Merrick Garland's Supreme Court Nomination

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farley3k wrote:

Obama To Nominate Merrick Garland To The Supreme Court

Settling for a centrist candidate with decades of judicial experience, President Barack Obama will nominate Merrick Garland, a federal appeals judge in Washington, D.C., to the Supreme Court seat left vacant by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, according to The Associated Press and congressional sources.

Creating a new topic, out of respect to both Merrick Garland and Antonin Scalia (and the discussion around his death).

Wonderful idea for a new topic.

Nice collection of links about Merrick so you can find stuff easily.

Who Is Merrick Garland

Jolly Bill wrote:

Creating a new topic, out of respect to both Merrick Garland and Antonin Scalia (and the discussion around his death).

Thank you!

Oh man McConnell's calling it "the Biden rule".

That is some world class trolling.

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NormanTheIntern wrote:

Oh man McConnell's calling it "the Biden rule".

That is some world class trolling.

"Once the political season is under way, action on a Supreme Court nomination must be put off until after the election campaign is over."

Well, they used his own words.

Of course, we can then go back farther and use McConnell's words.

Or just say that the election campaign goes on forever.

Senator Pat Toomey ‏@SenToomey: Should Merrick Garland be nominated again by the next president, I would be happy to carefully consider his nomination... #SCOTUS

Twitter responses are along the lines of "because the current president is a little too black for my taste," and numerous promises to vote against Toomey in his upcoming election.

Thanks to @BonusEruptus for RTing this into my stream.

garion333 wrote:
NormanTheIntern wrote:

Oh man McConnell's calling it "the Biden rule".

That is some world class trolling.

"Once the political season is under way, action on a Supreme Court nomination must be put off until after the election campaign is over."

Well, they used his own words.

Of course, we can then go back farther and use McConnell's words.

Or just say that the election campaign goes on forever.

Except Biden's own words were a hypothetical before suggesting what Democrats in the Senate wanted, and what Biden was proposing, a more moderate candidate that they could all get behind. It's up there with like Anne Coulter suggesting that a newspaper called W "a complete Nazi" with sourcing, while ignoring that the sourcing shows that they were quoting someone in an interview while Coulter attributes some random person's words in an interview to the newspaper as a whole.

Then again, I'm in no position to really complain. Several big fights for the GOP are coming into the Supreme Court as we speak, and Scalia isn't there to make it 4-3 in favor of the GOP on things like abortion access, climate change legislation, etc... so they'll stick with previous court rulings against. Meanwhile, this game is hurting the GOP in public opinion with folks outside of their base, so their failing strategy of double down with the base is costing them elsewhere.

BadKen wrote:

Senator Pat Toomey ‏@SenToomey: Should Merrick Garland be nominated again by the next president, I would be happy to carefully consider his nomination... #SCOTUS

Twitter responses are along the lines of "because the current president is a little too black for my taste," and numerous promises to vote against Toomey in his upcoming election.

Thanks to @BonusEruptus for RTing this into my stream.

I'm trying to think of a stupider thing he could have said... and I'm coming up blank. Other than saying, "Look, the black president can't do this, I'll consider it when the person who nominated him is white." That would have been stupider... though at least logical from his standpoint.

Nothing about important but he has a connection to my governor!

Supreme Court Nominee is 2nd Cousin to Iowa Gov. Branstad

Kinda disappointed with this nomination, honestly. I'm hoping the GOP kills it so the next nominee is farther to the left, hopefully being confirmed after the November elections.

I feel the same way Mormech. There were quite a few names attached to women or non-white men in the weeks building up to this; I'm hoping that this guy (while he seems like a fine choice, and a massive improvement from Scalia) is just a "test the waters" nomination to see if the Republicans stick to their obstructionist plans, and let the blowback hit them before Obama throws a more unique perspective at the bench.

Lol, I doubt he would do it, but I would love to see a bit of gamesmanship in the process.

Start with Merrick... after 4 or 8 weeks of no movement, withdraw the nomination and then nominate someone slightly more liberal.

4 to 8 weeks later... withdraw the nomination and then nominate someone even MORE liberal.

etc.

Keeps the obstruction in the news cycle, along with the media fascination with each new candidate and analysis of the current political climate. Actually, I'm loving this idea more and more, even if all Obama does is go down through his short list of 5 candidates over 7 months.

Hmmmmm

Developing - Now four Republican senators say they will meet with Judge Garland:

Ayotte
Collins
Flake
Portman

Podunk wrote:

Hmmmmm

Developing - Now four Republican senators say they will meet with Judge Garland:

Ayotte
Collins
Flake
Portman

That's odd. Portman straight out said that "there's no path for this nominee" earlier today...

I'm still holding out that when Hillary wins the Big House, she nominates Obama, and slips the GOP a note that says "This is payback for Trump".

OG_slinger wrote:
Podunk wrote:

Hmmmmm

Developing - Now four Republican senators say they will meet with Judge Garland:

Ayotte
Collins
Flake
Portman

That's odd. Portman straight out said that "there's no path for this nominee" earlier today...

Meeting with and holding hearings on are two different things. Even McConnell and the committee chair only said that they personally would not meet with the nominee (as I recall).

OG_slinger wrote:
Podunk wrote:

Hmmmmm

Developing - Now four Republican senators say they will meet with Judge Garland:

Ayotte
Collins
Flake
Portman

That's odd. Portman straight out said that "there's no path for this nominee" earlier today...

Aren't all 4 of them taking hits in the polls back home over the current obstructionism? If so, it's not that odd.

Jolly Bill wrote:

Meeting with and holding hearings on are two different things. Even McConnell and the committee chair only said that they personally would not meet with the nominee (as I recall).

I know they're two different things. But that's also that point. Republicans can say they're "holding meetings" with the candidate to make it look like they're doing their jobs even when they're explicitly refusing to do their actual job of holding hearings.

Maybe their meeting will just consist of them asking Garland "So who's your favorite Game of Thrones character?" Once the meeting ends they can hold a press conference to say that the meeting was unproductive and no progress was made towards a confirmation hearing.

Portman's also up for reelection, and Strickland has been pointing to this exact situation already. Wouldn't surprise me in the least if he's just doing it to make it look like he's doing something while remaining committed to doing nothing. Not that that will help all that much with anyone. The base sees something, even if meaningless, happening that they thought wouldn't happen, the moderates see him doing some thumb twiddling and still not doing his job while he pretends to do his job.

hmm...another non-Christian. White guy, but not a Christian white guy. Interesting move, Obama.

Really, this is the kind of nominee one would expect out of Obama. Obama ran on going beyond partisanship. A liberal with ties back to Justice Brennan but respect from conservatives is exactly what you'd expect out of Obama. It would be good for my side to have a liberal equivalent of a Scalia, but I don't think my side *needs* a raging liberal (edit: or even another rational but liberal lion, like Brennan), just someone left-center and reasonable.

Also, there's this:

So respected is Garland as a judge that Chief Justice Roberts, at his confirmation hearing, answered a question about one of his majority opinions by noting that Judge Garland had dissented and, said Roberts, "Anytime Judge Garland disagrees, you know you're in a difficult area."

Not a bad idea to put a liberal on the court that can get along with the conservative chief justice. Both in terms of cases and in terms of restoring the public's respect for the supreme court as an institution.

Vrikk wrote:

I'm still holding out that when Hillary wins the Big House, she nominates Obama, and slips the GOP a note that says "This is payback for Trump".

The biggest mechanical problem with that is that Supreme Court Justice Obama would have to recuse himself from most cases involving the Federal Executive branch from 2008 through 2016. That's probably going to be a non-trivial amount of Supreme Court cases over the next twenty or thirty years.

cheeze_pavilion wrote:

Also, there's this:

So respected is Garland as a judge that Chief Justice Roberts, at his confirmation hearing, answered a question about one of his majority opinions by noting that Judge Garland had dissented and, said Roberts, "Anytime Judge Garland disagrees, you know you're in a difficult area."

Not a bad idea to put a liberal on the court that can get along with the conservative chief justice. Both in terms of cases and in terms of restoring the public's respect for the supreme court as an institution.

I'm waiting to see what Orrin Hatch will think about the nomination, seeing as he referred to Garland as "a consensus nominee" back in 2010.

Asked if Garland would win Senate confirmation with bipartisan support, Hatch told Reuters, "No question."
"He (Merrick) would be very well supported by all sides (as a Supreme Court nominee) and the president knows that," Hatch said.

Definitely curious to see how all this plays out.

Yonder wrote:
Vrikk wrote:

I'm still holding out that when Hillary wins the Big House, she nominates Obama, and slips the GOP a note that says "This is payback for Trump".

The biggest mechanical problem with that is that Supreme Court Justice Obama would have to recuse himself from most cases involving the Federal Executive branch from 2008 through 2016. That's probably going to be a non-trivial amount of Supreme Court cases over the next twenty or thirty years.

What? No. These last eight years have been a bastion of bipartisan friendship in the federal government.

Every time I listen to a Republican congressman talk about this convinces me that the whole lot of them are a cancerous plague holding back this country and their ideology should be eradicated. f*ck the GOP in Congress.

Edwin wrote:

Every time I listen to a Republican congressman talk about this convinces me that the whole lot of them are a cancerous plague holding back this country and their ideology should be eradicated. f*ck the GOP in Congress.

Not the most nuanced view.....:) But I can't argue with it since it does feel that way.

Well this should be interesting.

This is awesome, I love The Onion.

I really don' t know what more to say...he's not going to be given a chance and I think most of us know this. The Republicans have said it so many times, and so loudly that they can't walk back on it now. They're stuck holding and defending that position and honestly, for most of them, it will work. Their constituents want this kind of action, they want to stop Obama at every turn. Yeah, there's going to be people in their states who are unhappy, but the plurality of their voters will praise and reward this, not condemn it.

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