By Bob Williams, Stevensville
Mitch McConnell wrongfully held 142 Federal Judgeship appointments away from President Obama, and gave them to President Trump.
SCOTUS Justice Scalia died in February, 2016. In March, 2016, President Obama nominated Merrick Garland as Supreme Court Justice. Senate Majority leader McConnell refused to allow a Senate vote on Obama SCOTUS nominee, Merrick Garland.
For lots of good reasons, a lot of people think the dominating political party stole that seat away from the people represented by the minority political party. Charles Koch, and his Americans for Prosperity(AFP) with organized chapters in 36 states, became well financed activists pushing Senators to vote to confirm Trump nominated Neil Gorsuch to replace long dead Justice Scalia.
In 2017, four months after SCOTUS Justice Kennedy kind of had to step down from the Supreme Court, President Trump nominated Brett Kavanaugh, the former law clerk of Justice Kennedy, to replace Kennedy on the Supreme Court. People watched the TV coverage of the September Senate Hearing. More watched the October Senate Hearing of testimony from Christine Blasey Ford, where Kavanaugh was implicated in a sexual assault on a 15 year old girl back when Kavanaugh was in high school. Charles Koch was backing Kavanaugh for SCOTUS and became publicly angry that Kavanaugh had not told Koch about the sexual assault history. Nevertheless, the usual sequence happened.
In stage one, the GOP Senate steps way back from vetting and recommending, and lets unknown members of the Federalist Society submit to the President a shortened list of people to consider in nominating a person to be a Justice on the Supreme Court.
Then comes stage two. Charles Koch, the Koch donor network, and Americans for Prosperity expend big money to get Senators to vote for SCOTUS nominees, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and now Amy Coney Barrett.
For lots of good reasons, a lot of people watched a lot of Kavanaugh. Evident to many, he lacks judicial temperament. And committed perjury to lie his way into a lifetime SCOTUS seat. All set up because an anonymous donor had earlier paid big money to help reduce Kavanaugh’s home mortgage and gambling debts.
Reportedly, Charles Koch spent into seven figures to drum up Senator support for Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh.
Here we are for the third time, watching this President who lost the popular vote, nominate a new Supreme Court Justice.
Four times before right now, a President who lost the popular vote got to nominate a new Supreme Court Justice.
Recently, Vegas odds, and FiveThirtyEight with Nate Silver, both said the Biden-Harris campaign has a 70% of winning this Presidential Election. There was one poll which shows that, even if Trump went up three percentage points over where he is now in all the states, he would lose the Electoral College vote by 20 votes. Certainly Trump will lose the swing states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania that he won by terribly thin margins. Now looks like Trump will lose Iowa. Evidently his campaign financiers have pulled back financial support. Tragically, the Trump campaign has not been well managed. AP reports that in polling results among likely voters, Biden receives ten percentage points more anticipated votes than does Trump.
Then came blockbuster news from the New York Times first report on President Trump’s decades of IRS tax filings. Evidently, in ten years between 2000 to 2015, Trump paid no IRS taxes. Paid $750 IRS tax in 2016, and $750 in 2017. Now we know what Donald Trump knows, he is personally responsible for some $421 million of debt payment due in 2022. National politicians with massive debt are easy prey for bad foreign actors and USA adversaries.
So, now comes the rest of the story. Charles Koch saw to it that his man Marc Short was in charge of legislative affairs during the first part of the Trump administration. Saw to it that Marc Short later became, and is, Chief of Staff for Vice President Pence. Charles Koch and his organizations AFP and ALEC have probably influenced the Montana Legislature far more than has any other person.
And right now, Charles Koch is working and spending big money to shoehorn his third person into a lifetime seat on the Supreme Court of the USA.
At the same time Charles Koch pushes the Koch libertarian end game of privatizing the US Post Office, and privatizing public land. At the same time Charles Koch nails the supposedly impossible to achieve libertarian end point goal. Diminishing Social Security coverage. Reportedly, some US employer classes, and the military, have stopped paying social security payroll taxes.
What will happen with Senators loyal to President Trump? Last week saw a surprising number of southern states increasing their likelihood of electing a Democratic Senator.
The 53-47 GOP Senate voting edge may thin, a vote or two. Could even go to 50 Senators voting Democratic, 50 Senators voting Republican. Who knows? After a debate or two, public pollsters may gauge sentiment that the Senate will flip to Democratic control. What happens then?
As fortune would have it, our Trump loyalist, Junior Senator, is apparently not disposed toward, or experienced in, working across the Senate aisle with members of the now minority party.
Much more importantly, he may not have built sufficient across-the-Senate-aisle relationships with which he could more effectively advocate for, and obtain benefits for, Montana.