Justice Anton Scalia Reportedly Found Dead At Texas Resort

Robert Reich wrote:

My mole in the White House tells me Obama will nominate 46-year-old Judge Sri Srinivasan, an Indian-American jurist who Obama nominated in 2013 to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit -- and the Senate confirmed unanimously.
...
My suspicion is Obama couldn't do better than Srinivasan. No other nominee with get a majority of Senate votes. What do you think?

Thanks to the damage that the 2013 gun control debacle did to Mr. Obama's second term...

Finn dAbuzz wrote:

The "others have done it too" defense doesn't hold much water for me.

No, you much prefer the "it doesn't matter if others have done it so long as Obama did it too" defense.

But let’s further imagine that though Clinton is the president, Republicans have held on to a majority in the Senate, which they well might. Will there be more than one or two who would vote for Clinton’s nominee and swing the Court to the left?

The question is particularly volatile because this is the first time since
Clarence Thomas replaced Thurgood Marshall in 1991 that the ideological balance on the Court will actually change. In the six prior cases, from Ginsberg through Kagan, either a Republican president filled the seat of a conservative justice or a Democratic president filled the seat of a liberal justice. Now the stakes are even higher, both substantively and politically. Every Republican senator trying to decide what to do will know that if they vote to confirm any Democratic nominee for this seat, a primary challenge from the right will probably be in the offing the next time they run for re-election.

A White House spokeswoman, Dana Perino, said Schumer's comments show "a tremendous disrespect for the Constitution" by suggesting that the Senate not confirm nominees.

In a typically insightful Twitter spree last night, David Frum noted that "McConnell’s precipitate statement [that he would refuse to hold a vote on any Obama appointee] is wrong not only on grounds of appropriateness & timing, but even politics ..." As Frum notes, it is entirely unnecessary for McConnell to make this stark pronouncement. He and his Senate caucus could simply decide in advance to judge any nominee beyond the pale, reject them on a party line vote and run out the clock.

Part of me thinks this too. And I agree with David that it is simply wrong. But I think I know why McConnell is right out of the gate with a principle he seemingly has no need to explicitly invoke: to normalize the behavior, to stake out the maximalist position early in order to allow it time to become accepted as a given. And more than this, it makes sense for him to do so while the White House is bound by normative rules of propriety and decency to focus on statements and gestures of mourning rather than political brinksmanship.

As I said, there's no debate here. It's just a power-play, a refusal to fulfill a straightforward constitutional duty, which no one, not the President or anyone else, has the power to prevent. Let's not pretend otherwise.

You say that like it's supposed to mean something. I follow politics fairly closely, and I have no idea what you're talking about when you mention this "2013 gun control debate." What "debate?" Who was debating?

Whatever it was, it may have been consequential for you and your limited circle of friends, but remember, just because everyone you know agrees with you doesn't mean everyone agrees with you.

As it happened, Schumer’s suggested obstruction never came to pass, as no more vacancies opened during Bush’s presidency.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2016/02/14/flashback-in-2007-schumer-called-for-blocking-all-bush-supreme-court-nominations/#ixzz40FazJpyg