Senate Truce Collapses as G.O.P. Rush to Confirm More Judges Begins Anew.

[elleng]

'Senate Democrats struck a deal last week with Republicans that saw the quick confirmation of 15 more conservative judges in exchange for a rapid flight to the campaign trail. Liberal activists were infuriated, but after the brutally divisive fight to confirm Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, the agreement held out a promise of peace.

“I would like to have the future mending things,” declared the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa.

On Wednesday, at Mr. Grassley’s instruction, the armistice collapsed.

Republicans on the Judiciary Committee convened yet another hearing to consider still more conservative federal court nominees — while the Senate was technically in recess. Incensed Democrats boycotted the proceedings, but their empty chairs did not prevent candidates for the bench, such as Allison Rushing, 36, a social conservative nominated by President Trump to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, from taking a crucial step toward confirmation.

“If there was ever any hope that after the Kavanaugh experience we could return to bipartisanship on the Senate Judiciary Committee, it was shaken this morning,” said Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Democrat in the chamber, in a telephone interview.

The hearing demonstrated the lengths to which Republicans will go to put conservatives on the federal judiciary, a signature initiative of Mr. Trump and Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and the majority leader. Only a handful of Republicans attended the Wednesday hearing, but it checked a box to move more judges to the floor during the lame-duck session after Election Day.'>>>

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/17/us/politics/senate-republicans-judges.html

[madaboutharry]

1. This is a horrible thing.

These right wing nut job judges are going to tear at the very fabric of our democracy because at their core they actually don’t believe in democracy. They believe in power for the privileged class.

[elleng]

2. It really is a horrible thing, they've been working on it for a LONG time,

and I have little confidence in Dem's responses (limited as they are.) Do want to study what just happened more thoroughly.

[vi5]

3. Wait....you mean giving them concessions in the hopes of something later didn't work?

I'm shocked! Shocked I tell you. Nobody could have seen that coming.

Sure a bunch of radical right wing judges got confirmed but in exchange we got.....uh..........um.......what exactly? For them to get to go home early?

[shanny]

4. Laughable and pathetic

that Schumer or anybody else fell for a truce. Where the F have they been for the last 10 (minimum) years?

[elleng]

6. Nothing laughable at all.

At LEAST pathetic.

[shanny]

8. When the choices are

laughing or crying, I prefer to laugh.

[elleng]

9. I would too, but haven't been able to do so recently.

[TheRealNorth]

11. No shit

Obama clearly figured it out after the budget negotiations in 2011 (if not sooner than that).

[msongs]

5. somebody in high dems leadership got played nt

[elleng]

7. BADLY played, it appears.

[Lucky Luciano]

12. They were crossing their fingers behind their backs.

Last edited Wed Oct 17, 2018, 09:57 PM - Edit history (1)

I’ll say it again! In 2020, we end the filibuster and go absolutely ballistic.

Pack all the courts. Pass whatever law we want. If we don’t do it first, they will.

[sharedvalues]

14. DUHHHHH. Fighting is important!! FIGHT, Dems.

The rules have changed. Fighting works and fires up the base.
START FIGHTING!

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100211271088

[TheRealNorth]

10. He needs to give up his leadership position

Chuck got Charlie Brown'd again.

[elleng]

13. Looks about right.

[sharedvalues]

15. We were telling him so last week.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100211271088

But remember, fighting for its own sake is important. We all need to fight.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/the-critical-question-facing-democrats-and-the-court

First, as I said, the ‘McConnell Rule’ is bullshit. But I think the exact argument Democrats fight on isn’t the most important thing. The most important thing is that Democrats need to fight this hard both to take some minuscule chance to defeat it and also to show that they know this is not a normal political moment. The last SCOTUS Justice was stolen through a corrupt act. Now, this compounds it. We have a sitting President who is the subject of multiple criminal investigations who is about to appoint a Justice who will likely judge whether the rule of law should apply to him. That is not remotely okay. That should not be allowed to happen both for the safety of the Republic and for basic principle.

But what if doing this actually damages Democratic numbers in Washington? Here’s my reasoning. You don’t win fights by not fighting. That applies to battles and wars. Democrats are asking voters, a significant number of whom may not ideologically be Democrats, to vote for them as a check on Donald Trump. I don’t think you can convincingly make that argument when you’re not doing everything to provide a check while you’re making the argument. To put it more specifically, you cannot go into an election in which enthusiasm and motivation is everything and in which numerous Democratic constituencies have key issues on the line and start the process by demoralizing them. That will not work. So I think you have to fight and fight in a way that signals clearly that you don’t regard this as a normal political situation. You have to take the risk of that paradoxically backfiring situation.

[More_Cowbell]

16. The GOP *LIES*. They lie all the time.

It's infuriating that the Democrats keep falling for it.

[elleng]

17. Yes