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Nothing was really abnormal about what was occurring with judges prior to 11/21/13. Reid made a power play to confirm three judges. That was a dramatic escalation.

This has *checks notes* absolutely nothing to do with your laughable claim that Mitch, after successfully blocking Obama from filling the Scalia seat and handing it to Trump, would have let Democrats filibuster it to oblivion without invoking the nuclear option. Is Mitch just a super nice guy? I mean I might have thought so yesterday, but you made such a convincing argument about the ruthlessness of politicians today that I'm feeling pretty sure Mitch would not have let that seat go unfilled!

That's the rub, isn't it? Would have Democrats filibustered the SCOTUS nominee into oblivion, which would have been another dramatic escalation? The wikiquote is relevant. Both sides engaged in shenanigans to block specific judges from time to time, for whatever reason. H. Reid did not like that anymore and opened pandora's box. Your best counter is "but what would have Mitch done in some future hypothetical".

A bigger escalation than not even giving the nominee a vote??? LOL, you didn't think this one through very well, did you?

as I've pointed out, and provided evidence, many judges from both sides have not received a vote. Why are you crying about this one particular judge?

Your own argument beats you there (Gorsuch would not be the first judge to get filibustered, yet you just claimed Dems filibustering him would be an escalation???? LOL). Is that your best defense?? Man this **** you're putting out right now is WEAK.

"into oblivion."

What does that change? Are there no other judges who got filibustered that didn't get confirmed? Would Gorsuch be the first judge in history to be filibustered "into oblivion"? LOL

Oh, I see. We are back to me having to defend some hypothetical action taken by the current Senate Majority leader if H. Reid had hypothetically not employed the nuclear option. Spike the football some more, bro.

You're the one who voluntarily offered that you didn't think he'd pull the trigger on the nuclear option. Like I said, I thought Mitch was such a nice guy, but your posts today convinced me otherwise!

Chance are, you'd would have got a more moderate SCOTUS judge than Gorsuch and Kavanaugh, otherwise we would see a filibuster. However, Gorsuch/Kavanaugh likely would have never been nominated if they were going to get filibustered. In other words, a compromise would have been reached, like almost every other time. If you want to play that stupid hypothetical game.

No, this is very and obviously wrong. What would have happened if Reid never pulled the trigger on the nuclear option is:
- Mitch still denies Garland a hearing and holds Scalia's seat for Trump to fill
- Democrats filibuster anyone Republicans put up, because the seat was stolen from them
- Republicans pull the trigger on the nuclear option and confirm their deplorables, like they were always going to

It's the same endgame. You've blamed Harry Reid for our nation's ills in dozens of posts in the last few days, yet every road winds up in the same place. The only possible reason to think otherwise is if you think Mitch is really just a super nice guy, and your posts have made very clear you don't think that's the case.

You're just really desperate to blame all your bullshit on Dems. You're such a Republican partisan that it's the only way you can cope with everything they're doing right now, by pretending it's not really their fault. Mitch McConnell exercised the nuclear option in the non-hypothetical world we actually live in right now yet you're seriously trying to argue he wouldn't have in the hypothetical world. Kinda sad, tbh.

What makes Garlands non-vote so different than any of the other 100's of judges that did not receive a vote? I get it, one of your guys did not get on the bench. Cry some more.

??? This is about you baselessly claiming Rs would not have exercised the nuclear option to confirm Gorsuch, which is laughably false. All the arguing you've been doing for the past few days has been based on the false premise that Reid did something McConnell would not have done. Garland is relevant only insofar as he would have guaranteed McConnell making the same choice Harry Reid made (only with far more significance, applying to SCOTUS justices instead of just lower court judges).

I'm glad we cleared up that you've been full of **** in all of those discussions.

Republicans had a laundry list of judges that did not get a vote, and they never exercised the nuclear option, but you somehow think they would have this time. As I said before, the fatal flaw of your hypothetical is whether Gorsuch would have been nominated if the threat of a filibuster was made. You seem to think the Democrats would have cried over spilled milk becasue one of their judges did not get confirmed, out of hundreds who had not before. So, you think they would have stopped all confirmations becasue one judge did not get confirmed, as if that was an abnormal and unfair thing to occur, nevermind there are hundreds of judges that were not confirmed over the years, by both sides. It seems D's don't like to lose. They lost the Garland fight, so they were going to make sure the Republicans are going to lose every other fight? I again ask, why is Garlands loss any different than the hundreds of other judges who lost their fights that the Democrats would go full filibuster?

I know why, it's because it was a chance to swing the ideological balance of the court, and they lost, and they can't stand they lost.

LOL imagine thinking nothing abnormal happened with the nomination of Merrick Garland. Just utter ****ing insanity in your head. Wild.

Like I see you edited this in and there's a very obvious answer that I'm pretty sure you can come up with if you think really, really hard. Can you think of what it might be, and why it might have motivated Democrats to obstruct any Trump picks to SCOTUS no matter what?

(I'll give you a hint: it's not "swinging the ideological balance of the court", that first answer isn't quite right, but you can try again!)

There is reason why you keep avoiding the point. Garland is one judge out of hundreds that failed to get confirmed. Both sides have lost fights over judges, and not invoked the nuclear option, and have not filibustered the other sides judges enmass. Why is this one so special to Democrats that they would go to the mat and shut down all confirmations? Seems like poor sports to me.

I mean the answer is so obviously simple I "avoided" it because was hoping you'd get there on your own and it would make for a funny moment, but you've disappointed even that very low bar I set for you. So, I will spoil the great reveal, which I didn't think would be a great reveal because it's so ****ing obvious, but, like I said, low bar and all:

When is the last time that a President was denied the ability to fill a SCOTUS vacancy by the opposing party?

There are many SCOTUS nominees who did not get a vote, and subsequently had to withdraw.

List them. And then list the vacancies that did not get filled.

No point. Obama lost his fight with Garland, and could not get him confirmed, and consequently lost the chance to fill the vacancy. Boo Hoo. This has happens a lot on the federal bench, which is arguably more important than SCOTUS.

LOOOOOOL. IHIV just googled some **** and realized what an utterly ****ing terrible argument he was making

Like remember when IHIV thought "what was so different about Garland?" was a major gotcha? I do!

He literally didn't know that this was the first time in recent history a vacancy had been denied to a president. Oh my ****ing god

What? Oh, you back in your imagination and trying to move the goal post.. Your argument is vacacy now, rather than confirmations. My argument still applies. Hundreds of vacancies within the court system, to which POTUS has not been able to fill by the time his term has expired due to due to a lack of confirmations. I guess the real issue is the fact it's a SCOTUS judge this time, rather than a lower court, and not the vacancy.