You Lost, Senate Dems -- Grow a Pair and Show Up

I don't doubt that you are following the Cabinet confirmation hearings with muted enthusiasm.  After all, this only happens in real earnest when an administration changes and, as we are only on our 45th president since 1789, that doesn't happen too often.

This is sort of the first "Twitter transition", where we are privy not only to simultaneous newscasts of what goes on in the committee hearings, but the commentary of experts, pundits, newscasters and frankly, you and me, in real time.

It is the latter fact that makes me wonder a great deal about Democrats.  Of course, I have a hard time figuring out why anyone would even be one, given the dearth of their ideas that have ever worked, and the incompetence of its leadership, now in their 70s without having apparently learned anything.  In fact, the biggest challenge the party has is the juvenescence of its voters vs. the senescence of its spokespeople.

Including, of course, the laughable Democrats that are the minority leaders in both houses of Congress.

Exhibit A this past week has been the committee hearings in the Senate that are supposed to make recommendations to the full Senate to vote on President Trump's Cabinet appointees.  The committees, made up of slightly more Republicans than Democrats (elections have consequences, y'know), interview the candidates and then vote for them.  That recommendation is necessary before the full Senate votes.

Now, the Senate is a rules-choked rules-driven body, and one of them is that a committee may not report out a vote to the full Senate unless at least one member of the opposition party, in this case the Democrats, is there for the vote.  So knowing that they weren't going to get any of the nominees outvoted because all the Republicans would vote for the nominee, the Democrats figured they would do the next best thing.

They didn't show up for the vote.

How did that work out for them?

Not well, apparently.  Since the Senate's arcane and convoluted rules include the "how many senators does it take to change a rule" rule (cf. Obamacare), the Republican chairmen of the committees simply changed the voting rules and suspended the requirement for contrarian presence for each final vote to report the approval to the full Senate.

The chairman just asked the committee, empty of Democrats but with a quorum, "Motion to suspend rules 2a, 4 and 5 for this matter, do I have a second?"  Second, a vote, and there you go, rule waived.  Then a motion to send the nomination to the full Senate also passed unanimously and, Bob's your uncle, done and done.  Cliches back on the shelf.

The Democrats on the committee simply walked out on their duty to represent their constituents, and the nominations moved forward.  Not even a participation trophy for them.

And they lost.  They lost in the election, they lost the White House and both houses of Congress.  So if they want relevance, if they want influence, well, the Democrats are going to have to grow a pair and show up.  They might not win very often, or maybe ever, but at least the voters will have an idea where they stand -- and where they sit.

Because by walking out of committees and accomplishing nothing, they show the voting public what spoiled children they are.  Oh, wait; they're actually spoiled elders (see above).  That really looks pathetic.

And the voters will remember that next election cycle, although they won't have to think too hard, I figure.

The Republicans will make sure that the voters see the Democrats as the ones who didn't show up, and the Republicans as the ones who got it done.

Copyright 2017 by Robert Sutton
Like what you read here?  There's a new post from Bob at www.uberthoughtsUSA.com at 10am Eastern time, every weekday, giving new meaning to "prolific essayist."  Sponsorship and interview inquiries cheerfully welcomed at bsutton@alum.mit.edu or on Twitter at @rmosutton.

Borking the Nation in 1987

I "met" the late Robert Bork 20 years ago on an airplane.

He was flying, as was I, from somewhere to somewhere else, and was seated in the front of the plane as I was walking past him to my seat.  As this was only a few years past his 1987 nomination to the Supreme Court, and he was quite recognizable, I leaned over quickly as I walked by and said something like "Don't let those illegitimate sons of desert camels get you down", or something like that.

Or maybe I just said "Hi."  I really don't remember, and Judge Bork is gone now, so it really does not matter at this point.

I mention that because Bork is an incredibly important figure in the history of our nation, more so than a surprising number of people you may think of, and distinctly more important than probably most of the actual justices who did serve on the Court.  He is important, though, not for anything that he did but, rather, what was done to him.

It seems only a few years ago, but it was actually 30, when President Reagan nominated Judge Bork to be an associate justice of the Supreme Court.  Judge Bork was clearly as qualified, or more, than a number of the people who have actually become justices since that time.  A brilliant jurist and constitutional scholar, Bork's nomination seemed a no-brainer at the rime.

For many, myself included, the hearings on Judge Bork by the Senate were the first televised Senate hearings we had actually paid attention to.  Ever.  Unfortunately, though, they were an utter embarrassment to the Senate and to the Federal government in general.

And that embarrassment continues to this day.

You see, Bork's nomination was the first time that the "advise and consent" clause in the Constitution was visibly used, in this case by the Democrats, in a manner such as to ignore qualifications of a judge (or, since, a Cabinet secretary) in favor of political considerations.  Not "What is your opinion of the intent of the Thirteenth Amendment", but "Would you vote to overturn Roe v. Wade?"

And, of course, ever since that hearing, it has become OK for senators to vote on justice candidates based on something other than their actual qualifications to serve on the Court, their understanding of the Constitution, their grasp of the intent of the Framers in writing it.

Since Judge Bork's nomination was killed by the Democrats, a Pandora's box has opened.  And that is specifically why he is the historic figure he is now, and why since the Democrats' despicable treatment of him, to be denied an appointed position in government because of politics rather than ability, is to have been "Borked."

Up to that point, with minor exceptions I can't recall now, a qualified candidate for the Supreme Court would be voted on based on competence.  It was assumed that the presidents making nominations would select candidates for the Court who shared their view of the law.  They often got surprised (I'm looking at you, Justice Souter), but there was plenty of leeway and deference to the president's wishes.

That all ended in 1987.  The Democrats in the Senate hit the button on their 1987 version of the "nuclear option" and denied Judge Bork the appointed seat.

They couldn't possibly oppose Judge Bork on his qualifications.  An accomplished legal career included terms as Solicitor General during the Nixon administration after years of private practice and finally a long period as a circuit court judge.  He was a prolific writer with some seriously argued opinions relative to the role of the Federal government and a particularly conservative view in that area. And he certainly knew the Constitution.

Robert Bork was immensely qualified, which makes his rejection so historical.  Senators like Ted Kennedy and Joe Biden gave speeches opposing him that were so full of misrepresentations and untruths that Bork had to make statements like the one after Kennedy's speech, stating "Not one line in that speech was accurate."  Typical.

Thirty years later, it has become the norm for presidential appointees to be evaluated on their politics rather than their competence.  Robert Bork was immensely capable of being a Supreme Court justice, and everyone, including Ted Kennedy and Joe Biden knew it.

But Democrats are not known for relating history and its impacts to the needs of the liberal today, or even the impact on tomorrow.  They didn't think of the fact that to change the traditional evaluation based on competence, that preceded Bork, meant that their own candidates were going to be subject to political opinion going forward.  Not as much, of course, since Republicans are reasonable people who believe that a president had a right to appoint justices who agreed with their opinions on thing.

And the Democrats did not care that they were setting a precedent that was truly harmful to the nation (and would later cost them the nomination of Merrick Garland).  But that's what we have now.  We have Democrat senators simply staying away from committee hearings on President Trump's Cabinet appointees like a bunch of spoiled children, without concern about how they look.

We have Democrat senators declaring that they're not going to vote for the president's Supreme Court nominee, even before the nominee was named ("I don't know whom you're going to nominate, but I'm not voting for him").  In other words, their vote is solely a political step with no regard for the process or for historic precedent, at least before the first Borking.

This needs to stop.  Barack Obama made two nominations to the Court (well, three, but one did not get voted on), and in both cases enough Republicans took the "advising and consenting" role seriously enough to agree on their qualifications.  Plenty of Republicans voted for Obama's nominees.  Will the Democrats predominantly take that position with the newly nominated Neil Gorsuch?

We absolutely have to go back to the pre Borkian approach to the Senate's role.  If nominees are qualified, it is not for the Senate to vote them down on solely political grounds,  It is their role to validate those qualifications, not to apply criteria that do not really apply.

I pray that the Gorsuch appointment is handled with the dignity the office and the man deserve.

That doesn't mean that a Senate with Chuck Schumer and Elizabeth Warren will care.

Copyright 2017 by Robert Sutton
Like what you read here?  There's a new post from Bob at www.uberthoughtsUSA.com at 10am Eastern time, every weekday, giving new meaning to "prolific essayist."  Sponsorship and interview inquiries cheerfully welcomed at bsutton@alum.mit.edu or on Twitter at @rmosutton.

On Medals of Honor and The Awarding Thereof

I have no idea what prompted this piece, but it was building for a while.  Maybe it was someone on television; maybe something completely disconnected from the topic.  After all, we have lots of dusty old synapses in our brains that fire off randomly as we get a bit older.

I was thinking about Congressional Medal of Honor winners.

Now, you don't go into the military hoping to win one; it's not like joining a pro sport dreaming of a Super Bowl or of playing in and winning a World Series, or Stanley Cup, or whatever you win in as champions of the NBA.  There is still an NBA, right?  Anyone here watch?

You go into the military because you have a set of core beliefs that include the proper defense of our country, and because you feel compelled to be part of that defense.  You don't go in expecting to have to be in a situation where you put your life in high risk to save your brother and sister military in some manner.  You are trained on how to do that and what to do, and how to respond if it happens, but it isn't exactly your dream.  It's about the mission.

You just do it.

So how must it have felt for those servicemen who have been awarded a Medal of Honor for the last eight years?  You become one of a select few put in a situation where your courage and placement of country above life is tested and you pass the test with an A+.  And eventually, you are brought to the White House and a precious ribbon is placed around your neck.

It looks like the picture of it you see often; each service has its own similar, but slightly varied, design.  You come to the White House, and the President of the United States is the one putting the ribbon and star medal on you.

But no, the president in office when you are awarded is Barack Obama, an anti-military ideologue who truly couldn't care less for your bravery and courage, who never served and never liked you when you served.  In fact, he picketed your brothers in arms, metaphorically or actually, years back.  He doesn't really even like you, because he doesn't believe in the role of the military.

That president released terrorists from Guantanamo Bay to go back into the battlefield and fight you, and that's the same president now choking back anger and putting on a big phony smile as he makes a speech about your heroism, but believes none of it.  And that is your memory as you go back to your unit.

You tell the story of your trip to the White House, but it is colored by the notion that, rather than someone who believed in you and your unit, and the military and the USA's position in the world, and deeply admired the special qualities that made you do what you did, you got Barack Obama.  All the photographs, all the memories, will have to be of the guy who refused to allow recruiting offices to be armed and defend themselves.

They'll be memories that the highest military honor was draped around your neck by the president who pulled troops out of Iraq without ensuring the stability of that nation's military and therefore leading to the power of ISIS.  You will have to discard the contempt that he has for you and your mission.

I don't know how many Medal of Honor winners had to endure being honored by Obama, however reluctantly, in the last eight years.  But that won't have to happen anymore.  I have every confidence, and so do you, that President Trump will be squarely behind our military, and that if the time comes that further Medals of Honor are awarded, that they will be awarded with a firm hand and a steely eye, and that both of them will be sincere.

Because our president truly believes in your mission.

Copyright 2017 by Robert Sutton
Like what you read here?  There's a new post from Bob at www.uberthoughtsUSA.com at 10am Eastern time, every weekday, giving new meaning to "prolific essayist."  Sponsorship and interview inquiries cheerfully welcomed at bsutton@alum.mit.edu or on Twitter at @rmosutton.