Kavanaugh

My two cents: no matter who Trump nominated, the Left was going to scream and hiss and pout and scream and try to hold it off until November and make it an election issue.  This would have been true if he nominated Alan Dershowitz.  His nomination alone makes it abominable.  Nothing else matters.

Now, one of two scenarios will pay out: Kavanaugh will get confirmed BEFORE the elections, or after.  If the Democrats play hard core partisan politics to delay his confirmation, then they open themselves to charges of being obstructionist.  Kavanaugh seems to be a moderate, and more or less a  replacement–which conservatives did NOT want, for Kennedy.  We want someone who reads the Constitution and sees it as binding law.  There is no evolution.  Evolution is provided within the Constitution through the Amendment process.  It is a changeable document, but through a process.  Valuing the Constitution as written is the JOB, as I and many see it, of the Supreme Court.  We have a Congress for everything else. You want a  new law, pass it, and get it signed.

But here is the thing: if they block Kavanaugh, and get painted as obstructionist–accurately, since he’s not the preference of most conservatives–they lose political points.  And if then Republicans keep the House and Senate, and overall put on a strong show indicating national support, as I think likely, then Trump can withdraw this nomination, and put in someone much more conservative, and dare the Democrats to block them too.  They can’t yell and scream forever, especially in the wake of an election in which the opposing party usually sees strong gains.  So they will confirm that person.

So, unless there really is a Blue Wave, which I very much doubt, given how insane the Democrats have become, and how widely and rapidly this realization seems to be spreading, they can either confirm Kavanaugh now, or someone more conservative later.

And strategically, putting up a hard core conservative likely would have helped the Dem’s in the mid-terms.  They could have played on the likely destruction of Roe v. Wade.  This guy doesn’t seem to care one way or the other, which mitigates this campaign theme. He’s as far to the left as Republicans will tolerate, and as far to the right as we can manage, and still make a strong claim that there is no just cause to delay his confirmation.

Trump wins either way.  It is not an ideal solution, but if politics is the art of the possible, maybe this guy is what was possible.

Or maybe we got sold down the river.  I don’t know.  I prefer the first option, though.