Kagan confirmation vote a sign of future troubles
With yesterday’s Senate confirmation, Elena Kagan is now a Supreme Court justice. She has the intellect and experience to do well in that post.
For the moment, though, I’d like to focus on the fact that 37 senators voted against her confirmation, which is perilously close to the 40 votes that would have been required to filibuster her nomination. I think that’s an ominous sign, confirming a sense that American government is coming close to a breakdown.
As an Obama nominee, Kagan is of course going to be different than, say, a Palin or Romney or Gingrich nominee. That’s how the system works. The right to make such nominations is part of the “spoils of war” that come with winning the presidency. Historically, the Senate has respected that reality.
Kagan is also well within the legal mainstream and eminently qualified for the court. In fact, one of the worst things you could say about her is that she has spent her life and career trying to avoid controversies that might prevent confirmation. Some Senate Republicans have tried to make an issue of the fact that she had never served as a judge, but on that too she falls well within the historical norm. Roughly a third of our Supreme Court justices had no prior experience on the bench, including the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who became a conservative legal icon.
So the fact that 37 senators nonetheless voted against an utterly mainstream, determinedly “safe” nominee such as Kagan ought to be taken as a serious warning sign. Most of those votes weren’t against her as a individual, they were a statement of general political opposition and would have been cast against any nominee that Obama was likely to propose.
“We are well on our way to a huge train wreck,” Tom Goldstein, a veteran Supreme Court litigator, told Politico. “I do think this is a corner we won’t be able to turn back [from], or at least there’s no sign the Senate will turn back from, for a long time.” If 60 “yes” votes “is the best anyone is going to have, a Supreme Court confirmation fight could easily turn into thermonuclear war.”
Sen. Lindsay Graham, one of five Republicans to vote for Kagan, is among those worried.
“Things are changing,” he said. “I worry the direction we’re drifting. I don’t question any of my colleagues’ decisions; I would just like to get us back to more traditional ‘advice and consent,’ where the [presidential] election is respected. I worry about where this takes us as a nation with the judiciary.”
In 1986, Antonin Scalia was confirmed by 98-0. Five years ago, John Roberts was confirmed by a vote of 78-22, with 22 Democrats voting for him. In 2006, Samuel Alito was confirmed by just 58-42, with just four Democrats voting for him, indicating that both parties are edging closer to the line. As Graham notes, the trend is ominous, threatening not just future Supreme Court nominees but the overall ability of government to conduct necessary business.
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967 comments Add your comment
josef nix
August 20th, 2010
9:53 pm
nice eddie rabbit…
But, on the other hand…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tth-8wA3PdY
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
9:54 pm
Well I see you guys have gotten to the real music and begun to appreciate the magic that is Captain Beyond.
Thanks!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGbgqTUm1lw
j$
August 20th, 2010
9:56 pm
apparently, the blue nosed-b is out
sfd @ 8:59:
I can only guess it means the $ brings a heavier load.
It’s all relative.
I’m being moderated now for some reason.
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
9:58 pm
@@,
Enough with the music, let’s discuss something important. My peppers have begun to change colors and the orange ones go straight from green to orange and the yellow ones go straight to yellow. The red ones either go from green to red or they’re really turning brown and rotting from within but still feel firm.
Do you suppose I have some genetically mutated plants? And Hillbilly D, if you’ve happened to read this, does Monsanto own my peppers?
Honu,
I had no idea it had been a year already. I’ll say a prayer and I’m with josef on the number change. Don’t do it.
josef nix
August 20th, 2010
10:02 pm
@@
According to Mama, I was listening to music when sperm cell met egg cell! ISH
What was playing?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNatwyAJ6dI&feature=related
Though methinks this was not the video she had in mind at the time!
Hillbilly Deluxe
August 20th, 2010
10:03 pm
does Monsanto own my peppers?
I don’t know but they will if they can find a way to finagle it.
Speaking of vegetables, I ate me 1/8 of a 30+ pound, yellow-meated watermelon after supper. Sho’ was good.
This a very nice cover of a Shenandoah song. Stumbled across this and had never heard of her but she can wail.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4sIFaQEiiM&feature=related
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
10:05 pm
josef,
Did you do something to provoke Kyle…we all now know you go searching for a fight somewhere on Fridays
…..first he goes with the southern white boy snark and now he’s on the Atlanta Public Schools.
Bruno
August 20th, 2010
10:06 pm
eyes, SC, and josef–Thanks for taking me “higher” earlier tonight. I put some “for rent” signs out in my yard today, and will try to trade my car in tomorrow. That will knock $1500 off my monthly nut, giving me a little more cushion.
Special mention to eyes for his Jackson Browne selection, “Eyes of an Angel”. Just beautiful.
Honu
August 20th, 2010
10:09 pm
Hi Shady J$!!! How about we resurrect mango `a mango, here at JB’s? We could probably do it each Friday night during the MusicFest (wouldn’t have more than 4 posts to state our picks.) Looks like my beloved Steelers are gonna have a rough go the first 6 games. Season starts September 9th. We finished with me being ahead by a kajillion mangos, right?
josef nix
August 20th, 2010
10:10 pm
RW
I’ll get with him tomorrow! I think my reputation must have preceded me! I TRY to be nice…but wasn’t that one about ME picking a fight a good one…just be still while I slap your face…oy!
Bruno
August 20th, 2010
10:15 pm
This Steve Winwood song has always been special to me. For “T”, wherever you may be tonight—Love always:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1osn_COoC4
Honu
August 20th, 2010
10:16 pm
Hi RW and thank you very much — I can’t believe a year has gone by, either. Sometimes it seems like a dream. On your and Josef’s advice — number will remain the same. (And from earlier — two “ee’s,” two “em’s” and ONE “tee!!!” HAHAHAHAHAH )
j$
August 20th, 2010
10:17 pm
ha ha jo-nix! you know how to use a switchblade, right?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olRWYrx4bAU
josef nix
August 20th, 2010
10:17 pm
I doubt the Bruin thought the Kagan thread would lead us here…but, Supremes in mind, this is for you Jaybird…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SuSsvJUqKI
josef nix
August 20th, 2010
10:21 pm
j$
Good one…but yeah…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEllHMWkXEU
j$
August 20th, 2010
10:23 pm
Of course Honu, but revenge is best served cold.
I’ll make the mangoritas.
I’m sure some other folks here would put some mangoes up too!
If they think they can hang…
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
10:28 pm
but wasn’t that one about ME picking a fight a good one
josef,
I was thinking that Friday is usually when you’re at your mellowest. I thought it was the music, but now I know you’re chasing Mattie and company around the blogosphere roughing people up so you can mellow out before you pop back in here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCCjv2OiTxE
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
10:29 pm
My sports blog never did recover from that last Mangorita party you too threw.
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
10:32 pm
I’m also invoking the to=too=two rule.
j$
August 20th, 2010
10:36 pm
RW, I don’t know.
josef with a switch blade could be dangerous:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiU2pKQ683s
Hillbilly Deluxe
August 20th, 2010
10:37 pm
Mississippi sure as hell ain’t #50 when it comes to songwriters.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-Le0bgJwXc&feature=channel
josef nix
August 20th, 2010
10:40 pm
RW
Who? Me?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6-1b0m8mhg&feature=related
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
10:40 pm
J$,
Like this
Bruno
August 20th, 2010
11:00 pm
What, do we have a knife fight breaking out now?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vgMYcMROcc
josef nix
August 20th, 2010
11:00 pm
J$
Ouch!
Hillbilly,
And on behalf of the natives of the benighted Magnolia, allow me the priviledge to thank you for the kind thoughts…
Hillbilly Deluxe
August 20th, 2010
11:05 pm
Josef
You mentioned Eudora Welty a while back. I saw her once on Merv or Mike Douglas or one of those shows. Erica Jong was on plugging a book of hers, which was a best seller at the time. When Eudora was asked if she had read Erica’s book and what she thought of it, she said, “It’s the most boring thing I’ve ever read”. I knew right then, she was my kind of person.
AmVet
August 20th, 2010
11:05 pm
Great selections tonight, all.
Take a few of these, the sweeter memories…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6k-4mpN9j0
j$
August 20th, 2010
11:13 pm
ya know I j/k jo.
naw, no knife fights. josef is sweet:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmlKjO4juCo
but then Saturdays:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26wEWSUUsUc
Bruno
August 20th, 2010
11:16 pm
Nice TR selection, Am.
I guess this will have to be my swan song tonight:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZywxsJtkw3A
josef nix
August 20th, 2010
11:19 pm
Hillbilly
As I’ve said before, as a teenager I lived a few doors down from Miss Eudora and she was very much a member of the community and we all had our Miss Eudora stories. She was known for her bad driving. One day as I was crossing Pinehurst she came careening around the corner and I had to jump out of the way to avoid being hit. I landed sprawled in the Nichols’ azaleas. She stopped, and called out the window, “Ah ya huht, dahlin’?” When I told her, “no ma’am,” she responded with, “weuhl get out uv mah way then.” A few days later I was in the Jitney Jungle and here she came pushing her buggy down the aisle, saw me, and smiled that mischevious grin of hers and said, “ah’ve already to-uld ya, get out uv mah way!” I kid you not when I tell you that a car with a fender bent by Miss Eudora had a higher resale value! We loved her and she loved us…
josef nix
August 20th, 2010
11:29 pm
Y’all’ve got me all wrong!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65AuuFpNFxY
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
11:33 pm
josef,
That duck song is just a distraction.
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
11:35 pm
Y’all’ve
By the way, I love that double contraction. APS?
j$
August 20th, 2010
11:44 pm
Here is an oldie but a goodie to blow your minds in light of the thunderstorms that may be passing through. Bet you never heard this version before:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYBQdXv0BhM
Hillbilly Deluxe
August 20th, 2010
11:49 pm
Y’all’ve
I love that double contraction
Think how much time and how many letters we save by not saying the whole words, when we all know what we meant anyway. We Southerners are an efficient lot. No wasted motion for us.
josef nix
August 20th, 2010
11:54 pm
It’s a perfectly legitimate usage as per the rules of colloquial English grammar, I’ll have you know!
And thanks everybody for a great evening of fun..it’s helped take my mind off my miseries. I would say it’s time to go to bed, but that’s where I’ve been most of the day already…but it is time to roll over and go to sleep…better keep one eye open, though, Unmentionable is curled up in another bedroom with a murder mystery…
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
11:54 pm
No wasted motion for us.
josef certainly saves a bunch of letters when he spells the name of his home state.
RW-(the original)
August 20th, 2010
11:56 pm
It was the Unmentionable in the study with an iron?
Hillbilly Deluxe
August 21st, 2010
12:12 am
Nite all.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCf60f_sAA0
RW-(the original)
August 21st, 2010
12:25 am
Time for the sandman here as well
j$
August 21st, 2010
12:25 am
I heard the University of Alabama misspelled “Mississippi” on their season football tickets and they already sent them out…
I’m calling it now. Ole Miss upsets Bama:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMLnDuzgkjo
Put ‘em up. I’ll take your mangoes.
good night.
theyeshaveit
August 21st, 2010
1:06 am
Good grief, who is teaching the kids at Bama?
Don't Forget
August 21st, 2010
9:14 am
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPjDMZiuhbQ
I can show you that when it starts to rain,
Everything’s the same.
I can show you, I can show you.
Rain, I don’t mind.
Shine, the world looks fine.
Can you hear me, that when it rains and shines,
It’s just a state of mind?
Can you hear me, can you hear me?
theyeshaveit
August 21st, 2010
10:46 am
Good morning Starshine
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGCmqIrfowo
@@
August 21st, 2010
3:56 pm
RW:
When the pepper begins to turn, just slightly (usually at the bottom), pick it. Take it in, put it in a brown bag with a slice of apple. It will turn in no time without suffering the effects of a brutal heat.
Peppers really do better if you plant them latter. They like cool nights.
I’ve had every problem imaginable with my garden this year. Only thing that’s done well are the chinese eggplant, thai pepper, and okra. The worse the conditions, the better okra does.
stands for decibels
August 21st, 2010
4:06 pm
I’ve had every problem imaginable with my garden this year.
Our jalapeno peppers are miserable. Our tomatoes were blighted, or something (never bore fruit) and were pulled. But our basil have been right as rain.
stands for decibels
August 21st, 2010
4:13 pm
Dinner tonight looks to be some kind of almond crusted troutlike objects (never tried this, but how hard can it be?) + simple noodle/broccoli thing on the side.
theyeshaveit
August 21st, 2010
4:54 pm
For all you vegetable lovers, here is young man Zappa playing dad’s music.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZvFoSI5VN8&p=9B0F78EA47E6CB9A&playnext=1&index=7
Southern Comfort
August 21st, 2010
5:02 pm
dB
Just as long as it doesn’t turn out like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRO2j8Fu6QY
RW-(the original)
August 21st, 2010
5:56 pm
When the pepper begins to turn, just slightly (usually at the bottom), pick it. Take it in, put it in a brown bag with a slice of apple. It will turn in no time without suffering the effects of a brutal heat.
@@,
Thanks I’ll give that a shot. All of mine start turning from the top though. Maybe its the heat or maybe my freak plants are doing that. Do I put the bag in the refrigerator or just leave it in a cool place?
We had no luck with tomatoes, except grape ones, this year either. Got a great, but extremely hot, bunch of jalapenoes.
stands for decibels
August 21st, 2010
6:18 pm
Just as long as it doesn’t turn out like this:
Better than what Mrs. Paul might whip up, but it wound up more rustic than I’d wanted. Clearly still a work in progress.
Normal
August 21st, 2010
7:12 pm
Howdy folks, “Saturday Afternoon sung on Saturday morning…but it was 1969, so go figure…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pP77jXqjHlU&feature=related
@@
August 21st, 2010
7:48 pm
RW:
You can put the bag in the fridge, but it’ll slow the ripening process. Only time I’ve ever used the bag ripening trick is with avacados and it was on the counter.
I’m thinking if you leave the bag out, they’ll ripen in about a week to ten days. Don’t know how the pepper will fare though. Try it and see. If the pepper goes limp, let it sit in some ice water. Works with wilted lettuce…some flowers too. As delicate as orchids are, a bouquet can be plunged in ice water to perk ‘em up. Had to do it once ’cause the bride thought her world had ended–her bouquet wilted.
Thbbppptbt
Southern Comfort
August 21st, 2010
8:01 pm
dB
Rustic can be good on a saturday afternoon/evening. Just add cold beer and a fireplace.
Don't Forget
August 21st, 2010
10:59 pm
stands for decibels
August 21st, 2010
4:06 pm
I’ve had every problem imaginable with my garden this year.
Our jalapeno peppers are miserable. Our tomatoes were blighted, or something (never bore fruit) and were pulled.
This should cover the tomato problems.
http://www.colostate.edu/Dept/CoopExt/4dmg/Pests/Diseases/tomaprob.htm
@@
August 21st, 2010
11:03 pm
I’ll be darned. I can use the same bagging process to get my bromeliad pups to bloom.
Thanks, RW.
j$
August 21st, 2010
11:41 pm
It may be your peppers too are getting too much H2O. Stick a beach umbrella over your brood if necessary.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bs4y5si8DGs
j$
August 21st, 2010
11:47 pm
I got the too’s two
Normal
August 22nd, 2010
8:47 am
Normal Your comment is awaiting moderation. Stupid blog god!
August 22nd, 2010
8:46 am
Good sunday morning to y’all… Read this, it’s very good…From The Nation magazine…
Alexander C*ckburn
No, the Empire Doesn’t Always Win
“The US isn’t withdrawing from Iraq at
all—it’s rebranding the occupation.… What
is abundantly clear is that the US has no
intention of letting go of Iraq any time soon.” So declared Seumas
Milne of the Guardian on August 4.
Milne is not alone among writers on the left arguing that even
though most Americans think it’s all over, Uncle Sam still rules
the roost in Iraq. They point to 50,000 US troops in ninety-four
military bases, “advising” and training the Iraqi army, “providing
security” and carrying out “counterterrorism” missions.
Outside US government forces there is what Jeremy Scahill calls
the “coming surge” of contractors in Iraq, swelling up from the
present 100,000. “The advantage of an outsourced occupation,”
Milne writes, “is clearly that someone other than US soldiers can
do the dying to maintain control of Iraq.”
“Can Iraq now be regarded as a tolerably secure
outpost of the American system in the Middle East?”
Tariq Ali asked in New Left Review earlier this year.
He answered himself judiciously: “[Iraqis] have reason
to exult, and reason to doubt.” But the thrust of
his analysis depicts Iraq as still the pawn of the US
empire, with a “predominantly Shia army—some
250,000 strong…trained and armed to the teeth to
deal with any resurgence of the resistance.”
The bottom line, as drawn by Milne and Ali, is oil.
Milne gestures to the “dozen 20-year contracts to run Iraq’s biggest
oil fields that were handed out last year to foreign companies.”
Is it really true that, though the US troop presence has dropped
by almost 100,000 in eighteen months, Iraq is as much under
Uncle Sam’s imperial jackboot as it was in, say, 2004, even though
US troops no longer patrol the streets? If Iraq’s political affairs
are under US control, how come the US Embassy—deployed in
its Vatican City–size compound, mostly as vacant as a foreclosed
subdivision in Riverside, California—cannot knock Iraqi heads
together and bid them form a government? Those 50,000 troops
broiling in their costly bases are scarcely a decisive factor in Iraq’s
internal affairs. Neither are the private contractors, whose military
role should not be oversold, unless the Shiites are supposed to
quail before ill-paid Peruvians, Ugandan cops and the like.
Is a Shiite-dominated government really to America’s taste
and nothing more than its pawn? It was Sistani, denounced by
Ali as America’s creature, who called Bush on his pledge of free
elections in 2005, thus downsizing the excessive representation
of the Sunnis, who chose to boycott the elections anyway. And
if all this was a devious ploy to break “the Iraqi resistance,” by
which Ali means the Sunnis, why does the United States constantly
invoke the menace of Shiite Iran and decry its influence
in Iraq?
If the Sunni “resistance,” honored without qualification by Ali,
ever had a strategy beyond a sectarian agenda, it wasn’t advanced by
blowing up Shiite pilgrims and setting off bombs in marketplaces.Muqtada
al-Sadr, lamented by Ali as sidelined by the United States
and Sistani, has been described as the “kingmaker” since his
success in the parliamentary election this past March.
If this really was a “war for oil,” it scarcely went well for the
United States. Run your eye down the list of contracts the Iraqi
government awarded in June and December 2009. Prominent is
Russia’s Lukoil, which, in partnership with Norway’s Statoil, won
the rights to West Qurna Phase Two, a 12.9 billion–barrel supergiant
oilfield. Other successful bidders for fixed-term contracts
included Russia’s Gazprom and Malaysia’s Petronas. Only two
US-based oil companies came away with contracts: ExxonMobil
partnered with Royal Dutch Shell on a contract for West Qurna
Phase One (8.7 billion barrels in reserves); and Occidental shares
a contract in the Zubair field (4 billion barrels), in company with
Italy’s ENI and South Korea’s Kogas. The huge Rumaila field
(17 billion barrels) yielded a contract for BP and the
China National Petroleum Company, and Royal
Dutch Shell split the 12.6 billion–barrel Majnoon
field with Petronas, 60-40.
Throughout the two auctions there were frequent
bleats from the oil companies at the harsh terms
imposed by the auctioneers representing Iraq, as
this vignette from Reuters about the bidding on the
northern Najmah field suggests: “Sonangol also won
the nearby 900-million-barrel Najmah oilfield in
Nineveh.… Again, the Angolan firm had to cut its price and accept
a fee of $6 per barrel, less than the $8.50 it had sought. ‘We
are expecting a little bit higher. Can you go a little bit higher?’
Sonangol’s exploration manager Paulino Jeronimo asked Iraqi Oil
Minister Hussain al-Shahristani to spontaneous applause from
other oil executives. Shahristani said, ‘No.’”
So either the all-powerful US government was unable to fix the
auctions to its liking or the all-powerful US-based oil companies
mostly decided the profit margins weren’t sufficiently tempting.
Either way, the “war for oil” isn’t in very good shape.
Ali and Milne are being credulous in taking at face value declarations
by US officials that the United States is not wholly withdrawing
and will stay in business in Iraq for the foreseeable future.
Those officials don’t want to see their influence go to zilch, so they
have to maintain that their power in Iraq is only a little affected by
the steady reduction of troops.
The left—or a substantial slice of it—snatches defeat from
the jaws of a decisive victory over US plans for Iraq by proclaiming
that America has established what Milne calls “a new
form of outsourced semi-colonial regime to maintain its grip
on the country and region.” Yes, Iraq is in ruins—always the
default consequence of American imperial endeavors. The left
should hammer home the message that the US onslaught on
Iraq, in terms of its proclaimed objectives, was a strategic and
military disaster. That’s the lesson to bring home.
stands for decibels
August 22nd, 2010
8:51 am
This should cover the tomato problems
thanks, DF, although it’ll have to wait until next year. I think.
What I don’t get–it would seem that there is still plenty of growing season left for ‘maters and such, but I’m not aware of any outlets selling such things.
Rustic can be good on a saturday afternoon/evening. Just add cold beer and a fireplace.
I read this as “keep the lights dim so nobody can see how rough-looking the plated materials really are” but yeah, point taken–it’s always about the setting/context, innit?
Don't Forget
August 22nd, 2010
11:27 am
stands for decibels
August 22nd, 2010
8:51 am
What I don’t get–it would seem that there is still plenty of growing season left for ‘maters and such, but I’m not aware of any outlets selling such things.
Well, it takes about 60 days for the fruit to mature so time is running out. Try the internet. Search year round tomatoes. You could do the hanging type indoors if you have a good spot in front of a window, especially if it’s a southwestern exposure. The fusarium wilt is pretty ubiquitous but it’s never kept my plants from bearing fruit. I heard someone say that too much water can cause the plant to not bear fruit but I’m not sure if that’s true. I always dig a trench about a foot deep then pour in a bag of composted cow manure and mix it in with the soil thoroughly. It’s never failed for me even with the hard clay soil.
theyeshaveit
August 22nd, 2010
2:46 pm
Tomato, Potato…..Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoUSrtw6gJs
Dan Quale
August 22nd, 2010
3:54 pm
theyeshaveit
August 22nd, 2010
2:46 pm
Tomato, Potato…..Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off.
You forgot to put the “e” on potatoe.
theyeshaveit
August 22nd, 2010
4:03 pm
For Dan…..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wdqbi66oNuI
And his son, Ben, who is running for office in (of course) Arizona.
http://www.sanfranciscosentinel.com/?p=84306
Dan Quale
August 22nd, 2010
4:17 pm
I guess each party has it’s slogans
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmlgwwCHof8
Normal
August 22nd, 2010
5:12 pm
JAY’S BACK!!!
theyeshaveit
August 22nd, 2010
5:57 pm
The Bruin has landed? Did you know that there is a song for everything?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewjxzSGmOGw