CFP: “Progressives think McConnell is bluffing on the nuclear option,” reads the headline at Hot Air. Gee, where would the political Left have gotten that idea?
If you said from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) himself, go to the head of the class. On Sunday, McConnell said, “Judge Gorsuch is going to be confirmed. The way in which that occurs is in the hands of the Democratic minority.”
Does that mean McConnell will exercise the nuclear option and eliminate the filibuster so that Neil Gorsuch doesn’t need 60 votes for confirmation to the Supreme Court?
Well, notice that McConnell didn’t say he’d use the nuclear option. Instead he uses the phrase “the way in which that occurs” which leaves him a lot of wiggle room. read more
I don’t think it leaves a lot of wiggle room. If the Dems try a filibuster then I think that McConnell would have no choice but to confirm a Judge that was perfectly reasonable and very acceptable to the party using the nuclear option. Doing some sort of deal that gains the Dems a lot and the GOP a little will put McConnell’s leadership on the line. Too many GOP Senators are watching Trump put policies in play that may well pay off big in 2018 (regardless of what the polls say now) and won’t risk pissing the President off. McConnell knows this and it’s a way to puff himself up at no real cost.
The more I read about him, the more I wish that naaasty woman had won.
McConnell will allow the filibuster, as a power play, to make himself look more ‘relevant’ to the press. And to his Dem friends.
Here’s the problem
Republican invoke the nuclear option to place a guy that isn’t any kind of an extremist on the Supreme Court.
Ten years from now, the Dems might have the Senate majority, and use that same nuclear option to put ever more extremist radicals on the court.
It a matter of degrees.
There is no easy answer.
You better hope that if the Republicans invoke the nuclear option, that Ginsburg and Thomas and Kennedy and whoever else retire or die while President Trump is in office and they have the majority so the SCOTUS can be filled with younger justices.
The Left is determined to undermine the Republic. Destroying gentlemanly traditions of civility furthers that, as does destroying “checks and balances”.
Obama ruled as illegal Dictator by illegal decrees.
Trump is now forced to do some semblance of the same precedent , precisely because the same Dems have now adopted the ‘render America ungovernable ” scorched-earth sabotage strategy.
Tough predicaments, stern remedies.
But ever more dangerous precedents.
The Left must be eradicated.
Before they eradicate the Republic, the Constitution, and the West.
MAGA.
Mr. Ropy may be correct about the Dem long-term strategy, but it seems likely that additional SCOTUS seats may be vacant before the Dems returun to power. They run more risk of having conservatives added to the bench.
The Senate has their ‘nuclear option’ but there are other versions.
With the Presidency and BOTH Houses in their control, the Republicans would risk annihilation, extinction and lasting opprobrium if they don’t start accomplishing many things and soon.
The payback time for Republicans is now. Nuclear option is a must.
The Repubs may get two more Supreme Court Justices over the next eight years. Just do it!
Who among us believes that if our side caves and doesn’t go nuclear that the dems would honor that when/if the roles were reversed? Hint: who last changed the filibuster rules?o