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...any questions.

Mitch McConnell is looking better and better.

McConnell is looking like a partisan hack. One philosophy with a Democratic picked candidate, a differing one when a Republican will pick one.

One good thing, imo, that may happen is that Roe vs Wade may be overturned. But that is about all I can say positive.

Hang on Ruth! Come to your senses Neil!

Don't think they can get it done. They're down to one seat in the senate, without McCain, and with Flake and Corker in rebellion, they don't have the votes.

Thanks, Keith. I'll tell my wife.

She may not be nearly as quick to believe it as Keith is!

My "supreme disappointment" is that rather than having an independence to the judiciary, the purpose of the Founding Fathers is being thwarted by the selection of people whose votes are not based on the evidence heard in a courtroom but on a partisan litmus test. To me, the system has been corrupted by the extreme partisanship displayed in the selection of Supreme Court and Appeals Court appointees. I see this as coming back to bite our Republic. The original idea of appointing justices for life was that they could function independently from whoever might be in the other two branches of the federal government. The system in being murdered by both parties.

I really do hope that the Democrats take the high road with this, as encouraged by Michelle Obama, and rather than throw up obstructionist roadblocks, make sure the process selects a justice based on his qualifications, not on his political opinions. There are enough moderate Republicans in the senate to ensure that some right wing nut job doesn't get on the bench. If their concern about Roe v. Wade brings this down to a single-issue, Roberts plus Sotomayor, Kagan, Ginsberg and Breyer is a pro-choice majority, and the Roberts court has signaled on more than one occasion that it is not interested in overturning it. Thomas is the only justice who has openly stated he would vote to overturn. If there aren't a couple of renegade Republican senators, and the nominee is qualified, let it go. If that's the route they go, it will be to their great benefit when they do get back in control.

Anti-trump sentiment runs quite high, higher than any other modern president has experienced. The Democrats just need to let that settle in and ride the wave. In just a little over a year, in regular elections, Democrats have turned two state legislatures, and gained more seats in a third in a single election than in its history, along with the top three state officers all Democrats winning by comfortable margins. The special elections have been a fountain of good cheer for the Democrats, especially since many of those who ran did so against ten times the money, and either won outright, or lost by fractional percentages in districts where the Republican incumbent either ran unopposed, or won by double digits in 2016. And of course, there was the crown jewel of special elections, the Alabama senate seat. The Democrats don't need to feed the anti-trump sentiment, it grows on its own. They just need to focus on the issues, like the wonderful gift Trump immigration policy has given them, hope that his tweeter doesn't get broken or taken away, and they're set.

I'm much more concerned with whether the president is determined to select the candidate who is least likely to obstruct his goal of destroying the balance of powers among the branches of the Federal government than I am with the specifics of reproductive freedom vs. fetal humanhood or the codification of legal definitions of marriageability. I always bear in mind his statement that maybe it was time to do away with the Constitution, and it worries me.

Looking at the lists that have shown up on the media reports, I don't see any right wing nut jobs or loonies. The ones that seem to be in the running are Bush-era appointees, and while they are "conservative" from a legal and judicial perspective, they'd be more moderate if they were politicians. I don't see anything alarming or Trump-like about any of them. That's a lifetime appointment, and that has a tendency to alter even stated positions once the appointment is confirmed. I think the Democrats could trump Trump's bungling attempt to make this into a media circus by simply going along with the pick, in contrast to the hissy-fit the Republicans threw when Obama dared do his job and name an appointment a year before an election. The Dems can add votes to their mounting pile, especially from independents, by just letting this one through.

Interesting thoughts Sandy. Kaveneaugh’s most Trumpian viewpoint seems to be that the President can’t be charged with any crimes while in office. I know there is a constitutional argument to be made both ways on that. But I wonder if that figured into his pick at all.

Are there seriously judges who believe that if a sitting President rapes and kills his bodyguard, he can't be charged with a crime until after the conviction on the impeachment goes through? Can he be "detained"?

There's a quote in this article from Kavanaugh on the matter. The issue has apparently come up just one other time, pertaining to Nixon. If a sitting President can't be indicted, then there's a conflict of interest because he gets to appoint the judges that would make that decision. No one is above the law, including the President. On the other hand, if he can be indicted or arrested, that makes him vulnerable to political motivation.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/29/us/p ... icted.html

Ours was an experiment. Later democracies (including Britain once the monarch really got out of the policymaking business) have learned a thing or two from our mistakes as well as from our successes. It really surprises me how few GOP lawmakers seem willing, yet, to say much that's critical of Trump. I would think that with Pence as the alternative they would be less hesitant.