^https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_option

Quote :

"In November 2013, Senate Democrats used the nuclear option to eliminate filibusters on executive branch nominations and federal judicial appointments other than those to the Supreme Court"

Both parties use it. Fuck them both.

4/6/2017 1:27:50 PM

Seriously. Biggest mistake in American Politics was adhering so strictly to the two party mindset.

4/6/2017 1:31:05 PM

a constitutional convention is our only hope, and there is no hope of that happening

4/6/2017 1:39:12 PM

^^^Except the Democrats used it after literally years of appointments sitting unfilled and agency functions being ground to a halt due to GOP obstructionism. Republicans did it the first chance they got for purely political reasons. In any case, all this means is the SCOTUS filibuster never really existed in practical terms, just a theoretical construct waiting for a moment like this to be disposed of.

4/6/2017 2:55:49 PM

^I take your point into consideration but I think back to the fact that the Constitution wasn't written to force people to make decisions. In other words, people stonewalling or holding back on allowing nominations to go through is absolutely stupid but if the founders (I'm presuming here, forgive my ignorance) thought it was a bad thing, I feel like they would have put a mechanism in place.

All that I know indicates that they intended for government to only move forward when most people were united and to ground to a complete halt when there was tremendous division. Let the people deal with it and if the division gets nothing done and pisses enough voters off, new people will be voted in who can theoretically work together.

One caveat though - I don't think they realized what the party in power during a census would do for congressional redistricting. I can't believe they didn't assign that task to the judicial branch.

[Edited on April 6, 2017 at 5:53 PM. Reason : a]

4/6/2017 5:52:50 PM

Quote :

"Seriously. Biggest mistake in American Politics was adhering so strictly to the two party mindset."

I Second that..

4/6/2017 7:31:23 PM

Gorsuch confirmed

4/7/2017 1:16:59 PM

Officially sworn in.

GOP knows how to play dirty, be complete assholes and win. Dems don't.

4/10/2017 11:18:46 AM

Quote :

"GOP knows how to play dirty, be complete assholes and win. Dems don't."

Yup. GOP is way better at politics right now.

4/10/2017 11:22:53 AM

Suck it leftists. No more judicial activism for you.

Quote :

"Court of Appeals is where policy is made - Sonia Sotomayor"

4/10/2017 12:49:19 PM

When exactly was that a thing that leftists had? The court leanings are pretty much back where they were when Scalia was alive.

Seriously, the scraps you need to cling to while you watch your party lead themselves down the shitter amuses me to no end.

4/10/2017 12:53:03 PM

Imagine thinking that Scalia's ideological contortions were not a form of activism.

4/10/2017 1:35:28 PM

Lmao at you hacks calling Scalia an activist. It isn't activism when you are trying to prevent change...

Quote :

"Biggest mistake in American Politics was adhering so strictly to the two party mindset"

It's inevitable so long as there is a perpetual individual/capitalist vs collectivist/socialist battle going on in our country. It's a slow inevitable decline from capitalist prosperity into socialist hell, but thankfully our founding fathers put rules in place to slow down you people.

Quote :

"Well, it turns out our founders designed a system that makes it more difficult to bring about change that I would like sometimes. - Obama"

Quote :

"The constitution is an imperfect document - Obama"

4/10/2017 1:56:41 PM

Just imagine if Senate Republicans followed an "originalist" interpretation of the constitution and were forced to give "advice and consent" on Merrick Garland, instead of never meeting with him and never giving him a hearing or vote.

#convenientconservatives

4/10/2017 2:55:54 PM

What a surprise! Another leftist hack that can't comprehend how the constitution works.

The senate isn't "forced" to do anything. The POTUS "shall" nominate... the Senate provides advice and consent. Meaning if America votes republican, you leftist don't get to put another activist judge in place to turn our country into a socialist hell hole.

4/10/2017 3:50:56 PM

so refusing to meet with Garland or even hold a hearing meets the requirement of "providing advice and consent?"

4/10/2017 4:00:39 PM

So, in '18 if there's a Democratic majority elected they've got your blessing to just sit on Trump's potential nominations until his term is up?

[Edited on April 10, 2017 at 4:00 PM. Reason : ]

4/10/2017 4:00:40 PM

Gonna lol when the Orange guy loses the house and the Senate for the GOP and then the next Dem president (obviously in 2020) appoints the most progressive judges possible.

In a perfect world it would lead to a Mexican immigrant knocking up JCEs teenage daughter.

[Edited on April 10, 2017 at 4:05 PM. Reason : Also, he doesn't understand socialism]

4/10/2017 4:04:38 PM

Quote :

"So, in '18 if there's a Democratic majority "

The way democrats participate in midterms? lmao yea right.

The same low-information, dependent, "victim" bases democrats pander to also tend to be too lazy and uninterested to vote in something that the media doesn't hype up to them.

I mean you had every news outlet brainwashing the masses that Trump is Hitler, and you still couldn't motivate enough "victims" to vote. I guess they are victimized by their own laziness.

4/11/2017 10:43:24 AM

Sweet deflection, bro.

4/11/2017 10:51:17 AM

The court has lost credibility so long as Gorsuch is a justice. The rightful nominee was Merrick Garland. It is a stolen seat. I know the "Biden Rule" is cited as justification but that is complete bullshit. It was a statement and not part of official procedure or an actual rule. Even if it was, the campaign didn't really start until the nominees of each party were selected some 6 months after Garland being nominated. Obama had almost a year left in his term and had every right to have his choice voted on. McConnell can go fuck himself and it is clear that if Trump has to fill a vacancy with the same time frame left in his term, there will be no delay until after the election (if the GOP still has the majority).

4/11/2017 11:07:20 AM

Or Democrats can start to learn how to fucking win for once instead of trying to please everyone.

4/11/2017 11:09:41 AM

^^^^valid point

4/11/2017 1:29:46 PM

Quote :

"The court has lost credibility so long as Gorsuch is a justice. after Obamacare passed"

fixed

4/11/2017 3:10:02 PM

SCOTUS passes laws now? Cool.

Maybe we can just get rid of the awful House then.

4/11/2017 3:26:46 PM

http://www.scotusblog.com/2017/04/argument-preview-just-playground-dispute/

Oh boy, a "religious freedom" case. Surely even Gorsuch can get this one right.

[Edited on April 19, 2017 at 6:40 AM. Reason : I'm not even sure why the court accepted to hear this case, our system is so fucked]

4/19/2017 6:40:07 AM

^

Quote :

" the church can still worship or run its daycare as it sees fit – the state just isn’t going to pay to resurface the playground"

yet churches dont have to pay income taxes like almost everyone else somehow. not that i support income taxes of course, just sayin

4/19/2017 7:27:10 AM

Yea, this one is clear to me. The state has a blanket ban on funding religious institutions. That has been ruled constitutional before, and I happen to think it's a pretty solid policy actually.

The church claims that prohibition on funding is somehow against their 1st amendment rights to practice religion or perhaps that its discriminating against them based on their religion.

Seems like a big stretch, but the fact that SCOTUS even decided to hear this case after lower courts ruled against the church multiple times suggests atleast a few of the justices think the Church's claims have merit. It'll be an interesting one to see where Gorsuch falls.

4/19/2017 7:53:41 AM

https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/ginsburg-slaps-gorsuch

Gorsuch being a little bitch. I get the feeling he is gonna repeatedly fuck this country over for.......basically the rest of our lives.

10/4/2017 11:25:01 AM

I can't say I've followed it too closely (omg no media coverage) , but I pretty much assumed the Menendez was guilty in this bribery case

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/10/11/nyregion/menendez-corruption-trial-mcdonnell-ruling.html?referer=https://t.co/R1Dek7OH04?amp=1

Looks like SCOTUS's decision on what constitutes an "official act" is gonna let Menendez off on quite a few of his charges. I'm still not quite understanding how this judge is extrapolating that ruling to suggest menedez's charges aren't legit, but I do know it's fucked up.

Our ethics, corruption, and campaign finance rules are so broken and out dated. Just how congress likes it.

10/12/2017 5:43:01 AM

I don't think the question is about official acts, it's about how Menendez was paid. The prosecutor can't seem to link any of the gifts and official acts together in an explicit "I will give you X in exchange for Y" way.

Menendez received gifts designed to curry favor which the doctor used later. The judge is debating whether or not that's sufficiently quid pro quo to be considered bribery.

10/12/2017 10:23:52 AM

Yea, I agree. But the SCOTUS case the judge is referencing is the McDonnell ruling where the Gov of Virginia got off of bribery charges because corruption rules only apply to "official acts." That's what I don't get, how is the judge citing that case while making the argument you're describing? They seem like totally different issues to me.


Regardless, we are quickly approaching the point we're this country won't even be able to prosecute the OBVIOUSLY corrupt. McDonnell (even if I don't fully understand why), McCutcheon, and citizens United will all go down in the history books as the beginning of the end, unless congress makes some new corruption/campaign finance rules (bwahahahaha yea right).

10/12/2017 10:56:42 AM

For it to be McDonnell corruption there needs to be an exchange of gifts for official acts. Menendez definitely performed official acts for the doctor, but there was no explicit exchange of gifts for official acts. The doctor bought access and then turned that access into official acts. The judge is asking whether or not the intermediate step of buying access is enough to make it not quid pro quo corruption. Access isn't necessarily an official act.

Yeah, it's fucked up for this to be a question.

10/12/2017 2:29:34 PM

Menendez gets a mistrial.

11/16/2017 2:36:08 PM

Looks like SCOTUS just locked us into ANOTHER election with unconstitutional districts?

1/18/2018 8:30:04 PM

i haven't read the opinion - this doesn't stop the progress by the special master does it?

1/19/2018 8:46:45 AM

I think so, at least temporarily. I think the "opinion" is just a stay, so probably the NC case will get grouped in with other gerrymander cases and SCOTUS will come up with something (this summer?) But candidate filing deadlines in NC are at the end of February, and SCOTUS def won't rule before then. We also can't have candidates file to run, then change the districts right before the election. So effectively we are locked into our districts for 2018.

It'll be 4 elections where we've been forced to vote in an unconstitutional system. Sad.

1/19/2018 9:06:59 AM

the districts have been gerrymandered for 100 years in NC. you're incredibly naïve if you think this problem came into existence when Republicans gained control of the state.

1/19/2018 10:35:04 AM

And on several occasions those districts were also struck down. See Shaw v. Hunt and Cromartie v. Hunt (and I'm sure others that I'm not familiar with). Unconstitutional districts are unconstitutional.

1/19/2018 11:02:40 AM

Yet you weren't bitching about it being unconstitutional before when it was the Democrats doing it.

1/19/2018 7:18:42 PM

Those cases are from the mid-90s, I was 10.

1/19/2018 8:30:06 PM

Please. They were gerrymandering the state legislative districts in the 2000s. NC Democrats should shut their mouths about gerrymandering for at least a century as far as I'm concerned.

1/20/2018 4:01:51 PM

Were those districts challenged in court? What was the outcome? If redistricting happens every ~10 years then I've only been of voting age for the GOP 2010-2012 redistricting. I believe in fair districts. Do I bitch more because I'm gerrymandered into one of the most red districts in NC? Probably. Doesn't change the fact that the state and we the public have a compelling interest in functional democracy. This should be a shared interest.

I also want to point out the role both computers, and better georeferenced data has taken map drawing to an absolute next level:
https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/7xkmag/gerrymandering-algorithms

So the argument is there that modern gerrymanders are next level, and highly vote mitigating compared to previous districts. We can use the same processes to help fix the process.

1/20/2018 7:00:51 PM

^^ good to see burro bring impartial as always

1/20/2018 8:48:31 PM

Good to see synapse is still riding my nuts like a merry-go-round.

^^ Are you trying to tell me you weren't cognizant just 10 years ago? I'm not sure that the state districts were challenged in the 2000s, but they were just as politically gerrymandered then as they are now, only for Democrats. What's new here, really, is the argument that political gerrymandering is something the USSC should take a look at and (and they have explicitly refused to do so in the past, saying it's out of their hands). I think we do have a vested interest in having well drawn districts. I just think it's sour grapes that NOW Democrats are bitching about it, since they are no longer the ones who benefit from the gerrymandering. State Republicans tried for decades to get independent redistricting boards created, and the Democrats in Raleigh ignored them. Well, turnabout is fair play at this point. And, I fully expect in 2020, when the Democrats retake the state in the massive anti-Trump backlash, for the new group of Democrats in control to suddenly forget about the importance of fair districts, just like they have for the previous century.

1/20/2018 9:17:17 PM

lol nice to see Burro's insults are still firmly rooted in the mid 2000's

[Edited on January 20, 2018 at 9:32 PM. Reason : though I have to admit I'm mostly I agreement with your point, minus the vitriol]

1/20/2018 9:30:38 PM

^^No, I really wasn't cognizant in high school, not on what amounts to the technical machinations of government. The Iraq war and fending off crazed evangelicals were a full time job back then.

Anyways here are the stats from the 2000s gerrymander up to the GOP gerrymander. This is for NC 13 congressional districts. Which one of these seems the least fair to you?

2002 - GOP 53% of the vote and gets 7 seats
2004 - GOP 51% of the vote and gets 7 seats
2006 - GOP 48% of the vote and gets 6 seats
2008 - GOP 45% of the vote and gets 5 seats
2010 - GOP 54% of the vote and gets 6 seats
2012 (new GOP districts) - GOP 48.8% of the vote and gets 9 seats

Again, vastly improved GIS systems mean we are gerrymandering down to the street level, and I think we've really entered into a new era we're mapmakers can construct some obscenely unfair maps.

[Edited on January 21, 2018 at 7:37 AM. Reason : The districts WERENT as gerrymandered then as they are now. It's worse now.]

1/21/2018 7:35:42 AM

i see you are conveniently ignoring how I was talking about state legislative districts...

1/21/2018 11:42:18 AM

Well, this is the SCOTUS credibility watch thread and SCOTUS recently stayed an order to redraw congressional districts, not state. Terd was clearly talking about that decision before you even posted.

So if anyone should be chided for trying to change the subject, it's probably you.

What are you even trying to say with your whataboutism anyway? Gerrymandering is cool--everyone is doing it? It's ok if Republicans do it because Democrats have done it? Don't mind me, I'm just here to troll? No one can complain about anything because everyone is guilty of something? You don't care about gerrymandering? You're pro-gerrymandering? What's your point man?

[Edited on January 21, 2018 at 12:11 PM. Reason : whataboutism]

1/21/2018 12:00:42 PM

I'm trying to say the NC democrats are hypocrites on this issue. All politicians gerrymander when they can. And the Nc democrats did it for more than a century. The republicans suck, too, but they are just doing what the Democrats here taught them to do

Also, I can't be accused of changing the topic, when scotus has ruled the state districts invalid, too. Seems like if one didn't realize that, then he's pretty misinformed on the issue.

[Edited on January 21, 2018 at 10:54 PM. Reason : ]

1/21/2018 10:47:36 PM