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Brett Kavanaugh has been confirmed as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. The vote was 50-48 in favor of Kavanaugh.
Senators Collins, Flake, and Manchin had already announced their intentions to confirm Kavanaugh before the vote was held. Senator Lisa Murkowski, who was previously ready to vote "no", agreed to vote "present" instead so that Senator Steve Daines could attend his daughter's wedding instead of being present in the Senate to support Kavanaugh.
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(Score: 5, Informative) by hemocyanin on Saturday October 06 2018, @10:23PM (14 children)
The Democrats are fine with Kavanaugh's positions (he and Merrick Garland voted together well over 90% of the time) -- they just wanted to create some hot-button issue to camouflage that fact the Democrats and Republicans share similar views in advance of the next election: http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/10/06/kava-o06.html [wsws.org]
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @11:46PM (1 child)
Garland was nominated to be a palatable choice for the Republican Senate. However, Republicans were too cowardly and conniving to even hold Garland's confirmation hearings. By making it an election issue, they may have gotten more evangelical turnout in 2016. Either way, the bet paid off. Now they get to live with the consequences: total war over every nomination. Eventually, Democrats will regain the Senate and possibly get their revenge.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 07 2018, @02:47PM
Yes, eventually. But, what does "eventual" mean, exactly? Two years? Ten years? Twenty? It's not outside the realms of possibility that the D's don't control the senate for fifty years. Unlikely, but possible.
Meanwhile, the Dems have introduced the idea that a SC nominee (or any other appointee who needs confirmation) can be blocked with rumors and/or false accusations regarding his conduct as a youth.
I'm reminded of a schoolmate. Big, strapping young man, borderline bashful, but a helluva fullback. Fairly smart guy, managed to keep high C and low B grades in all his classes without studying. He was called "Wheee" by everyone. It seems that when he was being potty trained, he stood in the commode, pulled the handle, and hollered "Wheeee" as the water sloshed around his feet.
Do you reckon that might put the stops to his confirmation, if he should be nominated to some position? Surely playing in the toilet is a sign of mental illness, and/or conservatism.
As someone has already noted, you guys are sore losers.
We're gonna be able to vacation in Gaza, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran and maybe Minnesota soon. Incredible times.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Whoever on Saturday October 06 2018, @11:58PM (3 children)
Lets turn that around shall we? If Kavanaugh and Garland would issue the same decisions, why didn't the Republicans confirm him?
Clearly, the Republicans' move was pure partisan politics. They did not confirm Garland simply because Obama nominated him, not because of any perceived ideological position.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by hemocyanin on Sunday October 07 2018, @02:38AM (2 children)
Of course it works that way. We have two right wing pro-war pro-bankster parties who do their best to come up with bullshit issues to say there's some difference between them.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Phoenix666 on Sunday October 07 2018, @12:39PM (1 child)
Yes, that is so. They pretend to have differences to give the illusion of choice to the public while there is no real choice at all. That is designed to keep the public fighting each other instead of fighting the material agenda of the elites.
I would point out that those parties are not really right wing. They're not left wing, either, as those on the self-identified right assert. Rather, they're about power first, last, and always. It's the only value they hold. That we on the outside characterize them as "left" or "right" is entirely according to their design; it incites people on the "other" side, who indignantly stand up and say no no no you guys are the ones who are the baddies--you are responsible for all this.
I keep waiting for the mike to drop, for both sides to pause, comprehension dawning on their faces as they slowly turn and regard the figures in the shadowy alcoves who have been sipping champagne, eating caviar, and petting their white cats while watching the fireworks. It never happens, though.
I want a party that can represent regular people, with big, sensible ideas, like the Progressive Party of 1912, which introduced child labor laws, the FDA, the 40-hr work week, social security, worker's comp, and much, much more. Read their party platform [teachingamericanhistory.org]. We could almost adopt it word for word now, because the same conditions they were fighting then obtain now.
Just read what they had to say about the Democratic and Republican parties, and decide if was really written in 1912 or was ripped from yesterday's headlines:
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 07 2018, @01:48PM
It sounds like you want the Socialist Equality Party [socialequality.com]. It looks like Niles Niemuth over in Ann Arbor, MI and western Detroit is their only candidate. It'll be interesting to see where that party goes.
The Green Party [gp.org] is another good choice.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 07 2018, @01:20AM (7 children)
> they just wanted to create some hot-button issue to camouflage
Have you considered maybe they truly believed he is not trustworthy, based on evidence?
I know, Occam's in politics, but still.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 07 2018, @02:02AM
Then why did they not pursue proving perjury with the fervor they had for the alleged and likely unprovable sexual crimes?
Sexual crimes got a day-long hearing. Perjury did not.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by hemocyanin on Sunday October 07 2018, @02:40AM (5 children)
Yes and I reject the assertion. Democrats didn't bitch about his hard-right positions -- they dredged up some unprovable/undisprovable allegation to dominate the airways and deflect from issues.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by bussdriver on Sunday October 07 2018, @06:28AM (4 children)
Yes they did! The MEDIA didn't give much coverage over the serious complaints; and the GOP kept everything they could secret and shortened the time to make the whole thing a sham. They had time to do it properly and they didn't at every turn. So LITTLE time to point out major problems and cite anything was given! Only when this minor problem exploding into a political nightmare got media/public traction did things have to slow down a little bit ONLY to deal with that issue.
Yes, I'm saying it is a minor issue because it's not provable and a political shit storm which might have been averted if the process worked the way it was supposed to in the first place. Now we can expect that Trump would have quietly had the guy withdraw to avoid it had the thing been known; but how can anybody reasonably expect Trump to let the man withdraw or that he even would respect the system/process like many patriots do when they resign from things rather than fight them. (not all are guilty when they do it. cabinet members for example.) If you actually investigated it maybe it would become something beyond a minor problem. He should have been rejected BEFORE the dirty issues became public.
I'm not one to hold somebody's stupid youth against them but this guy didn't show any signs of growing up. Hell, he didn't even show signs of average mental health under pressure.
The USA is dying. All this stuff is just symptoms; expect worse as democracy goes full circle. (Despotism is how all democracy ends; Franklin was right.)
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 07 2018, @01:47PM
The only policy issue I saw complaints about were "OMG, he's going to overturn Roe v Wade!", which certainly got plenty of MSM airtime.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 07 2018, @01:52PM
They got a whole day-long hearing for allegations of a 36-year old sexual assault that did not even investigate his position on Roe v. Wade. The content in the New York Times and Washington Post in particular is controlled by the same elites that control the Democratic Party. There is no amount of apologetics that can save them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 07 2018, @06:19PM (1 child)
Franklin? Plato! And who's Franklin?
(Score: 1) by bussdriver on Sunday October 14 2018, @06:49PM
Ben Franklin. The most famous and significant founder of the USA; he was even offered the 1st presidency. Look at this full speech which ended the constitutional convention.