(Democrats) obstructionism and hypocrisy

[SteveRogers]

What hypocrisy?

Comparing what the GOP did to Merrick Garland to anything Democrats ever did to Reagan or Bush's Supreme Court nominees is just downright dishonest. Democrats never filibustered a Supreme Court nominee. Democrats never refused to hold a hearing on a Supreme Court nominee. Democrats never lied to the American public on the national stage about an imaginary "tradition" of not appointing justices in an election year. What the GOP did was unprecedented in our nation's history, and it is inexcusable. The GOP didn't just obstruct; they flat out refused to do their Constitutional duty.

By letting Gorsuch into the building, Democrats will be taking the high road. By showing up to Gorsuch's hearings to vote "no," Democrats will be extending a far greater courtesy to Gorsuch than Republicans showed to Merrick Garland.

Hypocrisy would be the rampant abuse of the filibuster like when the GOP decided to filibuster every single measure under Obama. For decades before the GOP bastardized it, the filibuster was a legitimate procedural tool. When used correctly, the point of the cloture requirement is to drive consensus when it comes to matters like appointing Supreme Court justices.  I submit to you that it was the GOP who walked away from the negotiating table on this SCOTUS vacancy. Democrats have every right to use every procedural tool available to them to retaliate when it comes to this specific seat. If Gorsuch can get 60 votes to overcome a filibuster, then so be it. But this is one instance where senate democrats have earned the right to stand up to bullies.

[Mr. Reactionary]

So in a hypothetical future where Trump is reelected, the Senate has 56 Republicans, and the filibuster hasn't been nuked, is it ok for the Democrats to keep filibustering for a full 8 years? Because if your answer is yes, then the Republicans must not have done anything wrong in refusing to consider Garland.

[Confused Democrat]

So in a hypothetical future where Trump is reelected, the Senate has 56 Republicans, and the filibuster hasn't been nuked, is it ok for the Democrats to keep filibustering for a full 8 years? Because if your answer is yes, then the Republicans must not have done anything wrong in refusing to consider Garland.

Democrats shouldn't filibuster in that situation.

[SteveRogers]

So in a hypothetical future where Trump is reelected, the Senate has 56 Republicans, and the filibuster hasn't been nuked, is it ok for the Democrats to keep filibustering for a full 8 years? Because if your answer is yes, then the Republicans must not have done anything wrong in refusing to consider Garland.

Democrats shouldn't filibuster for the sake of filibustering, but they shouldn't shirk from voting against nominees they find either unqualified or too extreme and cannot in good conscience support, even if that means rejecting multiple nominees in a row in order to bring Trump to the negotiating table. The key distinction you are missing is that this particular vacancy was rightly Obama's to fill. Now, it was Obama's to fill in a divided government, and the Republican Senate would have been right to demand concessions. They didn't do that. Instead, it was Republicans and not Democrats who walked away from the negotiating table altogether.

Obstructing judicial appointments for politic's sake is unconscionable no matter which party does it. When it comes to filling vacancies for district and appellate courts, democrats should give Trump's nominees a fair shake and only fight against the ones who are manifestly unfit for the office. But when it comes to this particular SCOTUS seat, Democrats should never let anyone forget that Republicans straight up stole it. Trump will fill it in the end, but Democrats aren't wrong to make him fight tooth and nail for it.

[Klartext89]

Since Klartext89 is German I am going to post a quote from Berholt Brecht in German orginal:

Wenn Unrecht zu Recht wird, wird Widerstand zur Pflicht!

Let me answer with a German saying:

Was du nicht willst das man dir tut, das füg auch keinem anderen zu ;-)

[Klartext89]

What hypocrisy?

Comparing what the GOP did to Merrick Garland to anything Democrats ever did to Reagan or Bush's Supreme Court nominees is just downright dishonest. Democrats never filibustered a Supreme Court nominee. Democrats never refused to hold a hearing on a Supreme Court nominee. Democrats never lied to the American public on the national stage about an imaginary "tradition" of not appointing justices in an election year. What the GOP did was unprecedented in our nation's history, and it is inexcusable. The GOP didn't just obstruct; they flat out refused to do their Constitutional duty. 

LOL of course... It's always ok if you do it, but if it is done against you, then it's unfair. Grow up. What Dems did to Nixon and Reagan (and even Bush) was way more unfair then the Garland thing. The GOP did humiliate Garland, yes. But they never smeared him, not even close to the scale of the assasination of Bork.

It was Joe Biden who set the "Biden rule", it was Obama who justified the Biden rule. Maybe Dems should start thinking about the consequences before setting rules ;-)

[pbrower2a]

Democrats must go for broke. By 2020 Republicans may have the power to decide how the election goes by determining who can vote and who can't -- and our political heritage will be a coalition of plutocrats reminiscent of the Gilded Age and reactionary Southern aristocrats of the Jim Crow era deciding what the rest of us get. In view of the rapaciousness and cruelty that economic elites with unconstrained power have,  survival will be a privilege for almost all of us.

The worst slum in Calcutta is better than a torture chamber in America.

[SteveRogers]

What hypocrisy?

Comparing what the GOP did to Merrick Garland to anything Democrats ever did to Reagan or Bush's Supreme Court nominees is just downright dishonest. Democrats never filibustered a Supreme Court nominee. Democrats never refused to hold a hearing on a Supreme Court nominee. Democrats never lied to the American public on the national stage about an imaginary "tradition" of not appointing justices in an election year. What the GOP did was unprecedented in our nation's history, and it is inexcusable. The GOP didn't just obstruct; they flat out refused to do their Constitutional duty.  

LOL of course... It's always ok if you do it, but if it is done against you, then it's unfair. Grow up. What Dems did to Nixon and Reagan (and even Bush) was way more unfair then the Garland thing. The GOP did humiliate Garland, yes. But they never smeared him, not even close to the scale of the assasination of Bork.

It was Joe Biden who set the "Biden rule", it was Obama who justified the Biden rule. Maybe Dems should start thinking about the consequences before setting rules ;-)

Nixon, Reagan, and Bush all got to fill all the Supreme Court vacancies that happened on their watch. I don't defend the obstruction in the lower courts that both parties are guilty of. As I said in my previous post, I view that behavior as unconscionable. But the Supreme Court proceedings were always considered above that sort of behavior until now.

And why is Bork the point of comparison? You think Democrats were too hard on Bork? Who cares? Nobody denies that senators have the right to vote against nominees they find unacceptable. So Bork got rejected by a Democratic Senate and Reagan had to go with his second choice (confirmed in an election year I might add). That's how divided government is supposed to work, and the same should have applied to Obama.

Oh, and there was never a "Biden Rule." Yes, Biden once gave a speech expressing concern about what would happen if, hypothetically, a Supreme Court vacancy occurred in the heat of the 1992 campaign shortly after the hotly contested Clarence Thomas confirmation.
1. One senator making a statement does not make policy for a whole party or the Senate or somehow invent the "tradition" that GOP senators pointed to in 2016.
2. Biden never said the seat should be kept vacant so that the next president could make the appointment. What he said was, "It is my view that if a Supreme Court Justice resigns tomorrow, or within the next several weeks, or resigns at the end of the summer, President Bush should consider following the practice of a majority of his predecessors and not — and not — name a nominee until after the November election is completed" and "the Senate Judiciary Committee should seriously consider not scheduling confirmation hearings on the nomination until after the political campaign season is over." In other words, Biden acknowledged that the pick would still be Bush's to make and only suggested that the Senate should put off confirmation hearings until the lame duck session after the election. Biden's words in no way resemble the rhetoric that the likes of McConnell and Cruz used after Scalia's death.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2016/mar/17/context-biden-rule-supreme-court-nominations/

Your false equivalency game is weak.

[136or142]

What hypocrisy?

Comparing what the GOP did to Merrick Garland to anything Democrats ever did to Reagan or Bush's Supreme Court nominees is just downright dishonest. Democrats never filibustered a Supreme Court nominee. Democrats never refused to hold a hearing on a Supreme Court nominee. Democrats never lied to the American public on the national stage about an imaginary "tradition" of not appointing justices in an election year. What the GOP did was unprecedented in our nation's history, and it is inexcusable. The GOP didn't just obstruct; they flat out refused to do their Constitutional duty.  

LOL of course... It's always ok if you do it, but if it is done against you, then it's unfair. Grow up. What Dems did to Nixon and Reagan (and even Bush) was way more unfair then the Garland thing. The GOP did humiliate Garland, yes. But they never smeared him, not even close to the scale of the assasination of Bork.

It was Joe Biden who set the "Biden rule", it was Obama who justified the Biden rule. Maybe Dems should start thinking about the consequences before setting rules ;-)

Nixon, Reagan, and Bush all got to fill all the Supreme Court vacancies that happened on their watch. I don't defend the obstruction in the lower courts that both parties are guilty of. As I said in my previous post, I view that behavior as unconscionable. But the Supreme Court proceedings were always considered above that sort of behavior until now.

And why is Bork the point of comparison? You think Democrats were too hard on Bork? Who cares? Nobody denies that senators have the right to vote against nominees they find unacceptable. So Bork got rejected by a Democratic Senate and Reagan had to go with his second choice (confirmed in an election year I might add). That's how divided government is supposed to work, and the same should have applied to Obama.

Oh, and there was never a "Biden Rule." Yes, Biden once gave a speech expressing concern about what would happen if, hypothetically, a Supreme Court vacancy occurred in the heat of the 1992 campaign shortly after the hotly contested Clarence Thomas confirmation.
1. One senator making a statement does not make policy for a whole party or the Senate or somehow invent the "tradition" that GOP senators pointed to in 2016.
2. Biden never said the seat should be kept vacant so that the next president could make the appointment. What he said was, "It is my view that if a Supreme Court Justice resigns tomorrow, or within the next several weeks, or resigns at the end of the summer, President Bush should consider following the practice of a majority of his predecessors and not — and not — name a nominee until after the November election is completed" and "the Senate Judiciary Committee should seriously consider not scheduling confirmation hearings on the nomination until after the political campaign season is over." In other words, Biden acknowledged that the pick would still be Bush's to make and only suggested that the Senate should put off confirmation hearings until the lame duck session after the election. Biden's words in no way resemble the rhetoric that the likes of McConnell and Cruz used after Scalia's death.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2016/mar/17/context-biden-rule-supreme-court-nominations/

Your false equivalency game is weak.

Later in his speech, Biden also acknowledged that Bush had the right to make a nomination and that the Senate Judiciary Committee would consider the nomination in that scenario.

Although Biden was Chair of the Judiciary Committee at the time, it's clear that Biden was making up his speech as he went along and that he was speaking solely for himself and not as the Democratic Chair of the Committee.

There was never a 'Biden rule' and any claim otherwise is an outright lie.

[The_Doctor]

Democrats are in a pickle, but I think the choice is clear. Obstruct.

Who cares if we look like hypocrites. Republicans set this disgusting precedent, and now they'll have to live with it until both Democrats and Republicans can come together and start compromising again.

Things are going to get really f-ing ugly before they start to get better.

I agree. Frankly, the Republicans do not have any right to talk here about the Dems obstructing anything. They already set the example so suck it in, Reps.

Just remember this in 8 years when its back to GOP obstruction.

We will.

It'll be a never-ending cycle until our situation becomes untenable.

That'll be interesting. What happens at that point?

We all lose.

I don't think we'll all lose. Hopefully at that point both sides will see the folly in being obstructionist -- probably with the help of the citizens of the country through some type of outrage -- and both sides will agree to agree more.

No, I'm interested because in this kind of situation, you need one party to dominate the other. I'm just curious which one wins out that argument. It's like two forces pushing against each other; which one gives way first?

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Democrats are in a pickle, but I think the choice is clear. Obstruct.

Who cares if we look like hypocrites. Republicans set this disgusting precedent, and now they'll have to live with it until both Democrats and Republicans can come together and start compromising again.

Things are going to get really f-ing ugly before they start to get better.

I agree. Frankly, the Republicans do not have any right to talk here about the Dems obstructing anything. They already set the example so suck it in, Reps.

Just remember this in 8 years when its back to GOP obstruction.

Hopefully 4 years.