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NY Times Editorial Board Emits Primal Scream Over Neil Gorsuch

NY Times Editorial Board Emits Primal Scream Over Neil Gorsuch

Still bitching and moaning over the “theft” of Merrick Garland’s Supreme Court seat.

For the Editorial Board of the NY Times, these are not the best of times, but the worst of times.

But more than anything, for the Times Editorial Board, it is the age of foolishness and the season of Darkness. [h/t Charles Dickens] Trump *literally* has driven them insane.

The Editorial blaming Sarah Palin for the Gabby Giffords shooting was pure emotion spewing forth, a guttural lashing out, a primal scream. It also was blatantly and knowingly false.

If the Editorial about Palin was infuriating, the Times has an Editorial about Neil Gorsuch that will bring a smile to you, from ear to ear. A smile, that is, if you enjoy watching the Times Editorial Board suffer.

On July 1, 2017, the Editorial Board lamented Trump’s greatest success to date, Justice Gorsuch Delivers:

Justice Gorsuch, who was confirmed less than three months ago, has already staked his claim as one of the most conservative members of the court.

So far, so good, but that’s not the primal scream. Here’s the primal scream (emphasis added):

… [H]owever many setbacks [Mitch McConnell] might suffer over health care reform or other parts of the Republican agenda, he knows he has already won the biggest fight of all: the theft of a Supreme Court seat from President Obama, the installation of Justice Neil Gorsuch and the preservation of the court’s conservative majority for years to come.

The problem isn’t so much Justice Gorsuch’s judicial ideology, which is so far unsurprising. Presidents choose justices who they believe will rule in a way that aligns with their own views, and right-wing groups had long ago flagged Justice Gorsuch as a reliable conservative. He would surely have been a top choice of many Republican presidents. The problem is that he’s sitting in the seat that by rights should be occupied by Judge Garland. Had Mr. Garland been confirmed, the court would have had a majority of Democratic-appointed justices for the first time in almost half a century….

Mr. Trump will be out of power by 2025 at the latest. But thanks to Mr. McConnell, Justice Gorsuch, and whoever else might join him in the next couple of years, will entrench a solid conservative majority on the court for far longer.

Let’s unpack that, or as progressive professors like to say, let’s deconstruct that.

Nothing was stolen from anyone. Republicans controlled the Senate. They had the power and the right to stall a nomination, just like Democrats had done in the past. Because Republicans controlled the Senate, they didn’t need to “filibuster” a Supreme Court nominee the way Democrats just tried with Gorsuch. Regardless of whether Garland was going to get a hearing or a vote, Democrats didn’t have the votes to get him confirmed. Because elections have consequences, and Republicans took back the Senate in the  2014 elections.

Jay Caruso at Redstate notes this disconnect in Times Editorial Board logic:

What’s particularly galling here is the language. It’s as if the Times editorial board gave way to interns from Daily Kos and Think Progress to write this column after the board signed off on it.

“Theft.” “Installation.”

Hold it right there, Jay. How do you know the Times didn’t “give way to interns from Daily Kos and Think Progress to write this column”? They are so short staffed at theTimes, staffers are walking picket lines chanting “no editors, no peace.”

Caruso continues:

They’re behaving as though Garland was confirmed, went to sit down and Mitch McConnell shouting, “Neener, neener!” pulled the chair back and pushed Neil Gorsuch into the seat. McConnell then cackled as Garland fell embarrassingly to the floor, left to sit there, broken and stunned with the “stolen” seat now occupied by the Gorsuch The Usurper….

It’s fair to argue Garland should have received at least a hearing. But the votes were not there, and President Obama knew this….

That’s how it works. Elections do have consequences, and President Obama nominated and had confirmed, two of his Supreme Court nominees. When his party lost control of the Senate in 2014, it came with the knowledge he’d have difficulty getting his agenda through the legislative branch. Following the death of Justice Scalia, Mitch McConnell made clear a fight over a Supreme Court justice was not going to take place in a presidential election year.

President Obama thought McConnell was bluffing. He was wrong.

Caruso put it more succinctly on Twitter: “It’s almost as of the Times editorial board doesn’t know how things work in the Senate.”

The Times Editorial Board certainly does know how the Senate works.

They just are very, very angry people right now. And primal screaming seems to be their preferred method of communication.

[Featured Image: Hon. Neil Gorsuch Investiture Ceremony]

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Comments

Pelosi Schmelosi | July 2, 2017 at 8:43 pm

I always like it when the retarded Left tells me what is and isn’t a “right”.

Let’s steal a couple more.

DieJustAsHappy | July 2, 2017 at 8:56 pm

Sounds like a vineyard full of sour grapes to me. Good for only one thing: whine.

    mailman in reply to DieJustAsHappy. | July 3, 2017 at 9:55 am

    Haahahahhahahhaa…that is good! 🙂

    notamemberofanyorganizedpolicital in reply to DieJustAsHappy. | July 3, 2017 at 3:07 pm

    President Trump doesn’t “serve” Whinos!

    This is pretty rich from the rag that was calling almost non-stop for Obama to establish a dictatorship (at least in 2012, when I accidentally clicked links to their editorials).

    Oh and so conveniently almost in the same breath recommending a Federal government bail out of the newspaper industry!

    A pox on them and all in their houses – editorially speaking!

It’s fair to argue Garland should have received at least a hearing. But the votes were not there, and President Obama knew this….

Which is why Obama appointed Garland—he know he wouldn’t be confirmed. If he thought his nominee would make it to the Court, he wouldn’t have wasted a spot on another white guy; he’d have nominated, maybe, a black lesbian, preferably one who didn’t speak English. But this way his defenders get to say in future that no, Obama didn’t just nominate grossly unqualified women to the SC, there was this white guy who wouldn’t have been too ridiculous, but those dastardly Repubs in the Senate blocked him … too bad …

I’m speculating, of course, but I think after eight years of his abuse we all can appreciate just how treacherous and vindictive O. and his little Democratic buddies really are.

“Primal scream” is too dignified.

I prefer the phrase “temper tantrum”.

Morning Sunshine | July 2, 2017 at 9:05 pm

the sound is music to my ears. Not tired of winning.

The tell-tale hearts beat ever louder and is a first-order forcing of catastrophic anthropogenic cognitive dissonance.

If a fake tree falls in a fake forest, does it make a sound?

Yes: but only in pages of trash like the ny times.

And btw, the NY Slimses Editorial Board certainly does know how the Senate works. They just don’t care.

Freedom means nothing to these Stalin-loving leftists. Only control does – and only if they are in control.

This was the top reason (in my mind) to vote for Trump. He made a promise to nominate a conservative and after the addition of Kagan, Sotomayor and the failure of Roberts to actually be conservative, it was essential that Scalia be replaced by someone of like mind.

rabid wombat | July 2, 2017 at 10:31 pm

Lets ask Biden….or the rule named after him!

Born again leftists.

But it is unlikely that Kennedy will remain on the court for the full four years of the Trump presidency. While he long ago hired his law clerks for the coming term, he has not done so for the following term (beginning Oct. 2018), and has let applicants for those positions know he is considering retirement.

http://www.npr.org/2017/07/01/535085491/justice-neil-gorsuch-votes-100-percent-of-the-time-with-most-conservative-collea

Gremlin1974 | July 3, 2017 at 12:51 am

“It’s fair to argue Garland should have received at least a hearing.”

This is the one thing that is 100% wrong in Jay’s article. No there is no argument to be had. No nominee has any right nor guarantee to a hearing, period. The Senate under control of the Republicans fulfilled their roll to advise and consent, not scheduling a hearing made their advice clear, the withheld their consent.

Here is what really happened. Obama knew good and well the tradition of last year presidents not appointing justices so he decided to make an issue out of it. He never cared in Garland was approved or whether or not he had a hearing. Obama knew what the reaction would be to Garland.

So he nominated Garland and then sat back and played the petulant mistreated child. He had more than enough time to nominate someone more acceptable to the Senate (and let’s be honest if he had the RINO’s in charge would have bent over a spread’em for him at their first opportunity, but instead he just let it set so it could be a campaign issue.

What he wasn’t expecting was someone other than Hillary to win.

As far as the “editorial” there was no “theft” that seat belongs to whomever the Senate gives consent, period.

There also was no “installation” Justice Gorsuch was nominated and approved by the Senate the in the legal professional manner.

As far as the rest of the article it is basically just the petulant, hand ringing, snot drenched whining that the left is so good at when they lose, and that is their whole point if you read the article they don’t actually care that Garland wasn’t approved they are just pissy because they didn’t get to make sure there was a liberal majority for the next 50 years.

this is likely in a series of preemptive editorials published before the Palin Libel Defamation lawsuit prevails and these idiots get fired.. or is the firings to remain solvent causing it..

JimMtnViewCaUSA | July 3, 2017 at 3:54 am

“the “theft” of Merrick Garland’s Supreme Court seat”

Is this like when Scott Brown “stole” Sen Ted Kennedy’s seat in the US Senate?
Who knew these things were privately owned!

From above:

…Presidents choose justices who they believe will rule in a way that aligns with their own views …

Eisenhower said of his appointment of Earl Warren to the Supreme Court as being the worst mistake he ever made. Ike chose Warren for his conservative politics, but once on the bench he became a liberal Chief Justice.

Actually there is a hypothesis that could explain this editorial’s strange claim. Rather than assume the NYT editors have gone literally insane, let me suggest what may be going on in their minds that makes them think the seat should rightfully be Garland’s.

It’s quite simple, really: Suppose they assume, for whatever reason, that had McConnell allowed Garland’s nomination to come to a vote he would have got enough Republican votes to be confirmed. In other words, suppose a majority of senators actually supported the nomination, and would have consented to it had they been given the chance. But the majority of the majority, by exercising its right to control the senate’s agenda, denied their colleagues that opportunity, and thus “stole” the seat.

Given that supposition, the editors’ claim doesn’t sound insane. The fault is not in their ability to reason from a premise, it’s merely in picking the wrong premise to reason from. Their supposition, if indeed I’m correct in divining it, is not known to be true, it’s not solidly derived from known facts, it’s just wild speculation, unfounded guesswork. Sure, it’s possible, but there’s no reason to suppose it to be true. Many things are possible, but most of them are not true. Congress could vote next week to ban the immigration of all Moslems; but I’m willing bet that it won’t. And I’m reasonably certain that had Garland come up for a vote he would not have been confirmed.

    tom swift in reply to Milhouse. | July 3, 2017 at 6:53 pm

    “Advice and consent of the Senate” doesn’t imply that a mob of individual Senators would do the required consenting. The Senate is a structure and set of procedures, not just an arbitrary assemblage of persons.

      Milhouse in reply to tom swift. | July 3, 2017 at 8:40 pm

      The senate is made up of individuals, and whenever a majority of senators want something but a minority, whether it’s the minority party or the leadership of the majority party, frustrates their will, it’s an act of piracy — a filibuster. It’s fair to call a seat obtained by such measures “stolen”. That’s not what happened in this case. It is what happened, for instance, when the Democrats prevented Miguel Estrada from joining the federal judiciary, and thus by now being “supremabile”, so to speak.

if only Hillary had won….merrick would be on SCOTUS…if only…
darn russians

Someone should tell those self righteous jerks that when Scalia was assassinated, something was stolen. It’s right that his replacement is a younger and hopefully even more conservative version of the same.

Next time, don’t try to get away with murder.

    Milhouse in reply to artichoke. | July 3, 2017 at 8:42 pm

    There is no more reason to suppose that Scalia was murdered than there is to suppose that Trump is in Putin’s pay.

      tom swift in reply to Milhouse. | July 3, 2017 at 9:03 pm

      I’d opine considerably more reason for one than the other.

      Not enough reason, but certainly more than none.

kenoshamarge | July 3, 2017 at 10:19 am

Does the NYT intend to whimper and whine it’s way through the Trump presidency? When it’s not attacking him with innuendo, rumors and anonymous sourced nonssense? Because I would think that even their loyal foolish readers would find it tiresome after a while.

Although some #NeverTrumpers, of whom I was one, are still whining about Cruz so…

The editorial cartoon in the July 3 edition of the San Jose Mercury News (sorry, it is behind a paid subsubscription firewall) shows a workman carrying a toolbox. The workman takes on the appearance of an elephant. A dialogue balloon has the elephant saying “My election toolkit.”

A large screw sticks up and out of the toolkit. The screw is labeled ‘voter suppression’ A sickle and hammer are arranged to depict the symbol of the former Soviet Union and is labeled ‘Russia.’

The jaws on a pair of tongue and groove pliers (aka Channel Lock) are spread wide open. The handles of the pliers are labeled ‘Gerrymandering’ and apppear as a long narrow gerrymandered district. With judicious use of bends in the gerrymandered handles, the pliers clearly form a Swastika.

Common Sense | July 3, 2017 at 2:04 pm

Thank You President Trump! 🙂

Just wait till the next vacancy. There will be many heads exploding across liberal TV!