes it strange to me. It is clear that his stonewalling is retaliation for Merrick Garland and not an actual criticism of Gorsuch's qualifications. Considering that, Trump proposing a different nominee wouldn't change anything.

[Associate Justice PiT]

By more right-wing on free speech than Scalia you mean he would be more consistent in defense of it?   Okay, possibly.

     The mere notion of categorizing free speech as a left v. right issue in the United States today (not in other places and times where this divide is more relevant to understanding the issue) is a very odd one.

[Associate Justice PiT]

If a few more come around this might not be necessary:

You keep telling yourself that

     Well he is right: six more Dem ayes and Gorsuch can beat the filibuster. Whether those votes will ever materialize is a different question altogether.

[Associate Justice PiT]

     The ABA is a mess of regulatory capture that has less to do with practicing law and more to do with screwing over the legal profession for the benefit of a plutocratic elite (something liberals should be against). I am not going to lose any sleep over them not reviewing judicial nominees.

[Associate Justice PiT]

Tester is a no and he will filibuster

That is surprising.

Not really. Tester has always been very liberal. He doesn't want to disappoint his progressive base, which he needs to win reelection in 2018. It's probably the right decision.

LOL, Tester is not "very liberal". Sorry, but Gorsuch is not a moderate nominee. Yeah, he hedged on Roe so much that I'm scared he'll actually uphold it, but on other issues, he's a clear across the board conservative.


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Proceedings Update: Committee vote is tomorrow. Committee will be called to order at 10 AM ET. I don't know if this will be televised.

     Were you expecting Kennedy? Presidents who have the opportunity try to appoint someone more devoted to their cause than that. Of course Gorsuch isn't terribly moderate.

[Associate Justice PiT]

     Judicial filibuster is a dumb idea anyway, alongside the politicization of the judiciary. Also this:

tbh non-talking filibusters should be abolished for everything.

[Associate Justice PiT]

so it is pretty clear Democrats should take a stand here against Trump, the GOP, and their theft of this Senate seat.

Lol. So the rules say whichever party controls the presidency at the exact moment a vacancy arises owns that seat forever? Because i will never understand this "they stole it, so we have to steal it back, but somehow when we do it its not stealing" argument.

i could have lived with republicans rejecting half a dozen judges, until we got someone who finally was good enough or moderate enough or neutral on abortion or 80 years old or whatever, but just being able to reject hearings is mindblowing, imho.

Agreed. And the democrats were right then to complain. Now theyve taken what moral high ground they had, shat all over it, and still keep complaining about how stinky the republicans were a year ago.

Next time don't steal Supreme Court seats and maybe we won't have this problem.

I dont need to poke holes in your argument because repeating this "stolen seat " garbage betrays your lack of understanding and objectivity, but what the hell.

This overall argument is equivalent to a toddler justifying the pulling of his playmate's hair because "she should have shared if she didnt want it pulled." Right and wrong dont just disappear if someone else did something first. That is nor how logic works.

You guys made your bed and now you'll have to sleep in it.  Enjoy  Oh and spare me the hypocritical moralizing, I think I speak for most Democrats when I say you're wasting your breath.  I literally have no interest in seeing that seat filled by anyone regardless of their qualifications or objectivity until we have a Democratic President.

AT SOME POINT SOMEBODY IS GOING TO HAVE TO DEESCALATE.

Easier said than done.

I believe America is going to have to go through some sort of major crisis that leads to a watershed moment where politicians put aside partisan politics and begin to work together/compromise.

I kind of disagree, compromise can only happen once one party emerges victorious, forcing the other party to recognize it is the minority and compromise to remain viable. As we are now both parties are of relatively equal strength, with the Democrats winning The popular vote in six out the last seven presidential elections, but Republicans are more represented due to their support in rural areas and less populated states. Having two parties of equal legitimacy is not at all ideal, or the historical norm, and the longer we are stuck in this murky impasse the more destabilized the United States shall become. Hopefully something breaks the impasse soon.

     The parties are no longer on the same page about what it takes to run a country. They are so no longer on the same page that one could be reduced to an irrelevant rump and it would be no more ready to compromise than it is now. You would simply have a base that would insist that they need to be more radical and uncompromising.

[Associate Justice PiT]

May I ask a question?

Why do you hate your political opponents so much? It really doesn't seem healthy or normal in a country at peace, even one as polarized as America.

There are a number of Democratic hack posters I could ask this of as well, but they tend not to be as blatant or deliberate about it as you are.

This is basically the norm today. I don't think the country has ever been as polarized before.

1800. 1860. 1954.

     1954 was on the heels of a landslide Republican victory ending 20 years of Democratic Presidencies, with many states flipping. I'm not sure what exactly you are referring to with 1800 (I can think of a few things that happened then, none of which really point to such vicious division). In strictly geographical terms, the polarization of today may only be matched by 1860, which is a troubling thought.

[Associate Justice PiT]

May I ask a question?

Why do you hate your political opponents so much? It really doesn't seem healthy or normal in a country at peace, even one as polarized as America.

There are a number of Democratic hack posters I could ask this of as well, but they tend not to be as blatant or deliberate about it as you are.

This is basically the norm today. I don't think the country has ever been as polarized before.

1800. 1860. 1954.

     1954 was on the heels of a landslide Republican victory ending 20 years of Democratic Presidencies, with many states flipping. I'm not sure what exactly you are referring to with 1800 (I can think of a few things that happened then, none of which really point to such vicious division). In strictly geographical terms, the polarization of today may only be matched by 1860, which is a troubling thought.

Weren't we still incredibly politically polarized post civil war until 1896 when the GOP finally gave up on reconstruction and became the dominant Party all the way up til 1930/1932?

I could be completely wrong on my history though.

     The polarization continued long after the Civil War, though my impression is that it wasn't nearly as hot an issue after that point, though the South remained in Democrats' hands for another century. I may also be mistaken on this, though.

[Associate Justice PiT]

May I ask a question?

Why do you hate your political opponents so much? It really doesn't seem healthy or normal in a country at peace, even one as polarized as America.

There are a number of Democratic hack posters I could ask this of as well, but they tend not to be as blatant or deliberate about it as you are.

This is basically the norm today. I don't think the country has ever been as polarized before.

1800. 1860. 1954.

     1954 was on the heels of a landslide Republican victory ending 20 years of Democratic Presidencies, with many states flipping. I'm not sure what exactly you are referring to with 1800 (I can think of a few things that happened then, none of which really point to such vicious division). In strictly geographical terms, the polarization of today may only be matched by 1860, which is a troubling thought.

Brown v Board. Eisenhower had to send goddamn soldiers to an elementary school to prevent mobs from lynching innocent little children. Montgomery was exploding over the bus boycott.  Redline race riots in chicago. A few years later They bombed fricken choirgirls at church on sunday morning in Alabama. My dad remembers the impeach earl warren billboards (along with the occasional hang earl earren). The 50s and 60s were more divisive than now.

     How right you are. I associate that all with the '60s more, but 1954 is a very important year as far as that goes. I would definitely agree that there was more real division then. The silliness that people divide over today is still quite vicious, but also quite unimportant in many cases.

[Associate Justice PiT]

     Not sure what Bork has to do with this really.

[Associate Justice PiT]

     Today was a glorious outcome, though also the one we all knew would happen. I look forward to the good news coming tomorrow.

[Associate Justice PiT]

Awesome. Just hope Gorsuch is worth it.

if it was solely about Gorsuch he'd have well over 60 votes  to end debate and confirm him.  This is f[inks] Trump and the Pubs.  This isn't even about Garland, the person.  If Hillary was elected they wouldn't even care if she didn't re-submit Garland's name.

     Yeah, this was never about the people involved. The intellectual dishonesty of Schumer suggesting that it was disppointed me a little, but was not surprising. I would have had more respect if he could have just come out and maintained that they would be obstructing Gorsuch's nomination in protest over the obstruction of Garland's nomination.

[Associate Justice PiT]

What a great day for the unborn! 

Let's hope there will be another retirement/vacancy or two, so we can make more forward progress.

there are rumors that Kennedy could retire in the fall, and RBG has been in poor health for years

     Replacing RBG would be a big deal in terms of the balance of power.

[Associate Justice PiT]

This second part isn't so much directed at you as some other blue-avatars, but it's been really gross to see how some of the folks here (you know who you are) are virtually cheering for Ginsberg to die.  I know some Democrats were dancing on Scalia's grave and that was pretty bad too, but can we try not to hope for people's deaths just because we disagree with them?

You are right on this. It is a disturbing situation that we have been witnessing. I recall conservatives doing it with Justice Stevens as well, ten years ago. It was wrong then, it was wrong last year and it is wrong now.

     It is a natural result of shifts in political power in the judiciary (itself a terrifying phrase) hinging on people dying, but I do agree that we should aim to be better than this.