‘Trumped’ on Supreme Court pick
Karma. What goes around, comes around.
Any way you slice it, Republicans — and, in particular, conservatives — are getting exactly what they deserve as President Biden prepares to fill the upcoming Supreme Court vacancy. Justices serve for life, so the next one will be helping to shape the law of the land for decades, almost certainly from a leftist perspective. Despite that being anathema to the right, they have absolutely no one to blame but themselves.
The reason is two-fold: A) Donald Trump should never have lost the election, and B) even after he did, he simply had to deliver one of two Senate seats in red-state Georgia for Republicans to be in command of the nomination process. But since the former president failed on both counts, the current president should have little problem seeing a liberal nominee sail through Senate confirmation.
Why did Mr. Trump falter? Because since 2015, his base refused to call him out when he went off the rails. Contrary to conventional wisdom, Donald Trump could be reasoned with — if enough people were onboard persuading him with logical arguments. But since that rarely occurred, Mr. Trump took it as carte-blanche to continue his pattern of irresponsible and, quite often, offensive behavior. And he knew exactly what he was doing, as illustrated by his famous quote: “My people are so smart…I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters…It’s, like, incredible.”
That colossal failure will allow the liberal wing to remain one-third of the Court should Mr. Biden nominate a left-leaning judge — only two votes shy of decision-making power. And given Chief Justice John Roberts’ history of liberal rulings, it is, in reality, already closer to that threshold. For the record, the oft-used media description of the court as a “6-3 conservative majority” is a misnomer. First, as mentioned, is the John Roberts factor. Second, Clarence Thomas, at almost 74 years old, is no spring chicken. That’s certainly not to say that he couldn’t serve another 20 years, but that would be contrary to actuarial tables. Therefore, in the blink of an eye, the court could easily transform from “conservative” to a leftleaning bench.
To be clear, this is not “blame for the sake of blame.” Quite the opposite. It is the hard truth and, hopefully, a lesson for both sides that it’s not just what you do, but how you do it. For the right, the best path forward to is embrace the conservative ideals that have built America, but reject errant messengers who hurt the cause by offensive personalities and childish petulance. In this particular case, it should be clear that the man who is now advocating pardons — should he be elected again — for some Jan. 6 criminals, and questioning why then-Vice President Mike Pence did not reject the 2020 Electoral College results, isn’t the guy to follow.
Ironically, this column was originally intended to provide commentary on why choosing a nominee based on gender and skin color is wrong. But in retrospect, it doesn’t really matter what we opine on that subject, because to the victor go the spoils, and Joe Biden, as the legitimately-elected president, is following through on his shallow campaign promise to do just that.
Disqualifying huge swaths of people because they don’t possess the “desired” look is both racist and contrary to American ideals of equality and merit, which is destroying the Democratic Party more each day. But Joe Biden made his bed, and now he must lie in it. The proof of his unpopular decision is in the pudding, as 3 of 4 Americans disapprove of playing the ethnic card with Supreme Court nominations and only 1 in 3 approve of his job performance. In the short term, he and his party will almost certainly lose big in the elections, but long term, Mr. Biden will likely have succeeded in keeping the court’s liberal wing intact.
Far more than any other branch of government, the judiciary has an impact that is the most lasting — for good or ill. Given that charting the course of America for the next several generations lie in the hands of the Supreme Court, and future vacancies may not be all that far off, Republicans would be wise to learn from history so they are not doomed to repeat the mistakes of their past.