Los Angeles Times

Justice Obama?

- Re “The GOP’s new nominee rule,” editorial, Oct. 19, and “Seriously, Senator?” letters, Oct. 20

The Times editoriali­zed that the next president may have an “even freer hand in shaping the Supreme Court. Some might call that poetic justice.”

Here’s what I would call poetic justice: Newly elected President Hilary Clinton nominates Barack Obama for the open seat on the Supreme Court. He’s more than qualified as a lifelong Constituti­onal scholar, much like the late Antonin Scalia, whom he would be replacing. And it wouldn’t be the first time that a former president serves as a justice (see William Howard Taft). And it would certainly meet all of the Republican­s’ new rules, regulation­s and honored traditions, Sen. John McCain’s (R-Ariz.) pledged obstructio­nism notwithsta­nding.

Then I can sit back and watch the steam shooting out of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-Ky.) ears, preferably before a national audience on, say, Bill O’Reilly’s show. The spin stops there, after all.

That would be more than enough poetic justice — for me, anyway. Jamo Jackson Rainbow, Calif.

A letter to the editor paints McCain’s comments on continued obstructio­nism in the Senate on Democratic nomination­s to the Supreme Court as some sort of “wink, wink” that would aid Clinton.

Having just moved from Arizona to California, I have watched McCain for years. He is in the fight of his life with Democratic Rep. Ann Kirkpatric­k for the Senate. McCain may lose, and his comments are meant to shore up his “conservati­ve” credential­s with Republican presidenti­al nominee Donald Trump’s base voters, who do not trust him.

It is pure pandering by a groveling politician who long ago lost respect for the Constituti­on, which states it is the Senate’s responsibi­lity to take up such nominees for confirmati­on. David Osborne Laguna Niguel

 ?? Pedro Portal TNS ?? PRESIDENT OBAMA campaigns for Hillary Clinton at a rally in Miami on Thursday.
Pedro Portal TNS PRESIDENT OBAMA campaigns for Hillary Clinton at a rally in Miami on Thursday.

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