mmm_grayons · 5 years ago

> I'm not foolish enough to believe that people with guns could win a civil war in the day of modern weapons

I know HN hates opinions like this, but I'm a very staunch 2a supporter. My position is that citizens should have so-called "weapons of war", the same automatic weapons that the military carries with tons of ammunition. Joe six-pack should be able to walk to his local gun store and buy an M60 if he so pleases. In such a case, there's a very good chance that civilians could win a civil war.

jandrese · 5 years ago

What lost votes? Trump's base is going to eat this up. They would only be mad if he didn't ram through an appointment as fast as possible.

mFixman · 5 years ago

Trump's chances of winning will drastically increase with another Republican Supreme Court Justice.

The election will likely be contested. When some strategically selected counties in Florida start anulling mail-in votes the Republicans will be glad to have a person who will dispute in their favour.

thysultan · 5 years ago

Depress your opponents base and deny them a divisive issue to campaign on.

It would be a perfect game theory move to do it, no merit in holding out.

jessaustin · 5 years ago

Wow Hawley and Cotton have risen meteorically. I would have half-expected Hawley's crypto-unionist populism to have kept him off such a list, but he'd surely be better than the others mentioned. Somehow, he ran for MO Attorney General without promising to further brutalize minorities. Within two years he was in the Senate and now within two more years he would be on the Supreme Court? Wow.

tick_tock_tick · 5 years ago

For context https://www.politifact.com/article/2016/mar/17/context-biden...

nscalf · 5 years ago

Yep, they've gotten more corrupt.

tick_tock_tick · 5 years ago

I mean legally it's always been this the Supreme Court has been very clear on every cases regarding confirmation that Congress is free to act or not act at it's leisure.

nscalf · 5 years ago

This wasn't always the case, here's an excerpt from the wiki on recent changes making this the case: "Senate cloture rules historically required a two-thirds affirmative vote to advance nominations to a vote; this was changed to a three-fifths supermajority in 1975. In November 2013, the then-Democratic Senate majority eliminated the filibuster for executive branch nominees and judicial nominees except for Supreme Court nominees by invoking the so-called nuclear option. In April 2017, the Republican Senate majority applied the nuclear option to Supreme Court nominations as well,[2] enabling the nominations of Trump nominees Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh to proceed to a vote.[3][4] "

caymanjim · 5 years ago

There's no probably about it or thinking required. That is literally the law. The President nominates a replacement, and the Senate votes to confirm it or not. There are plenty of layers of politics, posturing, and pomp added on, but the law is simple and clear.

ryanobjc · 5 years ago

The Democratic Party legislates as if it represents all Americans. Which means compromise.

Rarely has the Democratic Party held all three branches recently. Holding the senate is a huge win for the republicans - they can be as obstinate and block things and only need a barest majority to do appointments and many other procedural shenanigans.

Like what the fuck is the house supposed to negotiate with? “We won’t pass bills”: the republican senate is entirely happy not to have bills passed. Now what?

The Republican Party is entirely devoted to debasing government and spoiling the notion of governance.

SpicyLemonZest · 5 years ago

Respectfully, you probably do know independents. We just don't often talk about our political views to people who say compromise is dead and you have to be on one side or the other.

shajznnckfke · 5 years ago

Merrick was a pretty moderate choice who had been praised by many Republicans. Since they never voted on him, we don’t really know if they would have changed their minds and voted against him.

tomrod · 5 years ago

Time for some history. The GOP senators never expected a moderate like Merrick Garland, who was named by senators in the news before Obama announced his confirmation.

kennywinker · 5 years ago

If they hold hearing for a 45 nominee before the election, they prove they were acting in bad faith. The expectation is that the president gets to appoint judges during his term, unless there is a reason to deny the nominee. By denying that they challenge the power of the executive branch. I.e. Does the president only get to pick a judge if the senate is a majority from the same party?

nscalf · 5 years ago

It's a bad faith enforcement of the constitution. In democracies like the US, precedents are as powerful as laws. This was not literally breaking any laws, but this was as bad as breaking a law.

robotresearcher · 5 years ago

The Senate, not congress.

"[The president] shall nominate, and by and with the [...] Consent of the Senate, shall appoint [...] Judges of the supreme Court"

https://www.senate.gov/history/powers.htm

aatharuv · 5 years ago

No, what happened is that Mitch McConnell refused to even allow a vote, and even Republican senators wouldn't have been able to vote for the centrist proposed by Obama.

coredog64 · 5 years ago

Early noise on Twitter is that Biden’s response to a filled seat is an expansion of the court to 11 seats.

Not sure what the calculus is. If it’s unfilled, Biden will fill it. If it’s filled, he’ll expand the court. Not sure if that also depends on a senate flip, but I have a hard time believing the senate doesn’t flip during a Biden win.

giantrobot · 5 years ago

> An unfriendly Senate is going to delay the heck out of it.

You hit on the problem without seeming to realize it. The Senate didn't delay the heck out of anything. McDonnell flat out refused to do anything about Garland's nomination. He declared the nomination "null and void" based on no precedence, case law, and certainly not any interpretation of the Constitution. The Senate majority leader should not be able to shut down the Senate and prevent it from performing its Constitutionally mandated tasks. If the Senate didn't want to confirm Garland they should have held all the appropriate hearings and held an approval vote. If it's the Senate's will that Garland not be approved that's fine. It was singularly McConnell's will that Garland not be approved so he just never allowed hearings. No matter your political leanings that should be seen as abhorrent if you profess to want law and order.

mcphage · 5 years ago

> but if elected Republicans simply use votes to do the same thing it's "no regard for the constitution".

They didn’t use votes. If it had gone to vote, Garland would have been confirmed. McConnell refused to bring it to vote.

nscalf · 5 years ago

Do you know how laws are often interpreted? It's asking what is the faith and meaning of the law, NOT what is literally written in paper. This means past precedents are incredibly important for defining what a law is. Refusing to hold a vote for a nomination of a qualified supreme court justice is not against the law on paper, but it is against the meaning of the laws and the precedents of how the president interacts with the supreme court.

It is not the senates job to decide if a nominee is worthy of being nominated, or if the president should make a nomination. It is their job to vote on the nominee. They did not do that.

gdubs · 5 years ago

I find this “thems the laws” theme in this thread pretty outrageous. Congress used run on decorum, arcane rules, and norms. Those norms were thrown out the window when the Senate refused to even have a hearing on Merrick Garland. Arguably, they had a legal requirement to do at least that. But now we’re supposed to pretend that “rules are rules”, and this is all totally normal.

tyre · 5 years ago

This.

Seeing trump as a cause and not a symptom or as the leading disaster for American democracy is a very common distraction.

McConnell is the heart of all of it. He is nothing but an appetite for power. He’ll do anything. No morals whatsoever (and I say that neutrally, as a fact and not a moral judgement.)

And he wins.

basementcat · 5 years ago

McConnell is just doing what his constituents want. Otherwise, they wouldn't have voted for him repeatedly since 1984.

EDIT: One might argue that Mr. McConnell correctly anticipated the desires of the USA electorate because in November of 2016 they expressed a wish for more conservative judges in federal courts. If the voting public was outraged by McConnell's actions, one might expect they'd vote accordingly.

tick_tock_tick · 5 years ago

Harry Reid, he's the one that ruined congress by changing the rules. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Reid

worker767424 · 5 years ago

More than Trump? McConnell is at least a professional politician and not a washed-up reality TV heir.

giardini · 5 years ago

It's beautiful to see someone like McConnell, who understands political power and is able to use it fully and legally w/o overstepping. If Democrats had someone his equal then they would be pleased too.

Please remember that luck (chance) is an important and sometimes decisive component in conflict. Today it seems the Republicans are lucky; who knows what the future will bring.

sukilot · 5 years ago

What's more "unnecessary partisanship" then refusing to follow the Constitution because the President is of a different Party (a concept which is not part of the Constitution)?

coredog64 · 5 years ago

Tit-for-tat. Harry Reid had exercised the “nuclear option” to exclude most Presidential appointments from being filibustered a few years previous.

We’re in an iterated prisoner’s dilemma and we’re still in the “last turn sets the new norm” phase. I’m hoping there’s a way out before too long.

rootusrootus · 5 years ago

I would not be entirely surprised. There was a time when Democrats seemed to be intimidated by threats over nuclear options and such. Now that they know the truth, maybe they won't heed such warnings and decide that they need to win at any cost, just like their opposition.

ApolloFortyNine · 5 years ago

That's really just the "end of the Supreme Court" argument. If you pack the Supreme Court once, it'll happen every time a new party has the senate and the white house.

Especially since you yourself suggest packing it to give an immediate "Democrat" majority, when it's incredibly likely, even without a new nomination, the Supreme Court remains republican for at least 8 years.

Personally I think this is what democrats (and people like you) are hoping for. It'd give an excuse to pack the court day one and maybe not immediately lose all public support.

ikiris · 5 years ago

This is hardly about petty. its about power, and always has been. and the sides are in no way equal.

tmountain · 5 years ago

In this case, it's about the preservation of our democracy (Trump has already indicated he will contest the election), so I don't think "petty" is the appropriate term.

erichocean · 5 years ago

> it's hypocritical

If Obama had a Democratic Senate majority in 2016, Merrick Garland would have been confirmed. That's the precedent.

taurath · 5 years ago

Sorry, if that were true, then obama could've nominated someone else.

Why would you need to block a vote you know you will win?

erichocean · 5 years ago

> [if] Obama had a Democratic Senate majority when he nominated Merrick Garland…

With a Democratic majority, Garland would have been confirmed. It's exactly because no Democratic majority in the Senate existed that Garland wasn't even voted on (and actually didn't even get a hearing).

stjohnswarts · 5 years ago

That is not what happened at all, he didn't hold a vote because he didn't want to and used an excuse that "Presidents shouldn't be able to nominate a SCOTUS judge in their last year". Now he's changing it to "majority party situation" and that is not what he said when he refused to hold any confirmations. He is a sneaky snakey weasel and has been for decades.

erichocean · 5 years ago

Sure, but the fundamental issue isn't McConnell, it's that Obama seriously weakened Democratic control of both the House and Senate during his time as President. As a result, his party lost a Supreme Court pick.

"Elections have consequences" and all that.

pnw_hazor · 5 years ago

Legislative leadership at all levels of US government often do not allow hearings, floor debates, or floor votes when they know the issue will fail.

redler · 5 years ago

As Republican Senator Richard Burr said in 2016, after Scalia died, "...And if Hillary Clinton becomes president, I am going to do everything I can do to make sure four years from now, we still got an opening on the Supreme Court."

tempestn · 5 years ago

You're right. Unfortunately this is a natural result of having so many different veto points in this process and in the US governmental system in general.

I was just thinking today about why Canada's Supreme Court isn't remotely politicized in the same way as the US. Part of it may be that we're just not as partisan, but I think the main thing is that with our parliamentary system, if the party in power has a majority—which they do the majority of the time—they can basically pass what laws they want. Of course, they generally refrain from doing deeply unpopular things since they'll pay for it at the next election, although even that does happen: eg. the Mulroney (conservative!) government implementing a 7% goods and services tax. Probably played a large part of them being out of power for a decade+ immediately following, but was great for the country fiscally from there forward.

Anyway, since the government can largely do what they want, there's much less need or reason to essentially try to enact 'legislation from the bench'. I couldn't even tell you the political leanings of our SC justices.

There are still plenty of downsides to this system of course (lack of proportional representation comes to mind), but it does appear to be more functional in a lot of ways than the US. And probably not by accident—the Canadian system was developed almost a hundred years after the US, and had it and other more recent governments as models; it was also soon after the US Civil War, which played a part in Canada adopting a strong federal system with less provincial power, relatively speaking.

Of course, it's easy to say all that. Much harder to actually enact significant reform!

zaroth · 5 years ago

At first I read your comment as “What keeps this principle from extending to a President’s entire team” and I recalled that Trump’s cabinet appointments were notoriously slow to get through the Senate, held up even by a Democratic minority.

namarie · 5 years ago

Not when he's been the senate majority leader in both situations

tomrod · 5 years ago

Hindsight 20/20.

tyingq · 5 years ago

I suppose, but the number of days before they bring a nominee to the floor seems a more direct measure.

basementcat · 5 years ago

It isn't about respect. The upcoming election may be disputed in court and the Administration wants to have as many judges on its side as possible. Even if there is no election related court challenge, there are many investigations of the current administration ongoing and it would be helpful to have more conservative justices for insurance.

_-david-_ · 5 years ago

Both sides have lists for judges not just for the supreme court but all federal courts. Its easier to keep a up to date list then to try to figure out a list when there is a vacancy. They will also often reveal the list or parts of it to get other people's opinions.

stjohnswarts · 5 years ago

You are completely right, I don't know why people are downvoting you.I predict they'll have someone nominated and approved and sitting on the seat within a month. All legistlation will be dropped until this matter is complete. No stimulus checks, no help for businesses, everything else just dropped to Ring2 and getting a new SCOTUS judge is in Ring 0

spuz · 5 years ago

It's a terrible argument. If the senate is not controlled by the same party as the president and they dislike the president's choice for supreme court, they can vote not to confirm him/her. It also encourages the president to choose a nominee who can appeal to both parties. McConnell refused to allow Garland to even have hearings in the Senate let alone a vote because he feared that some of his republican colleagues may have been persuaded. If there are two controlling parties in two parts of the government then the solution is compromise. This is a philosophy totally abhorrent to McConnell whose views can only be supported by an authoritarian minority.

monocasa · 5 years ago

Yes... the article is about the new, updated list as of last week.

Hnrobert42 · 5 years ago

That was not the precedent. The precedent was to “allow the country to decide.” Drop the pretext. His side won. Screw the other side. Just have some integrity and own it.

Aeolun · 5 years ago

Of course. If it’s clear that the other party is not playing by the rules, there’s very little reason to keep to them yourself.

blake1 · 5 years ago

It was a new rule, concocted at a moments notice, and discarded the moment it outlived its usefulness. That latter moment was today. It was the definition of abuse.

robertoandred · 5 years ago

Did you view it as an abuse of power when Republicans filibustered Obama's nominees, making the nuclear option the only option?

chipotle_coyote · 5 years ago

That's the way he's reframing the point now. There was no mention from 2016 that I can find where he mentioned anything about opposite parties: his argument was entirely "it's too close to the election and the next president should be the one who gets to appoint the next Justice."

Aeolun · 5 years ago

I think the problem is that you cannot use one strategy one time, and another the next. If he’d elected to delay like before, nobody would have complained. If he’d not sabotaged the last nomination, nobody would have complained now either.

rayiner · 5 years ago

Biden didn’t just suggest the idea, he was also citing historical practice!

matthewbauer · 5 years ago

Biden's speech was just saying that the nomination shouldn't happen during an election. I don't think he ever said it couldn't happen during a lame duck session of the Senate.

Hnrobert42 · 5 years ago

So we are in agreement. Trump should not appoint.

sukilot · 5 years ago

June 1992, quite a bit ways past February.

There's always another election coming up.

sp332 · 5 years ago

https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/28/politics/mitch-mcconnell-supr...

blake1 · 5 years ago

https://www.republicanleader.senate.gov/newsroom/press-relea...

He’s basically that the partisan makeup of the Senate as of the most recent election should be the controlling factor.

It has the veneer of a neutral rule, and that’s all they need.

cortesoft · 5 years ago

He tweeted it today

https://mobile.twitter.com/senatemajldr/status/1307121192516...

rectang · 5 years ago

The proper response to this cynical argument is to pack the court.

_qulr · 5 years ago

Can we please stop talking about "precedent" when the last time was over 150 years ago?

For some perspective, there were only 31 states at the time.

filoeleven · 5 years ago

What happened with Garland was new in that the Republicans refused to hold any hearing or vote on the matter. They did not violate any laws with their refusal, only norms. I don’t know why no nominations were made before Election Day in 4/10 cases; that may have been another lesser norm, or the vacancies may have been closer to the elections, or both.

In any case, the refusal was a further erosion of any semblance of working towards the good of the country with people of opposing ideologies. The same goes for the increased frequency of government shutdown threats and occurrences.

Really, if those practices had stood for so long on norms, they should have been codified into law already. But the Congress, regardless of party, doesn’t like to cede any power. It’s equally unlikely that if the Democrats take control they’ll do anything about it either. I’m vague on what it would entail—it’s been a while since I read up on it—but another hurdle might be that it would take an amendment rather than a law. Regulating what the Congress does is explicitly harder than making laws for the rest of us.

jakelazaroff · 5 years ago

The link does not support your claim (or its own). The Senate did not consider and reject Merrick Garland, it refused to consider any Supreme Court nominee by Obama.

Of course, I'm splitting hairs between "refused to consider" and "voted against". But it's similarly splitting hairs to say that the party of the president makes meaningful difference as well.

Frankly, there's no good faith interpretation of McConnell's stance here as anything other than (ab)using his power to shape the judiciary.

dbingham · 5 years ago

The National Review became dishonest propaganda some time ago. They are going back 150 years to find a precedent and ignoring many more recent precedents.

https://www.scotusblog.com/2016/02/supreme-court-vacancies-i...

dctoedt · 5 years ago

> the party controlling the senate can exercise its heckler’s veto

I'm trying to think of a plausible vehicle for arguing that if the Senate refuses to vote on a nomination within a reasonable time, then that refusal (i) constitutes a waiver of the right to withhold consent and therefore (ii) is deemed consent.

matthewdgreen · 5 years ago

Lately I see a lot of people saying things like “this particular example of real behavior is bad and conflicts with my values so should be electorally punished, but my mental model of the other side tells me that they would probably do the same thing if they hypothetically got the opportunity, and so I’m not going to uphold my values.”

notahacker · 5 years ago

Sure, but the argument that the Senate shouldn't approve or even consider a Supreme Court nomination in election years because voters should have a voice was made by Mitch McConnell, at a time when not approving a presidential nominee suited him.

I don't think anybody can argue in good faith that it is equally incumbent upon the Democrats to act in a manner consistent with principles argued for and precedents set by Mitch McConnell.

dehrmann · 5 years ago

Interesting point. Trump and McConnell's interests aren't actually aligned, here. McConnell is up for reelection, ahead in the polls, and wants an inoffsensive conservative justice. Trump's behind, is more interested in his reelection than in getting a conservative justice on the court. He can't drag his feet too long or it will look like he's stalling, and he'd have to nominate a judicial version of Judy Shelton so he's playing to his base, but it's someone the Senate wouldn't approve. Or if they have someone they already vetted with skeletons in the closet that just haven't come out yet.

evan_ · 5 years ago

With Supreme Court supremacy Republicans don’t have to get re-elected by voters anymore, they just have to dispute the results, lose, and appeal up to the nearest friendly court.

quickthrowman · 5 years ago

The court seat matters more than the Senate and more than the presidency to Mitch McConnell. He’d give up his own senate seat to confirm this justice.

dang · 5 years ago

Please don't use uppercase for emphasis. If you want to emphasize a word or phrase, put asterisks around it and it will get italicized.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

adrianmonk · 5 years ago

I definitely would expect Trump to calculate whether it is more in his interests to do it before or after election day.

I don't think it's possible to remove the election math, though. Whatever he does, it could influence voter turnout for both sides.

There's also the possibility that something about the election will be disputed and go to the Supreme Court (as happened with vote counting with Bush v. Gore in 2000). So Trump might decide he wants his appointee to already be serving before election day if he thinks that would be more in his favor.

rayiner · 5 years ago

No. See: https://www.nationalreview.com/2017/03/neil-gorsuch-supreme-...

rayiner · 5 years ago

It's not "common" because election-year Supreme Court vacancies where different parties control the Senate and Presidency are "not common." Republicans filibustered the nominee when LBJ sought to appoint Warren's replacement, leading to Warren not retiring. Then before that, Eisenhower, a Republican, got an election year nomination through by nominating a Democrat.

Then you're back in the 1800s. But we routinely look back to the 1800s to establish what is accepted practice in our government.

AuryGlenz · 5 years ago

Throwing one of your own under the bus for political reasons isn’t what I’d call accountability.

joshuamorton · 5 years ago

Has any elected democrat threatened to pack the supreme court, except as a response to McConnell reversing his position now that his party is in control?

You can't compare the senate majority leader with a random anonymous twitter account.

Frondo · 5 years ago

If your claim is supported by that article you linked down below, it seems like a big stretch to refer to Democrats as a unified whole ("believe Democrats ... after they") when you're referring to three people, two of whom were engaged in ultimately failed campaigns for the presidency.

It might be more constructive to speak with precision about a claim of such import.

publicola1990 · 5 years ago

But Democrats did try to nominate Garland in 2016, so now can they protest if Republicans put up a nominee now? Republican position may be inconsistent between 2020 and 2016, but if Reps now take position taken by Dems in 2016, how can Dems be critical if it?.

jb775 · 5 years ago

Any references and/or dates?

Or just gonna stop there since that's what you'd like to believe?

jcalvinowens · 5 years ago

It wouldn't take anything close to a landslide for the senate to flip.

My point is: if the Democrats win the senate and the presidency, it doesn't really matter if Trump fills this vacancy. There is zero doubt they will stack the court when in power if he does.

jcalvinowens · 5 years ago

> I for one, hope to all hell, this doesn't happen. It would make the supreme court just an extension of any party in power of presidency and senate.

I completely agree, but at this point I think it's inevitable.

tstrimple · 5 years ago

I, for one, am tired of "precedent" being broken benefiting Republicans and Democrats continually being expected to "take the high road".

ModernMech · 5 years ago

The precedent for 9 did change. Republicans changed it to 8 justices in 2016, and then back to 9 again in 2017 because it suited them politically. I don't see why Democrats should be shy about changing the number of justices this point.

ianai · 5 years ago

I think the patch including a general election is good. But I think say every 5 or 10 years a justice is given an approval vote-have it rotate across the bench and one or two per year, not many. I’d they get less than 67% approval then they’re removed until after the next general election-no fillers until then. Give a time lag to let people consider their first choice before the second choice is made.

cwhiz · 5 years ago

You can lawyer consent to mean a lot of things. Many legal scholars and lawyers argued that the Senate did consent in 2016 when Obama made his nomination. He sent his nomination to the Senate, and they thought about it for 9 months without rejecting, and therefore they consented.

It’s way more open to interpretation than you’re suggesting. It has never been challenged.

cwhiz · 5 years ago

Like I said, it’s never actually been challenged. Consent can mean a lot of things. For example, if I tell you what I’m going to do, and you don’t say not to do it, did you consent? I could argue yes. You could argue no. This has never been litigated on the subject of a Supreme Court nominee.

And my overall point here is that the Supreme Court would decide whether the move was legal. If the court is now stacked, well that’s just tough shit. There is no other immediate remedy except to amend the constitution. Good luck.

Fellshard · 5 years ago

A true friendship is not necessarily based on mutually-beneficial backroom deals. A sound friendship would have each party seeking to uphold and maintain the integrity of one another. To do otherwise is to reveal that it is not friendship, but rather opportunism, cronyism, or convenience - none of which have the stability or moral foundation of true friendship.

function_seven · 5 years ago

The Supreme Court is not just another legislative branch.

But that being said, have you seen how many decisions are 5-4? Or 6-3, 7-2? It does not appear that whatever friendship that existed between Scalia and Ginsburg impacted their rulings and dissents on the matters before the Court.

It's completely possible—and I say preferable—to hold starkly contrasting political or legal views, but still like one another. We need more of that. It's how we stay one cohesive nation, instead of warring factions.

landryraccoon · 5 years ago

I don't think this is true. In the past people have reached across the aisle to compromise and collaborate successfully.

If your position is right, doesn't that contradict the continued existence of the United States? What's "United" about the US if it breaks down into a bunch of hostile warring tribes?

sillysaurusx · 5 years ago

Well, props for sticking with a truly unpopular opinion.

I’d like to change your mind one day though. My friendship with Scott was instructive here. He was a former HN mod. I looked to him as a mentor and a friend, though I’m not sure it went both ways. Regardless, we worked together on Lumen for years. When I was banned for a year from HN, he never once allowed our friendship (such as it was) to affect his duty to the site. The decision wasn’t his, and he wasn’t going to pull strings internally just because we occasionally wrote code together.

I get what you’re saying. And I agree that in the long term, it’s extremely important to set up incentive structures in the right way. But friendship — a word quite hard to define, if you think about it — is a part of the human experience.

The point here is that there are people with integrity. They do exist. And they can be friends regardless of other duties — sometimes unpleasant ones.

Now, my little story isn’t quite related. I wasn’t an adversarial peer, which is what you’re talking about. But your reasoning seems to be: if the incentive structure permits friendship, it compromises integrity. It’s a reasonable concern, especially over the course of decades. But the word “professional” reflects the fact that business comes before friendship.

It’s a fundamental truth that people will try to form friendships regardless of their occupation. Rather than change the incentive structure, as you propose, shouldn’t we recognize that truth?

The reason I related to your comment so much is, for a time, I felt exactly the same way: if business was any indication, it was a web of insider deals, “friendships”, and favors behind closed doors. I wanted nothing to do with that world. But two people with integrity can sidestep all of those concerns and simply... be friends. Even in the highest court of the land, which determines our fate.

(As a sidenote, you seem like an interesting person. If you happen to want a friend, or to debate hypothetical political structures, feel free to DM me on Twitter.)

NateEag · 5 years ago

Daryl Davis has converted a lot of KKK members away from racism by risking his life to befriend them.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daryl_Davis

How many people have you seen converted from dangerous beliefs by isolating them away from dissimilar thinkers?

lawnchair_larry · 5 years ago

Republicans and moderates are not denying anyone’s humanity, nor do they support political policies that have no other effect than to hurt people. Nobody does. Arriving at that conclusion should tell you loud and clear that your model is incomplete and you don’t understand your opponent.

arunbahl · 5 years ago

This — suspension of judgement long enough to engage in genuine introspection, followed by a return to the conversation with humility — is something we so rarely see, and each need to engage in more.

Kudos to you for leading by example.

RonanTheGrey · 5 years ago

> I entertain the cognitive-dissonance of being "anti-racist" and "not having ever done anything that was anti-racist"

The systems and histories in place we battle with are much bigger, and much older, than we are. Unless your explicit goal is to set out to change the world (which frankly is a shitty goal and usually leads to some kind of genocide), literally the best advice is "think globally, act locally", as "outdated" as that saying I suppose now is.

Except that it is especially true when what you want is positive social change. Think about the implications of someone who first implements your initial original post ("just stop and think for a sec"), and then also implements your second ("is there anything I can do here?"). That's enough. Literally that, when applied on a large scale, would change the world, in a way far more positive than riots and social justice movements.

See, humans are really terrible creatures. We have a bad habit of overcorrecting and, you know, killing millions of people in the name of an ideal. We've done it what, dozens (hundreds? thousands?) of times.

It's the difference between water carving a river, and a nuke carving a crater. The first one takes longer but is alot less destructive.

ABCLAW · 5 years ago

Here's the line of thinking:

The idea is that ineffectual discourse without actual efforts towards reform is a method of signalling that one wants change while benefiting from the status quo of oppression.

Discussion is great, but the discussion is supposed to result in change, not a vortex of words which have no connection to reality.

When people advocate for lofty civility above all else when the status quo is violent, aggressive, demeaning and unjust, it shows that the priority is not justice; it is the maintenance of the current order.

Is this position accurate? I don't know. There's obviously countervailing concerns regarding having a chilling effect on the market of ideas, but like all tough questions, it's likely a difficult situation with no clear cut answer and two virtues being traded-off against each other. This seems to be borne out by the fairly dramatic spectrum of positions adopted on the issue across the globe.

lawnchair_larry · 5 years ago

No, the statement is nonsensical abusive rhetoric. Silence is literally not violence. It substitutes an argument that stands on its merits with a rather shameful and racist manipulation technique that is unfortunately quite effective, as evidenced by your apparent guilt. You obviously did nothing wrong. When racism flourishes is when we allow phrases like that to enter the discourse.

ctdeneen · 5 years ago

I'm sorry I wasn't clear in my reply which was short and poorly written considering how it has a very powerful phrase. I'm not implying your post was racist but was responding to the quote you provided:

We may not agree but I will always listen to you. I will always consider your opinion with respect and will endeavor to understand your reasoning. My views are not set - my goal is to listen to arguments to come to an informed position, I can honestly take forward

I was trying to explain that because the internet has increased the visibility of ones opinions to a global scale, and a recent increase in the use of both public shaming as well as punitive financial measures (fired from job, boycott) it could be dangerous to opine about anything.

goldcd · 5 years ago

I would politely disagree (and happy to talk about it)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came_...

I think speech can definitely lead to violence - and speech can also counteract it. Neither directly, but the delta has real-world repercussions.

Or to look at it the other way - can you come up with an example of violence, that wasn't preceded by rhetoric?

FranzFerdiNaN · 5 years ago

Speech is most definitely capable of being violence. Just ask most anyone who was bullied as a child.

munificent · 5 years ago

> It feels over the last decade that we really have lost this.

Polarization has been increasing in the US for longer than that. Many of these tendrils stretch all the way back to the founding days of the US, but I think the real uptick of this modern flavor is hate started with Newt Gingrich:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newt_Gingrich#Role_in_politica...

Clubber · 5 years ago

If you really want to find a compelling starting point for the state of our current public political discourse, you may find it in the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine in 1987. Rush Limbaugh's first radio broadcast airs in 1988 which introduced "anger-tainment" as a very profitable political news model. As time passes, this new business model affected every news organization in one way or another, to various degrees, willingly or not.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCC_fairness_doctrine

Cd00d · 5 years ago

I'm close to your age I think.

Don't forget that well before Fox News there was a AM radio, and Rush Limbaugh was national in the 80's. I definitely remember how his talking point impacted my high school's debate team's rhetoric.

Agree that zero-sum thinking is a net-negative.

KittenInABox · 5 years ago

I agree it has become difficult to talk to people with different political opinions than my own. I just think the statement suggested was logically too strong, and entirely non applicable in very important failure modes. There are often legitimate reasons why someone believes what they do, but sometimes the belief is "I think there should be no consequences to murdering someone like you, because you're not worth the social resources you take with your disability", which was a belief expressed to me, and I need to protect myself emotionally from people who genuinely believe I should be dead.

lawnchair_larry · 5 years ago

> If listening to someone's opinion is actively causing emotional harm, then sure, don't listen to them.

I think that might be the most important time to listen to them. If merely hearing an opinion threatens your model, that’s probably a warning sign indicating that your own ideas are fragile and unsustainable, and they need to be exposed to ideas that challenge them. Engage with painful ideas, break your own models down and reformulate them into something more robust. I think the unwillingness to do this is what leads to the problems you mention.

I’m reminded of “The Coddling of the American Mind”

KittenInABox · 5 years ago

I mean, honestly, yes, if someone wishes your death I don't know if it is healthy to expose yourself continually to their opinions that you should die. That's emotional abuse.

TeaDrunk · 5 years ago

I think this is an easy handwave to ignore that some people get more disagreement than others about whether or not they deserve civil rights, life, etc. While you espouse a need to listen, you’re not really listening at all here or even trying to understand what is being said.

maxlybbert · 5 years ago

I enjoy John Cleese’s speech making the same point ( https://youtu.be/wXCkxlqFd90 ).

ngcc_hk · 5 years ago

If I believed in one true (God/Truth/...) why I do not kill you all/crusade into/suppress all/burn you in stake/ Spanish ...

It is so hard to accept others and let them articulate their view.

larkery · 5 years ago

There's a factor not considered here: to what extent were Scalia & Ginsberg able to get along because of other material conditions?

As supreme court justices we can assume that they had a basic foundation of psychological and material security - a position of prestige, a job for life, healthcare and so on.

I believe it is a lot easier to summon the "higher thoughts" necessary to be civil when ones personal position is more secure, so to achieve a more civil society it may help to work to make more insecure people secure.

rendall · 5 years ago

Personally, I think the US in particular is prone to this kind of thinking because the winner-take-all system incentives a dualistic, all-in approach. Thoughtful reflection does not win elections: riling up the rank and file does, including demonizing the opponent. More parliamentary, proportional systems encourage cooperation and collaboration among opponents

As for generalizations, the English language has an unfortunate construction that allows speakers to be ambiguous about their intent when making a generalizing statement. For example, "Men are violent" is a misleadingly meaningless statement. Does it refer to some men? To all men? Is it referring to the fact that men tend to be more violent, statistically, as a group? That assertion is ambiguous, but the always-truthful qualification "some" sits uncomfortably close to the always-unfair and bigoted "all". Bigots of all stripes rely on this ambiguity.

I don't think generalizations are bad necessarily, but to honor the dignity and diversity of individuals, it's vital to avoid this ambiguity, and to always be explicit about the generalization that you're making, and then your statement can be evaluated for what it is, pro or con. E.g. Instead of a Men are violent say what is meant, clearly: Some men are violent. In general men are violent. Most men are violent. All men are violent. Now at least we have a statement that can be agreed with or disputed, instead of motte-and-baileyed

Aeolun · 5 years ago

In some respects it is, it’s just correlated I’d say.

Aeolun · 5 years ago

All the educated conservatives I’ve met have been pleasant people. It’s just that the far majority have not been educated (as opposed to liberals, which seem to be pretty much all educated, to the point where I feel education and liberalism might as well be the same thing :/).

bluedevil2k · 5 years ago

Yes, people are wrong every election, that’s what happens when someone wins and someone loses. The same thing will happen in 7 weeks as well.

bluedevil2k · 5 years ago

Have you? Yes, Trump is terrible, there have been other Presidents as terrible as him in US history (Buchanan, Johnson, Harding) and the ship has always righted itself. He also hasn’t fundamentally altered the American political system. Congress still makes laws, Supreme Court still rules on their legality, President still signs them into law. The comments on here act like Trump has become a Francisco Franco when the fact is he’s likely to be voted out of office in 7 weeks and gone from politics on January 20th.

mindslight · 5 years ago

I'd guess it exists for most politicians. I'm just specifically calling out Republican senators as it seems they're no longer beholden to the US power structure. It's a novel position for me to be hoping the US establishment retakes control, instead of succumbing to whatever external powers are working to disrupt it. Freedom has to arise from the people via technological progress, a collapse will merely drag us backwards.

As for how the creation of compromising material happens - people lust after power to obtain things that money can't buy. Epstein's island wasn't merely for recreation.

geofft · 5 years ago

They don't have lifetime appointments - they have appointments during "good behavior." Who's going to determine when they've started behaving badly?

I mean, the history of basically every country that has fallen into single-party rule is the story of good intentions, including the belief that people will listen to the constitution, not counting for much in the face of real-world political power. I'm not saying it will happen to the US; I'm saying it's naive to believe it can't happen.

lovehashbrowns · 5 years ago

I am an immigrant who relied on the Supreme Court to stay in the US legally. I don't think it'll do you much good to have a 10k wager with me, lol.

bleepblorp · 5 years ago

The general problem with any kind of pro-democracy reforms is that the people who need to approve reforms are precisely the people who benefit from current antidemocratic policies. No one will approve reforms that will end their careers.

Some of the US' democratic problems could be helped by splitting up the more populous states so their populations have more representation in the Senate and Electoral College, but any such plan would need to be approved by flyover state Republican Senators who benefit handsomely from the status quo.

Given that the GOP party line--echoed by both McConnell and Trump--is that fixing US democracy would be a Democratic power grab, meaningful reforms are dead on arrival. This is especially true as any meaningful reforms would, by definition, remove the Republican party's disproportionate hold on power.

Sadly, I don't see a way out of this. With no route for peaceful reform, the usual escape route for irreconcilable differences within a country is civil war, but the human geography of the United States makes another civil war very unlikely. An inexorable slide into deepening authoritarian oligarchy/kleptocracy seems unavoidable.

bleepblorp · 5 years ago

In terms of erosion of democratic rights by the Supreme Court, the gutting of the Voting Rights Act is the most literal example, as is the decision to prevent Al Gore from taking the White House in 2000 despite being the legitimate electoral victor. A more peripheral example is Citizens' United.

Non-judicial examples include sabotage of the USPS to prevent mail-in voting, the last state election in Georgia (where the then-secretary of state supervised an election in which he was a candidate; needless to say, he won), removal of polling stations in Democratic areas, targeted disenfranchisement of demographic groups that traditionally vote Democratic, Mitch McConnell rejecting measures to increase voter turnout on the grounds that making it easier to vote would be a "Democratic power grab," Republican use of big data to jerrymander safe districts to maintain GOP control of states despite losing the popular vote, FBI interference in the 2016 election by releasing unsubstantiated accusations (the Comey Memo) against Clinton shortly before the election, and, finally, the Republican party soliciting foreign help to illegally acquire and spread disinformation against Democrats.

These are not signs of a healthy democracy.

I can provide sources if you would like but this stuff is everywhere and simple DDG/Google searches about these examples should lead to plenty of information.

dragonwriter · 5 years ago

> So now we’re claiming the entire US monetary system is going to collapse (and as a result most likely the worlds monetary system)?

No, that's not why outspoken critics of an incipient authoritarian regime would not be likely to be able to collect or enjoy their winnings if the regime was successful in establishing itself. The monetary system is in no way part of the issue.

Trasmatta · 5 years ago

It's like Reddit, where people have been claiming for a year that Trump would just cancel the election, despite him having to power to do so.

I expect a lot more fuckery to happen, but cancelled elections and the Supreme Court nullifying the 22nd amendment won't be included.

bleepblorp · 5 years ago

A Republican USSC throwing out the constitution, and the principle of democratic fairness, to put a Republican in the White House is not without precedent.

Al Gore legitimately won the 2000 election. The USSC prevented him from taking office.

smcameron · 5 years ago

Parent asked how they could do it, not why. So I told how. Never said I thought they would do it. At this point, it wouldn't surprise me as much as it should though.

nerdponx · 5 years ago

To be fair, most American "left" politicians are hardly left, with the exception of Sanders and the handful of DSA-affiliated Congressmen. Although popular support for more-left policies seems to be forcing them (reluctantly) farther leftward.

nsajko · 5 years ago

To be fair, it is hypothetically possible that Corbyn did the best he could have done, considering he was being terribly smeared, even vilified, by all the big media organizations in UK AFAIK.

worker767424 · 5 years ago

Controversial view: no, we shouldn't. Have you see how stupid people are? How easily they're manipulated? How little they understand about how government works? Any you want politicians pandering to these people?

If it weren't to the stigma of "literacy" tests and how the were historically used, I'd be fully in favor of "licensing" voters.

ransom1538 · 5 years ago

"We should pay people to vote"

Reminds of me of 3rd grade when kids would make a christmas tree out of their scantron tests. That is what we need -- randomness added to voting.

tyre · 5 years ago

I am under no delusions about what I mentioned as panaceas.

But in terms of direct action that democrats could pass in the first week (the bills exist already), those are my picks.

Gerrymandering would take a constitutional amendment. Yes, it would help more, but that’s a moot point if the people we’re talking about can’t do it.

AlanSE · 5 years ago

The whole electoral college is non-intentional gerrymandering. The candidate with fewer votes has been winning since 2000, and winning with a wider and wider vote margin. A major political goal should be getting the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact done.

tyre · 5 years ago

That would take a constitutional amendment.

The top three amendments (in my opinion) that the US needs most:

- ending gerrymandering

- taking money out of politics (federally financed elections)

- forcing votes on nominees within a certain time period, otherwise they are assumed confirmed

bscphil · 5 years ago

I don't think you need anything that conspiratorial, it's not that centrist Democrats really don't want to get anything done, it's just that they really are basically okay with the current neoliberal consensus.

pm90 · 5 years ago

This kind of thinking assumes that the ruling party can unilaterally make policy changes, which is not possible in the American system currently (e.g. fillibuster).

w.r.t Sanders: he lost in a small d democratic primary. It wasn't the leadership: it was the voters that chose Biden over Sanders.

ALittleLight · 5 years ago

You have to have the cooperation of the Senate I meant. Obviously, in cases where a President of one party has a nominee appointed by a Senate of another, the cooperation of the Senate was there.

8note · 5 years ago

Looking earlier than the 60s or so seems irrelevant for comparing the republicans and democrats

cmurf · 5 years ago

They did. Reid's cloture vote to end the filibuster applied to federal judges, not Supreme Court justices. Before the vote on Kavanaugh there was a cloture vote to end the filibuster.

chkaloon · 5 years ago

The useful thing about seeing 'Democrat' in a comment is that it is immediately obvious which way their bias leans.

nostromo · 5 years ago

In this case I don't see why it needs to be an adjective.

By analogy, you'll more often hear "Texas senator Mr Bean" (using the singular noun) vs "Texan senator Mr Bean" (using the adjective).

In any case, it's not something anyone should get worked up over.

JohnTHaller · 5 years ago

"Democrat" is a Trump-speak signifier and chosen on purpose.

chris11 · 5 years ago

Joe Lieberman killed the public option in Obamacare. He threatened to vote against the bill if a public option was included.

nerdponx · 5 years ago

It's getting hard not to believe that it's mostly a front.

refurb · 5 years ago

Oh, the old "the reason my party can't get anything done is because they are too principled".

malandrew · 5 years ago

The only people I've seen principled is Justin Amash, Rand Paul, Ron Paul and Ben Sasse. Beyond those few, everyone else is pretty much playing power games.

Very very few people in Congress do anything but vote along party lines on pretty much everything.

I don't know how you can democrats are principled to a fault with a straight face when you have Nancy Pelosi who is just the Democrat's McConnell.

anm89 · 5 years ago

I'm not a Bernie supporter. Just pointing out that the party repeatedly screws itself over.

Also just because a person loses a primary does not mean they are they weaker candidate in the general election. The math can easily go the other way.

tyre · 5 years ago

Filibuster was abolished for SCOTUS nominations.

There was nothing procedurally that Democrats could have done to stop Kavanaugh. If there were, they would have.

They cannot stop this nomination by traditional means.

wyldfire · 5 years ago

Trump will leverage his lame duck session to contest the loss in the courts.

gorbachev15 · 5 years ago

SCOTUS is already clearly partisan if the newly departed justice's final wish is for a different president to appoint her replacement. Playing politics up until the end.

redler · 5 years ago

If Democrats gain power, nothing changes unless they frame their opportunity as "what would Mitch do?"

pm90 · 5 years ago

Not if you give statehood to DC (and PR if they vote for it).

ncallaway · 5 years ago

I strongly agree with your desires, but I've also been sucked into the D vs R world lately. While I've always been politically left, I despise the 2 party system.

I'm of the opinion that a first past the post and winner take all voting system will almost always produce a 2 party outcome. As such, until we change the voting system I've decided to stop considering myself independent and throw in with the party most closely aligned with my views.

I don't think your imagined future is impossible, though! I just think it's heavily discouraged by our voting system. We can change our voting systems, though. I'd really strongly encourage you to check out and support Ranked Choice Voting (or other proposed voting systems). I don't think it's a silver bullet, but I think RCV would go a long way to breaking down the 2 party system

pm90 · 5 years ago

People do vote for these things, but if you split voters is a particular way you can ensure that the minority hold on to power (Gerrymandering and the Electoral College).

8note · 5 years ago

Is it relevant what people do vote for?

Getting the most votes isn't what translates to forming a government in the US. The big things are: having your family members run state governments, setting district lines, and setting up laws to prevent people that disagree with you from voting. Not to mention just having a lot of money to bribe already elected politicians.

manquer · 5 years ago

Perhaps not, however democrats should not complain when they set precedent knowing full well they will end up regretting it later.

refurb · 5 years ago

OF course not. It's just ironic the Democrats themselves eliminated a rule that could have helped them now.

athms · 5 years ago

Stacking is a bad idea, but the GOP would do it if they controlled both chambers of Congress and the White House. The GOP of the 1940s is not the GOP today. That political party is gone off the rails. The last time they were fiscally responsible, Eisenhower was in the White House.

The Supreme Court does need to be expanded though. It hears half the cases it did fifty years ago. While they are at it, split the Ninth Circuit. Give California its own circuit since the majority cases originate from that state.