Bob Woodward: Everyone will miss Scalia.
On CNN‘s State of the Union today (2/14/16), Washington Post associate editor Bob Woodward laid out the “potential minefield” posed by a liberal Supreme Court appointment to “everyone, including Hillary Clinton and the Obama White House.”
Because Scalia was a conservative, said Woodward,
the Democrats will say, “Gee, we’re going to put a fifth liberal on the Supreme Court.” The Republican nominee can go out and say, “We’re going to preserve the balance.”
This is a unique understanding of the term “balance,” meaning a court with a conservative majority. (Don’t get me started on the assumption that the other four are liberal….) Though framed as a GOP view, this was clearly embraced by Woodard, who explained how most undecideds and independents would view the appointment of anyone but a conservative as a “radical” move:
In the world now of real voters, I think it is the persuadable voter or the independent who’s likely, in a positive way, to respond to the idea that, “Yeah, let’s preserve the balance, let’s not do anything radical.”
Woodward closed the segment citing a 1970s Washington Star headline on the occasion of Justice William O. Douglas’ death, which he claimed said that everyone, “left, right and center, is going to miss Justice Douglas.” “I think it’s the same for Justice Scalia,” said Woodward.
Presenting the views of the power elite as those of the public, no matter how detached those views are from actual public sentiment and opinion, is what the national media are about. This largely explains why dullards and fantasists like Woodward thrive in it.
Steve Rendall is a FAIR contributing writer.
“[L]et’s not do anything radical”
Like ruling that corporations are persons
I don’t miss him.
Among his other horrible achievements, Scalia handed the American democracy over the the Koch brothers. And to call Bob Woodward a dullard and fantasist gives him too much credit. He’s a media hack who should have been fired years ago.
Fair is fair. I remember Woodward being all up in arms when GHW Bush appointed a radical conservative to replace Thurgood Marshall. He really spoke truth to power then, didn’t he?
Sad what the guy has become now that he has money and connections.
It’s sad how many people in the media or elected office have decided that their mission is to protect neoliberalism at any cost.
I consider myself left and I’m not at all gonna miss Scalia. On the contrary good riddance. Antonin, ye died 10 years too late.
i am very happy Scalia is off the court, lets let Obama nominate someone and let the chips fall against the gop.
In one way, he was right; I am going to miss Scalia in the same way I miss those blinding toothaches that result in the tooth being pulled, with great relief.
We all know the current crop of “Tea-bag” politicians will fight tooth and nail because the last thing they want is a really balanced court. It would be too upsetting to their Corporate lords who hold their Genitals in their pockets.
Obviously they also really believe that the uber-nuts they have running for President are going to win in the fall, since they were so fast to jump on the ‘let the next president’ pick. It would be delicious irony and all round ROTFLOAO collectively if we can get Bernie to win.
A number of articles have point out that if the Senate blocks all nominations now, it will turn out to be a lose-lose for them all the way around, particularly in the election year. Either way, this is a big game changer for a lot of decisions that need to have a stake put their heart and decorated in a necklace of garlic; Citizens United, Fredricks Vs Cal Teacher, Clean Air plan, to name a few.
Consider this, a vast majority of American voters think Citizens United was a wrong decision that has worsened our electoral,process. With the confirmation of a “liberal” judge, there may be the opportunity to reverse that decision without a constitutional amendment. Why would the American voters go for that?! That is what the Democratic Party needs to be pushing for.
PERFECT SOLUTION
(1) As we have a two-class war, with the upper-half of society owning all the wealth, always being the voting majority and most successful at enslaving the lower half by poverty, the perfect solution would be a law that guaranteed the lower-half the right to own a forth of the land and wealth.
(2) As all nine members of the Supreme Court represent the rich ruling class, the top forth of society that owns 75% of the wealth, the perfect solution would be to have four of the members picked from those who lived in mansions, four of the members picked from those who live in the slums and one member picked from a middle-class neighborhood.
(3) Half of those who run for public office should live in a laboring-class neighborhood, 40% should live in a middleclass neighborhood and 10% should live in a mansion.
The problem, of course, is that Obama is not liberal (and neither is Clinton) and they would never nominate liberals, only moderates. We live in a country of idiots and the Overton window has been pushed so far to the right it would make Hitler’s head spin. In this climate ANYONE nominated by a Democrat is painted as a liberal and anyone by a Republican, a conservative. In reality, Democrats appoint center-right justices and Republicans nominate extreme right justices.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/02/19/in-the-middle-of-an-electoral-revolution-scalia-leaves-the-plutocracy-one-seat-short-and-its-a-radical-seat/
Should be of interest to those following “citizens united”
The difference in the cognitive dissonance suffered by observers of Bob Woodward having been presented as a crusading journalist (played handsome by Robert Redford) and Barak Obama having been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize is that it took a few years to see through the poetic license of “All the President’s Men” while it took only days before the Nobel Laureate made Oslo blush.
Sometimes we see what we want to see.