Gorsuch, SCOTUS Nominee

Okay, The Orange Boob has nominated Neil Gorsuch to replace Antonin Scalia. Although eminently qualified, he's a originalist and textualist in the mold of Scalia, and thus out of step with directions in the court over the past two decades. NPR, in their profile of him this afternoon, said he's not a bomb-thrower and would work for consensus rather than continually making minority dissents like Scalia.

Senate confirmation is not guaranteed. He needs 60 votes, and the Republicans hold 52 seats. Unless eight Democrats break ranks, Mitch McConnell will be forced to invoke rule changes which will, if I understand it correctly, forever alter the Senate to be more like the House where a simple majority rules all decisions.

Quote :

Gorsuch is seen as a less bombastic version of Scalia; he also believes in an “originalist” interpretation of the Constitution and would seem destined to be a solidly conservative vote on the ideologically split court. But friends and supporters describe Gorsuch as being more interested in persuasion than Scalia, who was just as likely to go it alone as to compromise.

Senate Democrats have promised a vigorous battle, believing that Republican colleagues “stole” the court opening by refusing to hold even a hearing on former president Barack Obama’s nominee for Scalia’s seat, Judge Merrick Garland. His nomination withered.

Some Democrats have pledged to try to block a vote on Trump’s nominee. “I won’t be complicit in this theft,” Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) wrote in an email to supporters. “There is only one person in America who is a legitimate selection: Judge Merrick Garland.”

Other Democrats aren’t likely to take such a bold move. But there were already signs that things won’t be particularly cozy: Trump invited senior Democratic senators to the White House for a reception to meet his Supreme Court pick, but they declined the invitation, according to senior aides.

Quote :

Like Scalia, Gorsuch, 49, who serves on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver, is a well-respected conservative who believes judges should decide cases based on the law as it was understood when passed, not on how they think it should be. He’s a clear, impassioned writer, albeit without Scalia’s flare for biting sarcasm.

But Gorsuch also evokes the qualities of Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, for whom Gorsuch worked as a law clerk. (If confirmed, Gorsuch would join three justices who previously clerked on the high court, but he would be the first ever to serve alongside the justice he or she worked for.)

Quote :

Last week’s landmark Supreme Court decision in favor of marriage equality across the U.S. is a momentous event, but there’s a lot more there than just the result. If you haven’t read the full opinion, you should–don’t rely solely on news summaries of it. One of the most interesting aspects of Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion was its unequivocal embrace of the concept of a “living Constitution.” That’s the idea that the U.S. Constitution is a document whose meaning and practice changes in each successive era, uncovering new rights and protections and different ways of doing things than were the case at its inception in 1787. The right to marriage equality is one of the rights that our modern Supreme Court has found in the document, specifically the 14th Amendment. The idea of a living Constitution is the opposite of another school of Constitutional theory, which might be termed “original intent” or simply originalism. This view is that legal questions must be interpreted solely on the basis of what the words of the document originally meant, or, if we can’t tell, whatever we think the drafters of the Constitution (the Framers) might have intended. There’s originalism in the Obergefell v. Hodges decision too: look at the now-famous dissents by Justices Roberts, Scalia and Thomas.

I believe strongly in a living Constitution. As popular as originalism is in some circles, especially since the 1980s, there are some very good historical arguments as to why it’s wrong. Yet even beyond that, if we apply an “intent of the Framers” standard to the question of Constitutional interpretation, there’s an additional argument that the Framers themselves believed in a living Constitution. If that’s true, then originalism and the idea of a living Constitution wind up in exactly the same place: a Constitution whose meaning and context changes with the times. From a common sense perspective, it seems terribly presumptuous to assume that the Framers believed they were writing a comprehensive manifesto that would remain rigid and immutable for all coming time. Just thinking logically about it, it seems clear to me that the Constitution was always intended to be a source code, not an operating system.

Originalism fails as a doctrine because it casts the Framers in a historically inaccurate light. In order for originalism to be a viable doctrine, either the men who wrote the Constitution were totally perfect and infinitely far-seeing, or they thought they were. Neither claim makes any real sense.

NoCoPilot wrote:

if I understand it correctly, forever alter the Senate to be more like the House where a simple majority rules all decisions.

The Senate can adopt new rules whenever they feel like it. They can change the rules to eliminate the filibuster and then later change it back.

I think I've said this before, if Thomas is such a Constitutional Literalist he should insist that his vote only count as 3/5th of a vote.

Fuck Elizabeth Warren.

She didn't have the balls to run against Trump, she didn't have the balls to endorse Sanders against Clinton. She is at least partially to blame for the situation we find ourselves in now.

There were hundreds of millions of Americans who did not run against Trump. Fuck all of them as well?
Give it a rest.

I keep telling myself to "give it a rest." I'm angry about the stolen election and the Democrats' impotent response to it, and I need to just let it go.

I'll try.

You should be angry about the election. But you should direct your anger properly: the Democratic Party, the FBI, Donald Trump, the Russians. But to continue to abuse Elizabeth Warren makes no sense at all.

NoCoPilot wrote:

She didn't have the balls to run against Trump, she didn't have the balls to endorse Sanders against Clinton.  She is at least partially to blame for the situation we find ourselves in now.

That's about the most ignorant thing I've ever read. From you anyway.

Really.  

And women don't have testicles.

kilo wrote:

And women don't have testicles.

I would normally agree with you, but I'm not sure about Clinton.

She has Bill's set in her pocket. In addition to her own.

Why to you believe that?