Shut the F#$% Up

Political commentators just need to shut the f#$% up.

They remind me of the husband berating his wife in the elevator of a Las Vegas casino over losing $50. When she points out that he lost $500, he says: "Yeah, but I know how to gamble." The hypocrisy I see, hear, and read on political matters is even worse.

Merrick Garland was qualified to sit on the Supreme Court. So was Robert Bork. While one could argue that it is a gross rationalization, Mitch McConnell decided that it was more palatable not to have a vote than present his caucus with the option of voting against a clearly qualified candidate. Doing that does not seem to matter to the Democrats, but it might to more Republican Senators. I believe 54 Democratic Senators would vote against a qualified candidate nominated by a Republican president in her last year in office.

This time, the Republicans still control the Senate, and they are acting. They are forcing the Democrats to smear Amy Barrett and vote against her, which they are more than willing to do. No one doubts that if the Democrats had controlled the Senate in 2016, they would have confirmed Garland, and a large number of Republicans would have voted for him.

The Democrats seem to be frightened about Roe v. Wade. Have they read it? Basically, the decision - like many Supreme Court decisions holding a law unconstitutional - said that the will of the majority could not be followed on abortion during the period of time that the fetus could not live outside the womb. Viability was the term used. There is nothing in the decision that says a state cannot permit abortion at any time prior to birth; the decision says that restrictions prior to viability cannot be imposed, regardless of the will of the majority.

People fail to understand that the Constitution is an exercise in restricting the will of the majority in certain areas. Most people are fine with that if they are in the minority, but when they are in the majority, it really pisses them off. The Constitution feared the mob and the majority. Ben Franklin famously called democracy a vote among two wolves and a sheep over what to have for lunch. The will of the majority has been ignored, by design, in several Presidential elections, notably 2000 and 2016. The popular vote does not matter, so if 99% of California votes for a candidate, she only gets California's electoral votes. Sorry, those are the rules. In fact, at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, the drafters were extremely worried about the oversized influence of Virginia and New York, so the only got two Senators just like Rhode Island.

No one reveres judges or justices who were middle of the road. We should. Sometimes, courts have to deal with cowardly legislatures and be judicially active. Sometimes, they need to apply the law strictly. Knee jerk decisions do a disservice to the country.