The Commentariat -- Feb. 14, 2016
Afternoon Update:
Janell Ross of the Washington Post explains why Marco Rubio (& Jeb!) often speak Spanish to constituents & why Ted Cruz does not. CW: Ross is a bit long-winded, but my own observations comport with her thesis: it's a cultural thing. There's no shame in speaking Spanish in Florida; in the Southwest, it still can be taboo.
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His hands were sort of almost folded on top of the sheets. The sheets weren't rumpled up at all. It was just like he was taking a nap. He just went to sleep and didn't wake up. -- Resort owner John Poindexter, who found Antonin Scalia's body
Gary Martin & Guillermo Contreras of the San Antonio (Texas) Express-News: "Associate Justice Antonin Scalia was found dead of apparent natural causes Saturday on a luxury resort in West Texas, federal officials said. Scalia, 79, was a guest at the Cibolo Creek Ranch, a resort in the Big Bend region south of Marfa.... A federal official who asked not to be named said there was no evidence of foul play and it appeared that Scalia died of natural causes." ...
... Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "Justice Antonin Scalia, whose transformative legal theories, vivid writing and outsize personality made him a leader of a conservative intellectual renaissance in his three decades on the Supreme Court, was found dead on Saturday at a resort in West Texas, according to a statement from Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. He was 79.... The cause of death was not immediately released." ...
... CW: My general policy, here & in life, is not to speak ill of the recently dead, out of respect for their families. I do not hold contributors to that standard. This courtesy does not extend to the deceased's philosophical allies, who even now must be conjuring conspiracy theories that place the cause of death upon a certain Kenyan-born emperor who should under no circumstances be allowed to appoint a successor. The San Antonio Express-News reports that Justice Scalia was with a party of about 40 people. It will be interesting to find out who-all was in that party, so we can develop risible conspiracy theories of our own. ...
... Mark Landler & Peter Baker of the New York Times: "Within hours of Justice Scalia's death, both sides began laying the groundwork for what could be a titanic confirmation struggle fueled by ideological interest groups. The surprise opening also jolted the presidential campaign hours before a Republican debate in South Carolina, shifting the conversation toward the priorities each candidate would have in making such a selection." ...
... The New York Times is running "live updates" of developments related to Justice Scalia's death. They should have thunk up another headline for the page. @8:48 pm ET: "President Obama, in his first public comments after Justice Antonin Scalia's death, announced that he would nominate a replacement, overriding Republicans' contentions that any nomination should wait until after the next president takes office":
... Dylan Matthews of Vox names some likely candidates for nomination. ...
@7:22 pm: "Ben Carson, who is seeking the Republican nomination for president, joined other members of his party in arguing that President Obama should not nominate a successor to Justice Antonin Scalia."
@ 7:11 pm: "The Thurmond Rule -- an unwritten rule, not legally binding -- holds that a judicial nominee should not be confirmed in the months leading up to an election. It has its origins in June 1968, when Senator Strom Thurmond, Republican of South Carolina, blocked President Lyndon B. Johnson's appointment of Justice Abe Fortas as chief justice." ...
...@ 7:03 pm: "Jeb Bush ... said on Saturday that Justice Antonin Scalia ... 'was my favorite justice'.... Mr. Bush declined to repeat calls made by other Republican candidates, including Senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, for Justice Scalia's seat on the Supreme Court to remain vacant until a new president was sworn into office in 2017." ...
...@ 6:54 pm: "Harry Reid, the Senate minority leader and Democrat of Nevada, urged President Obama to nominate a successor to Justice Antonin Scalia as soon as possible. Mr. Reid released a statement that forcefully pushed back at Republican arguments that the Supreme Court seat should remain vacant until after a new president was elected." ...
... @ 6:40 pm: "Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and the Senate majority leader, backing the sentiments of Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, said in a statement that the next president, not President Obama, should appoint a successor to Justice Antonin Scalia." CW: I'd say we have a Constitutional crisis a'coming in our near future. ...
... Robert Barnes writes Justice Scalia's obituary for the Washington Post. ...
... The Washington Post also is running "live updates & reactions" to Justice Scalia's death. @ 8:15 pm ET: "... Hillary Clinton praised Scalia's service to his country in a statement posted on Twitter, criticizing Republicans who in the hours since Scalia's death have called for his replacement to be chosen by the next president." ...
... @ 8:12 pm: "'The president has said he will send a nominee to the Senate,' Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, told The Post a telephone interview Saturday night." ...
... Robert Barnes: "The death of Justice Antonin Scalia on Saturday plunged the Supreme Court and the nation's politics into turmoil, and an immediate partisan battle began over whether President Obama should be allowed to nominate his successor. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said in a statement that the Senate controlled by his party should not confirm a replacement for Scalia until after the election.... Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.), the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, joined [Minority Leader Harry] Reid [D-Nev.] in saying that the court should not go a year without a full array of justices.... Scalia's shocking death also creates doubt about the outcome of a Supreme Court term that was filled with some of the most controversial issues facing the nation: abortion, affirmative action, the rights of religious objectors to the contraceptive mandate in the Affordable Care Act, and the president's powers on immigration and deportation.
[Justice Scalia] died while on a hunting trip in Texas. The Supreme Court did not reveal the cause of death. The Associated Press reported that Scalia died at a private residence in the Big Bend area of West Texas. The service's spokeswoman, Donna Sellers, says Scalia had retired for the evening and was found dead Saturday morning after he did not appear for breakfast. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. officially announced Scalia's death after it was reported by news outlets in Texas. ...
... Tom Goldstein of ScotusBlog has more on "what happens to this [Supreme Court] term's cases.... Votes that the Justice cast in cases that have not been publicly decided are void. Of course, if Justice Scalia's vote was not necessary to the outcome -- for example, if he was in the dissent or if the majority included more than five Justices -- then the case will still be decided, only by an eight-member Court." ...
... Ian Millhiser has more on the specific cases before the Court & how decisions could play out. ...
... Jonathan Chait: "The immediate and easily foreseeable impact [of Scalia's death] is staggering. Last week, the Supreme Court issued a stay delaying the implementation of Obama's Clean Power Plan. The stay indicated that a majority of the justices foresee a reasonably high likelihood that they would ultimately strike down Obama's plan, which could jeopardize the Paris climate agreement and leave greenhouse gasses unchecked. Without Scalia on the Court, the odds of this drop to virtually zero. The challenge is set to be decided by a D.C. Circuit panel composed of a majority of Democratic appointees, which will almost certainly uphold the regulations. If the plan is upheld, it would require a majority of the Court to strike it down. With the Court now tied 4-4, such a ruling now seems nearly impossible. Even if the Senate does not confirm any successor, then, Scalia's absence alone reshapes the Court." ...
... Richard Mayhew, in Balloon Juice, also has a useful piece on the politics of upcoming (or already decided but not published Supreme) cases, an eight-person count & the nomination dynamic. ...
... CW: I'd like to remind readers that three of the best tactical politicians in Washington, D.C., are Mitch McConnell, Harry Reid & Barack Obama. If there is a way to effectively force a vote on a Supreme Court nominee, I think Reid & Obama can figure it out. Should it require the threat of publication of photos of McConnell & Chuck Grassley in flagrante with a distinct whiff of S&M, so be it. ...
... Rick Hasen: "... this is the moment. It is the beginning of the most important civil rights debate of our time." ...
... New York Times Editors: "The question now is whether the Senate will honor Justice Scalia's originalist view of the Constitution by allowing President Obama to appoint a successor, and providing its advice and consent in good faith. Or will the Republicans be willing to create a constitutional crisis and usurp the authority of the president to ensure that the Supreme Court functions as one branch of this government?" CW: I believe we know the answer. ...
... Libertarian Conor Friedersdorf of the Atlantic lays out why Constitutional scholar Ted Cruz's call to block any nominee is contrary to the Senate's Constitutional duties: "There is no agreed upon standard of what legitimate advice and consent entails. But any standard that rejects a nomination before it is even made fails the laugh test. Few truly believe that the Framers would regard 'I want to wait until the next president is chosen' as a legitimate reason to block a Supreme Court appointment." ...
... CW: Seems to me that Ted & Marco have already declared themselves ineligible to vote on any Senate business. Like Obama, Marco is an incontrivertible lame duck: both are leaving their jobs next January. Ted is a declared lame duck: he intends to take another job come late January. If the president is proscribed from doing his Constitutional duty under some theory of lame-duckiness, then so are senators who wish themselves out of the Senate. Pennsylvania Avenue is a two-way street.
... Steve M.: "... Republicans are largely going to have message discipline. Many of them are going to argue, in all seriousness, that Obama is a lame duck, and therefore not really president, so he should let the next president replace Scalia. They'll say that we're in the midst of a campaign to choose his successor, so even offering up a nominee would be the height of arrogance. The Constitution says nothing of the sort, but these self-styled worshipers of our founding documents will talk as if Obama is betraying American values just by doing his job."
... Benjamin Mullin of Poynter: "How the San Antonio Express-News broke news of Scalia's death." ...
... Alan Blinder & Manny Fernandez of the New York Times describe the luxury Cibolo Creek Ranch where Justice Scalia died.
Presidential Race
Kevin Drum: The death of Justice Scalia has created what now will be "the most important issue in the presidential campaign. Appointing Supreme Court justices has always been one of the biggest reasons to care about who wins in November, but it's stayed mostly under the radar until now. No longer. Both sides will go ballistic over this, and the Supreme Court will suddenly seem like the most vital presidential power ever. If you thought things were getting nasty before this, just wait. You ain't seen nothing yet."
Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: "The Republican presidential candidates faced off Saturday night in a contentious final debate before next week's South Carolina primary, sparring about immigration and foreign policy and attacking one another personally in an affair that verged on mean-spirited." CW: Cruz, Trump & Rubio called each other (& George W. Bush) liars -- nice soundbytes for the general election. And of course, they're all right; they are liars. ...
... Dylan Matthews has quite a helpful summary/analysis of the debate. With clips (which don't seem to load). ...
... Ted Cruz is such a good debater, he can rebut Marco Rubio in a language Marco says Ted doesn't speak:
... Cruz has said his mastery of Spanish "is lousy."
... Philip Rucker & Jenna Johnson the Washington Post: "The six remaining Republican presidential candidates sparred with ferocity over U.S. foreign policy in a debate here Saturday night, with front-runner Donald Trump savaging former president George W. Bush's intervention in Iraq, which helped spawn more than a decade of instability in the Middle East." ...
... Matt Yglesias of Vox: "... after months of watching Trump say things that are racist, absurd, patently false, or all three at once the Republican Party establishment decided to stomp on him for saying things that are basically true.... It was a bizarre and telling moment, in which the battered forces of the Republican establishment finally picked themselves up off the floor specifically in order to defend some of its least-defensible conduct of the 21st Century."
Alan Rappeport: "The two-hour [Republican] debate airs live on CBS beginning at 9 p.m. Eastern time." Rappeport reports on other ways to see or hear the debate. CW: I'll be damned if I join the virtual audience. ...
... CW: Apparently there is so little interest in the debate that none of the major U.S. newspapers is liveblogging it. Here's the Guardian's liveblog.
New York Times: "The Republican presidential candidates face off Saturday in Greenville, S.C., at 9 p.m. Eastern time, one week before the state's primary. There will be one candidate fewer on stage because Gov. Chris Christie, whose debate performance one week ago blunted the momentum of Senator Marco Rubio, dropped out after the New Hampshire primary. We asked political reporters for The New York Times what they would be looking for in the debate...."
** Today's History Lesson. Ben Fountain of the Guardian on political hucksters Pappy O'Daniel & Joe McCarthy. For some strange reason, the Guardian also posts photos of Donald Trump & Ted Cruz within the text. (The Coen brothers moved O'Daniel to Mississippi & made O'Daniel's opponent the "broom-sweeping reformer"):
Oh, what the hell. Tim Blake Nelson & the Soggy Bottom Boys:
Nicholas Confessore & Yamiche Alcindor of the New York Times: "Hillary Clinton set out on Saturday to blunt one of Bernie Sanders's most potent arguments against her, attacking the Vermont senator as a one-note rival whose relentless focus on Wall Street excess and exorbitant political spending would do little to improve the lives of Americans. The line of attack, laid out at a rally [in Henderson, Nevada,] with labor union members and amplified more pointedly by a video Mrs. Clinton's campaign released on Saturday morning, comes as she is seeking to sow doubts about Mr. Sanders's readiness for office and defend herself as a more reliable and proven fighter for Democratic interests." ...
... Steven Myers of the New York Times: "The State Department released 551 more emails from the personal server of Hillary Clinton on Saturday, including 84 with some or all of the messages blocked out because they contained information that has now been deemed classified. Three of those are classified 'secret.'" ...
... ** Maureen Dowd: "The interesting thing about the spectacle of older women trying to shame younger ones on behalf of Hillary is that Hillary and Bill killed the integrity of institutional feminism back in the '90s -- with the help of Albright and Steinem.... Seeing Albright, the first female secretary of state, give cover to President Clinton was a low point in women's rights. As was the New York Times op-ed by Steinem, arguing that Lewinsky's will was not violated, so no feminist principles were violated. What about Clinton humiliating his wife and daughter and female cabinet members? What about a president taking advantage of a gargantuan power imbalance with a 22-year-old intern? What about imperiling his party with reckless behavior that put their feminist agenda at risk?... [Feminists have made an] ugly Faustian bargain with the Clintons, not only on the sex cover-ups but the money grabs: You can have our bright public service side as long as you accept our dark sketchy side. Young women today, though, are playing by a different set of rules. And they don't like the Clintons setting themselves above the rules." ...
... CW: As any math-challenged cynic might say, I agree with Dowd A THOUSAND PERCENT!!!! It was not only Bill Clinton who betrayed feminists in the Lewinsky affair; it was also the powerful women, including his wife, who defended him.
Politics Makes Asses of the Finest People. The Very Finest Apologize. Martin Pengelly of the Guardian: "John Lewis, the influential congressman who this week appeared to dismiss Bernie Sanders' credentials on civil rights issues, has sought to soften the ensuing controversy over his remarks.... On Saturday, he said he had not meant to express doubt 'that Senator Sanders participated in the civil rights movement, neither was I attempting to disparage his activism'.... As a student at the University of Chicago, Sanders was involved in the Congress on Racial Equality and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), of which Lewis was chairman. Sanders was also arrested while protesting.... Lewis also clarified a comment made on Thursday in which he said he had known Bill and Hillary Clinton in the civil rights era. Lewis said he 'did not say that I met Hillary and Bill Clinton when I was chairman of SNCC in the 1960s'."
... John Frank & Joey Bunch of the Denver Post: "Bernie Sanders galvanized a crowd of more than 18,000 with a populist message against inequality.... Hillary Clinton's campaign hosted a small event that featured party leaders and teary families affected by gun violence." Read on. Sanders will go to a party & criticize the hosts, to wit: at "the Colorado Democratic Party's annual fundraising dinner..., Sanders took the stage in front of a room of well-heeled Democrats and called for a more inclusive party not controlled by wealthy donors." Clinton, not so much: "Clinton struck an optimistic tone as she focused on raising incomes for the middle class, addressing student debt and continuing the fight toward universal health care." ...
... Yamiche Alcindor : "Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont pointedly criticized Republican officials for recommending that President Obama hold off on nominating a successor for Justice Antonin Scalia of the Supreme Court, who died Saturday. Speaking on Saturday at an annual fund-raising dinner hosted by the Colorado Democratic Party, Mr. Sanders said Republicans are overlooking the powers given to the president in the Constitution.... Hillary Clinton made similar remarks at the same dinner." ...
... Talia Lepson, chair of the College Democrats of Massachusetts Women's Caucus, in a Globalist essay: "I am voting for Bernie Sanders because I am a feminist." Thanks to D.C. Clark for the link.
News Ledes
AP: "Turkey shelled positions held by a U.S.-backed Kurdish militia in northern Syria for a second day on Sunday, drawing condemnation from the Syrian government, whose forces are advancing against insurgents in the same area under the cover of Russian airstrikes."
AP: "Pope Francis urged Mexicans to shun the devil and resist the temptations of wealth and corruption Sunday as he celebrated an open-air Mass for hundreds of thousands of people in this drug- and violence-riddled city [-- Ecatepec --] on the outskirts of Mexico's capital."
Weather Channel: "A blast of bitter cold arctic air has brought the coldest temperatures in decades to some Northeast cities Valentine's Day morning."