SUPREME SHOWDOWN: Obama names court pick; McConnell refuses to allow Senate hearings

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...servative-heat-on-gun-votes.html?intcmp=hpbt1

 

Strange that nobody wants to touch this topic with a ten foot pole so far. I watched McConnell give his speech this morning and he was well prepared to say the least and made a lot of sense, especially when bringing up Bidens stance on the subject way back when and his sudden 180 once he had to tow the company line and stand next to Obama during his speech at the White House this morning.

Obama is attempting to establish his legacy down the road as someone that did the best he could to stem senseless mass shootings that occur all to frequently in the US by nominating someone that is anti gun rights among other things that pisses republicans off.

I believe it should be left to the next commander and chief ... and I'm not even a republican supporter.

 

The shooting have increased since resident Obama took office. Everthing he says or does is to make this country look bad.

 

Obama is within his right to nominate and of course the GOP will sit around with their heads up their asses and do nothing

 

Prior to Justin Trudeau winning a majority government in Canada late last year the Harper Conservatives loaded the Supreme court with their choices with the idea that it would set things in their favor ... fast forward 10 years and numerous Supreme court challenges of which the Harper government was laughed out of court nearly each time that they went there, resulting in some important laws being struck down and rightfully so.

The US Supreme court is currently one member short of the nine required but to think that Obama's nominee is a swing vote is insane at best and undermines the intelligence of the other 8 members that have the interests of the general public at the forefront of their decisions. They are the last line of defense against totalitarianism.

 

The Senate is taking a giant risk on this. Merrick Garland is a centrist about whom Orrin Hatch once said there was “no question” could be confirmed to the Supreme Court. Let's break it down a little.

If Mrs. Clinton is elected, it is probably, generously, a 50% chance she picks a centrist. And highly likely she'll pick a liberal jurist much younger than Mr. Garland's 60+ years. The result? Big loss for the GOP. For, maybe, decades.

If Mr. Trump is elected, he could do absolutely ANYTHING. He may pick a conservative ... or a liberal ... or a centrist. A friend of his. Howard Stern. The result? A 33% chance of a big win for the GOP.

I dunno ... President Obama is handing the chair of the judiciary committee his dream candidate, and still there is hesitation to have confirmation hearings.

Additional Hatch quote from last week: “The president told me several times he’s going to name a moderate [to fill the court vacancy], but I don’t believe him. [Obama] could easily name Merrick Garland, who is a fine man. He probably won’t do that because this appointment is about the election. So I’m pretty sure he’ll name someone the [liberal Democratic base] wants.”

 

The guy ain't all that moderate.

The ‘Moderates’ Are Not So Moderate: Merrick Garland

by Carrie Severino March 11, 2016 8:21 PM

As the White House prepares to choose a nominee for the Supreme Court, they are continuing to suggest that they might nominate a supposed “moderate.”

But Garland has a long record, and, among other things, it leads to the conclusion that he would vote to reverse one of Justice Scalia’s most important opinions, D.C. vs. Heller, which affirmed that the Second Amendment confers an individual right to keep and bear arms.

Back in 2007, Judge Garland voted to undo a D.C. Circuit court decision striking down one of the most restrictive gun laws in the nation. The liberal District of Columbia government had passed a ban on individual handgun possession, which even prohibited guns kept in one’s own house for self-defense. A three-judge panel struck down the ban, but Judge Garland wanted to reconsider that ruling. He voted with Judge David Tatel, one of the most liberal judges on that court. As Dave Kopel observed at the time, the “[t]he Tatel and Garland votes were no surprise, since they had earlier signaled their strong hostility to gun owner rights” in a previous case. Had Garland and Tatel won that vote, there’s a good chance that the Supreme Court wouldn’t have had a chance to protect the individual right to bear arms for several more years.

Moreover, in the case mentioned earlier, Garland voted with Tatel to uphold an illegal Clinton-era regulation that created an improvised gun registration requirement. Congress prohibited federal gun registration mandates back in 1968, but as Kopel explained, the Clinton Administration had been “retaining for six months the records of lawful gun buyers from the National Instant Check System.” By storing these records, the federal government was creating an informal gun registry that violated the 1968 law. Worse still, the Clinton program even violated the 1994 law that had created the NICS system in the first place. Congress directly forbade the government from retaining background check records for law abiding citizens.

Garland thought all of these regulations were legal, which tells us two things. First, it tells us that he has a very liberal view of gun rights, since he apparently wanted to undo a key court victory protecting them. Second, it tells us that he’s willing to uphold executive actions that violate the rights of gun owners. That’s not so moderate, is it?

 

''ELECTIONS HAVE CONSEQUENCES.''

 

Are you a U.S. citizen?

 

But we'll ignore the fact that not doing something is a choice. Because if "the GOP" isn't considering the rights of the American people like they are elected to do, or more properly why both sides are supposedly elected to office, that is the same thing as sitting there idly.

 

This has nothing at all to do with 'choice', it is a 'responsibility'.

A persons history also has consequences.

The elected officials with the legislative body of our government has the full duty to uphold and protect the U.S. Constitution, if the elected officials have documented history of certain judicial decisions from a potential member that has been suggested to fill an open seat of the Judicial branch, that has been viewed as controversial, contentious and extremely questionable to the the law of the land, the Senate has to authority and the duty to decline such a nominee.

 

Well I didn't label him such ... that was the Chair of the Judiciary Committee's label for Mr. Garland.

Chairman Hatch double-dog dared President Obama to name him and he did.

Another interesting plot twist ...

 

Merrick Garland is no friend to marijuana reform. In 2013 he was one of three judges on a panel to decide if marijuana should be taken off the schedule one list that treats it as the most dangerous drug out there. Merrick sided with the DEA to keep it there.

Off with his head!

 

I think we should definitely be sending a message to Obama, but this is the wrong message.

The Senate should interview this guy and summarily reject him. THAT should be the message.

What is going on here is that the RINO establishment is so thoroughly bought and paid for that McConnell can't trust his own senators to do that.

It's pathetic.

 

Yessirree. Gotta give Obama credit for doing that.

He has exposed McConnell as the true lame duck who can't even control his people on something this simple and straightforward.

McConnell doesn't dare give Garland a hearing now. If he does, and the senate fails to reject him, conservatives nationwide will openly revolt.

 

Why does the Senate think Hilary is going to send a better nominee in January?

 

I'll bet it's a lot easier to ignore a Congress "not doing something" than it is trying ignore a Congress that IS doing something. Congress was NOT meant to be in D.C. all year long, finding new ways to justify their extended sessions (along with their extended pay and extended benefits...) by finding new ways to "consider the rights of the American people."

Meetings of Congress Clause

Yeah yeah, different time...history. Parse it any way you like. The Founding Fathers did not mean for Congress to be full-time.

James Madison, not a fan of federal government:

Federalist Papers #45:
The operations of the federal government will be most extensive and important in times of war and danger; those of the State governments, in times of peace and security. As the former periods will probably bear a small proportion to the latter, the State governments will here enjoy another advantage over the federal government. The more adequate, indeed, the federal powers may be rendered to the national defense, the less frequent will be those scenes of danger which might favor their ascendancy over the governments of the particular States.

The Congress back then would be sitting at home, (rather, working their farms and/or going about their normal lives) and Obama could justifiably appoint Garland to the Supreme Court temporarily until December, at which time the Senate would have to hold hearings when they returned. And if he was on the bench for 9 months already, chances are his nomination would be a mere formality.

 

Yep. And he was shellacked twice, too.

 

They should take Joe Biden's advice....