Younger readers may not have seen the ad, but in 1987, much of the country saw an anti-drug abuse commercial in which an angry father confronted his teenage son. The father wants to know where the teenager learned to use drugs.
“Yours, okay?” the son answers. “I learned it from watching you.”
The ad came to mind while watching the latest developments on Capitol Hill. Newsweek reported:
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell was called out by his Democratic colleague after the Kentucky senator complained about playing “political games” with judicial appointments. McConnell made the comment during a Senate hearing on Monday, saying he was concerned that two U.S. circuit court judges who had plans to retire would not do so following President-elect Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. election from 2024.
“This type of partisan behavior undermines the integrity of the judiciary,” McConnell said. “Never, never before has a circuit judge retired after a presidential election. It is literally unprecedented.”
Of course, those interested in playing “political games” with judicial nominations can easily turn to the Kentucky Republican by saying, “Yours, okay? We learned it by watching you.
For example, if McConnell is serious about having a conversation about what is “literally unprecedented” when it comes to the politicization of the federal judiciary, the Senate GOP leader might be interested in his own record.
For example, it was in February 2016 when then-Justice Antonin Scalia died unexpectedly. Then-President Barack Obama nominated Merrick Garland, a center-left compromise lawyer — who had received rave reviews from Senate Republicans — to fill the vacancy, which in turn opened the door for a historic opportunity to stem the Supreme Court’s drift to the right to stop. .
McConnell instead decided to impose an unprecedented blockade of the Supreme Court for nearly a year, hoping that Americans would elect a Republican president and a Republican Congress despite the GOP’s abusive tactics.
It worked: McConnell effectively stole a seat on the Supreme Court from one administration and handed it over to another. He repeatedly boasts about the pride he has in carrying out the cross-border plan.
Nearly four years later, as Election Day 2020 approached, McConnell and his Republican brethren rushed to confirm Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court — abandoning the principles that Republicans claimed to care about four years earlier — even as millions of Americans took advantage early voting .
Not to put too much emphasis on this, but McConnell has done more than anyone to politicize the judiciary. To the extent anyone is playing “political games” with judicial appointments, they are merely following the playbook the Kentucky Republican wrote years ago.
This message updates our related previous reporting.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
