As I said before, if the Democrats intend to filibuster Gorsuch, they need better arguments than #FreeMerrick and #F--kTrump. Gorsuch is certainly not my choice, but he is exactly the sort of judge that any Republican candidate would have nominated. Trump is not out on a limb with this nomination and it will be impossible for Democrats to paint Gorsuch as unqualified or a buffoon. He is not Betsy Devos.

Dunno about Euros, but who on the left in the US panders to these illiberal views?

And bigoted Muslim leaders like Farrakhan don't get love from the left and in fact he supported Trump.

Entrenched laws bad. Unconstitutional. Period.

Said it better than I could.

People who lambast him tend to see the blocks of text Sam writes or listen to what he says and reduce it to Islamophobia out of intellectual laziness. That way, they can completely discard his beliefs without it challenging their preconceived notions.

Not saying that everything he says is right, but that's the extent to which 99% of his opposition goes to when criticizing him.

People hesitate to criticize Islam because your average American doesn't have the knowledge to integrate nuanced, complex opinions about it properly. Republicans will reduce it to, "ISLAM BAD!" and bomb mosques while Democrats will go, "How dare you speak that way of nearly 2 billion followers!" Regardless of your party, it's pretty much political suicide.

Or at least it was until Trump got elected.

Why do Dems need a better reason? The GOP had no reason to block Garland. If the Dems vote for a Trump pick they have just accepted a rule change that only Republicans get people on the SCOTUS. If they don't have the power to stop the GOP this time, so be it, but rolling over is just accepting the new de facto rules.

Couldn't the same be said of Garland?

The argument against Garosuch is he same against Merrick: it was effectively but laughably that Obama didn't have a mandate to nominate a SCOTUS justice.

Democrats can just shamelessly say Trump lost the popular vote by a large margin, huge margins really. He's already historically unpopular, just deeply despised. Look at the approval polls. He has no authority to nominate and they're not going to vote. The voters get a chance to choose the nominee in 1400 days or whatever.

Make the GOP go nuclear or do whatever. Let the Trump Admin lead the way on the campaign to get a vote for him: Trump's a ****ing idiot so he'll probably tard it all up anyway, look at the rollout of the immigration travel ban. Democrats should be goading Trump into fights like people try to goad donkeys into pots.

I mean what's the worst that can happen? All that gerrymandering and de facto segregation cuts both ways, the Democrats have very few competitive seats, no one in power now needs to sweat too much. Schumer and Duckworth and Warren and Bernie aren't going anywhere. Just obstruct. It won't get worse.

America, **** yeah, whatta country.

You could probably go back to Bork and make the argument that he was plenty qualified too. It's a power/political play and public sentiment will determine if it is wise or not.

Reason is simple: The rules of the game say the President picks appointees, the Senate holds hearings and confirms them or not. Republicans broke this tradition and institution last year by refusing to hold hearings. Now, the rules have changed. Playing the game as if it's 1997 will only get the Democrats crushed more quickly under the heavy boot of fascism.

Why the **** are liberals in this forum arguing that we should expect voters to hate obstructionism when it ****ing worked brilliantly for the Republicans?

Make some **** up, who cares. Scaremonger about abortion or Chevron deference or some other nonsense. It doesn't matter. Just make up a pretext that isn't totally embarrassing. Say it's because Trump's a minority president and the American people still haven't decided who they want in that seat.

The only good reason to give Gorsuch a vote is if you think the GOP will go nuclear on the entire filibuster in response AND you think it's more beneficial politically to make them go nuclear over some future legislation that will be filibustered later.

Anything other than total obstruction until the Democrats control Congress and the Presidency is unacceptable. And no messing around once that (hopefully) happens.

You are part of the problem, SUB. Never forget that.

Micro let's work out your argument to its conclusion.

And believe me. Merrick should have had a hearing and an up and down vote.

The GOP will nuclear option if they have to. Full stop.

He is going to get confirmed.

What you alude to that I think is now true and unfortunate is that a SCOTUS judge is only going to get confirmed if the Presidents party controls the Senate.

When is the last time a SCOTUS judge has been confirmed by a Senate controlled by the opposition? HW? Reagan?

dems do it tooooooooooooooooo

Last week:
Today:
Trump. Voter.

Reagan still got his pick on the court after Nixon's stooge was rejected.

Why? Those were basically the Reps arguments against Garland.

Hillary tried the "going high" approach against the Reps and didn't do her any good. The reality is that the Dems have to dig in their heels and take a stand instead of reaching out an olive branch only to have Reps it in half and spit in their faces. **** liberals was good enough for Reps and the opposite feeling will be fine for the Dems.

The GOP certainly isn't crying "oh well, the rules. they got us." when Dems boycotted the committee meeting votes to send cabinet appointees to the full Senate. They said, ha, we're gonna SUSPEND the rules because WE ARE THE LAW. And they didn't back in MARCH when Scalia died either. They said we're gonna find a way to steal this Supreme Court seat. Are we going to let them or fight for it? That's the question here.

My God, he spends part of his Black History Month comments whining about Zeke Miller

Damn that is cold. And the funny thing is people are always calling lou the "intelligent conservative" on the forum.

The point I was trying to make was that "qualified" as the threshold was abandoned long ago.

wow seattlelou

You seem to make the case for why #FreeMerrick is the argument they should go with.

Also, am I only one that thinks the whole "this is Scalia's seat" thing is v weird? It's not his seat. He's dead. People talk about that like it makes sense. Where is the rule that the court must have the same ideological makeup it's had in the past?

I'll never defend what the Republicans did vis-a-vis Garland. It was a complete outrage. That said, it's one thing to play the obstruction game for a little less than a year. It's another thing to play it for an entire four year term. I don't think that is realistic for Democrats to try and prevent Trump from filling the seat with anyone other than Garland or his moral equivalent for an entire term.

Here is the sad truth. Gorsuch is not incompetent. He isn't really an outlier among conservative appellate court judges. And Republicans control the Senate. McConnell doesn't want to exercise the nuclear option to fill this spot, but I firmly believe that he will do so if necessary.

The next spot to open (probably Kennedy unless RBG or Breyer has a health issue) will have much graver implications for the ideological balance of the Court than Gorsuch replacing Scalia will.

To the extent Democrats have any powder to save, I fully expect them to save it for the next appointment. Many Democrats will vote no on Gorsuch, which does not bother me at all, but I don't think there will be enough Democratic support for a filibuster.