The Republicans Foolish Gamble.

Mitch McConnell has indicated that the now Republican controlled senate will not consider a nomination to fill the seat of the late Antonin Scalia on the supreme court until after the next presidential election. This is a high stakes and foolish gamble on the part of the Republican establishment.

First off this only pays off if a Republican wins the next presidential election, and that is far from certain. One needs to look at the groups Obama carried in the last election and try to imagine which of these will either show up in less strength at the polls or which groups will show up in greater strength for the Republicans. Probably the groups most in flux would be the white lower income group, they could be energized by a Trump or Cruz candidacy from either a independent minded or theological perspective, but the wild card there is Sanders. It is not unrealistic to imagine Sanders siphoning off that vote. While it may seem hard to believe given that Sanders bills himself as a Socialist he does have the highest approval rating of anyone serving in the senate, and Vermont does have significant conservative rural areas. Sanders does well in these areas because his constituents, family farmers for the most part, view him as someone who will fight for their interests against the powerful. He also has a strong resume for labor support, so the idea that he might take away some of the lower income white vote from Republicans is not unrealistic.

So there are two bad scenarios for Republicans here, one that Clinton wins and puts forward much the same type of centrist nominee that Obama would, or that Sanders wins and has coattails, the snowball rolling downhill of his campaign doesn’t stop and he wins the general election and also carries the senate. He then goes on to nominate somehow like Noam Chomsky for the supreme court.

This is not helped by the fact that the opening on the supreme court will not play to Republicans strengths. Their biggest issue going into the next election would definitely be national security, fear of terrorism is probably the over riding issue for their constituents, and stands to be their strongest argument against their rivals, especially if it is Sanders. On the other hand a majority of people now consider themselves pro choice, a majority of people are in favor of gun control, a majority of people are in favor of over turning citizens united, there are clearly more opportunities for Liberals to energize voters over possible decisions by the supreme court than conservatives.

That energizing of voters could carry over into multiple other races also, if you turn them out they stand a good chance of voting straight ticket.

On the other hand the Republicans could simply accept a centrist nominee from Obama and go with it. So what they are pursuing doesn’t seem like a very good gamble, and what Democrats need to remember is that no matter what no one will be more conservative than Scalia, they need to worry more about Ginsburg’s seat than Scalia’s.

 

 

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