Ruth Bader Ginsburg

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      in US Politics

      Can the Democrats turn the tables on Trump in supreme court battle?

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      Hard numbers suggest that the fight over the nomination of the conservative Catholic judge Amy Coney Barrett to the US supreme court is over before it begins. The 53-47 Republican majority in the Senate is solidly in favour of Donald Trump’s preferred replacement for the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg – and according to the constitution, it is the Senate, not the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives, that decides. There appears to be little the Democrats can do. But is that true? Get out the votePolls show most voters believe Ginsburg’s replacement should be selected by whoever wins the White House, with independent (uncommitted) voters especially strongly opposed to a rushed process.A Washington Post-ABC News survey found a 58-37% split in favour of delay among all adults. If Republicans defy public opinion and push through a final vote before the 3 November election, Democrats may begin to pick up critical support in several tight Senate contests. In such a scenario, the GOP may delay the final Senate vote until after the election. And if, as seems likely, the election result is itself disputed (and goes to the supreme court for a ruling, as in 2000), politics will freeze – and almost anything could happen. Another worry for Trump: 64% of Democrat voters say the prospect of a reinforced conservative supreme court majority has made it “more important” that Joe Biden wins, as against 37% of Republicans who say the same for Trump. The president is already in trouble with non-religious white suburban women voters, many of whom view him as a misogynist hostile to women’s rights, such as abortion. By energising such opposition, the nomination could backfire on Trump. Change the rulesEven if Barrett’s nomination is confirmed, the Democrats may pursue a number of reforms, without reference to the Supreme Court, that could prevent the Republicans manipulating the electoral system (and thus judicial appointments) in future – and retroactively redress the court’s political balance. One such reform would be a strengthening of the 1965 Voting Rights Act to ensure universal registration and to stop partisan congressional redistricting and vote suppression practices that discourage voting by ethnic minorities in poorer, pro-Democrat areas. Another badly needed measure is an overhaul of the outdated voting system itself, for example to avoid future controversies over postal voting, currently being exploited by Trump. Big snag: in order to implement these and similar measures, the Democrats would need majorities in both houses of Congress, and control of the White House. But proponents say that if that outcome is achieved in November, there must be no hesitation. Democrats, they say, must learn to be as ruthless as their opponents. Move the goalpostsMore radical proposals under discussion include action by a Biden presidency to expand the supreme court bench from the current nine justices to 11, which could go some way towards mitigating the prospective 6-3 conservative majority (assuming Judge Barrett is confirmed). Even more dramatic is a proposal to grant statehood to the District of Columbia, which includes the city of Washington, and to the “unincorporated territory” of Puerto Rico. The disenfranchised African-American and Latino majority in Washington DC has long campaigned for statehood, viewing its denial as discriminatory. With 3.2 million inhabitants, Puerto Rico is more populous than 20 mostly Republican-voting rural states. If both acquired statehood, the 100-seat Senate would gain four, most likely Democrat senators. More

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      'Vote him out': Trump booed while paying respects to Ruth Bader Ginsburg – video

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      Donald Trump was loudly booed by crowds as he visited the supreme court to pay his respects to Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the late justice and liberal icon who died last week aged 87.
      As the president and the first lady paused at Ginsburg’s casket, the crowd yelled: ‘Vote him out!’  Ginsburg is the first woman in history to lie in state in the US Capitol 
      Ruth Bader Ginsburg in her own words – video obituary
      ‘She was what America should be’: mourners bid farewell to Ruth Bader Ginsburg

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      The US supreme court has become a threat to democracy. Here's how we fix it | Sabeel Rahman

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      Just a few days after Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s passing, Donald Trump and Senate Republicans are moving quickly to appoint and confirm a replacement. A growing number of moderates, such as Eric Holder, are warning that should Republicans ram through an appointment, this fact, plus the deliberate blockade of Barack Obama’s appointment of Merrick Garland in 2016, would justify a new Democratic administration and Congress to add seats to the supreme court to restore balance.With voting already under way in the 2020 election, a rushed appointment and confirmation in this moment would be a clear partisan power play, and further collapse the legitimacy of the supreme court. But more broadly, the firestorm over Justice Ginsburg’s replacement is a reminder of how the modern supreme court has too much power in the first place. It is critical that our democracy reform agenda also consider how to reform the judiciary.Courts have too much power to radically remake our social and economic lifeFirst, courts have too much power to radically remake our social and economic life. If this latest Trump appointment goes through, the resulting 6-3 far-right majority on the supreme court would have the power and opportunity next month to invalidate the Affordable Care Act (in the middle of a deadly pandemic). They would be positioned to further gut voting rights, reproductive rights and rollback anti-discrimination protections for LGBTQ+ and Black and brown Americans, while further shielding police departments and immigration officials from accountability for racist state-sponsored violence against people of color. While courts have at times also ruled in more progressive directions to advance rights and equity, on balance this concentration of power without sufficient accountability is a threat to democracy – and to the ability of our communities to thrive.Second, courts today are a threat to democracy because of how they have been weaponized to skew political power and insulate extreme conservative coalitions from democratic accountability. Over the last decade, conservative jurists and their aligned partisans in the states and the Congress have combined to radically shift the terms of political power in the country towards corporations and away from working class communities and Black and brown communities in particular. More

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      in World Politics

      Justice Ginsburg Secures Progressives for Biden

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      Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has died and the political seas have changed. She was a beacon of American conscience in a nation that has no conscience to spare. For those of us in America who see a nation in steep decline, this loss further deepens the gap between hope and reality. Most importantly, Justice Ginsburg’s death puts the last of the nation’s three core constitutional institutions at deep peril. The Congress is already a dysfunctional failed deliberative body, and the executive has been overwhelmed by corruption and incompetence.

      This doesn’t leave much to fall back on. Progressives will allow for a moment of silence to celebrate Ginsburg’s life. And then, it will be time for her death to propel our determination that Trump be deposed and his acolytes dethroned. We will need to get even angrier than we have been and more committed to the singular objective of winning the presidency.

      What the Death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg Means for America’s Political Future

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      Many progressives surely wish that these were different times. Then, we could focus on social and racial justice, on a national plan to confront the coronavirus pandemic, on universal access to meaningful health care, on economic equity, on affordable housing, on quality public education and on reimagining good governance. But we cannot do that now.  Now, we have to do everything that we can to get Joe Biden elected president.

      On the plus side, there continues to be a somewhat encouraging sense in America that maybe, just maybe, all the lies, all the ignorance and incompetence, all the corruption and all the chaos are finally catching up with the demonstrably worst American president in modern times. And that is saying a lot given that George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon would be the competition. So with that said, and only Biden to choose from, staying focused on the singular goal will be easier.

      The Inspirational Candidate?

      To reach that goal, it would be nice to be able to say that Biden is an inspirational candidate who can will the nation to a better place, can open the eyes of the willfully blind, and define an agenda of transformational change. But he is not that candidate. Rather he is a candidate who can win the presidency, surround himself with honest and committed advisers, and begin the long and difficult trek toward undoing the Trump damage.

      For me and many others, being the only serious candidate not named Trump is enough to ensure my vote and to ensure that I will do what I can to get him elected. For others, however, it may be important that Biden be for something, not just against Trump.

      As Biden tries to define his agenda and demonstrate his policy priorities, he will have to do so carefully. The effort may win over some wavering or undecided voters, particularly if he focuses on health care issues and articulating an understanding of the intractable racial morass that is today’s America. Appealing to a tired nation with calm and a resolve to simply make things better could help as well.

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      However, there is peril for Biden in detailing much of anything beyond broad general policy themes. This peril lies primarily on his left. For the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, too much “visionary” detail of a future beyond November 3 can provide more insight than may be healthy for Biden’s campaign. For now, since it remains critical that “all the roads of our discontent must merge at this time to meet the singular threat” of a Trump reelection, progressives can and likely will stay focused on this prize alone.

      Yet, as Biden begins to define the policy goals of his future administration, the details as they are emerging crushingly disappoint. The goals are so connected to yesterday that it is hard to envision a better tomorrow. It will be easier, for sure, to live without the daily lies and the pernicious undermining of the nation’s institutions, but it will be no easier for those in need to live with a return to “normal.”

      To provide early solace, Biden and his administration will surely strive to return some measure of good governance to federal institutions, a key metric if there is ever to be the transformational change that America’s outdated and tired “democracy” so critically needs. However, it will all seem so incremental, especially to those in need now who have waited so long and to those who have spent a lifetime advocating for those in need.

      Final Tribute for RBG

      This is where Justice Ginsburg as that beacon of conscience can enter the fray anew. She never gave up on her extraordinary drive to simply right things that were wrong. She is gone, but her zeal has to live on in enough of us to get this election right and then move on to the hard challenges that lie ahead. As I have moved from sadness to resolve, I have looked at a lot of what Ginsburg had to tell us. There is something about the following quotation that seems worthy of the moment: “Yet what greater defeat could we suffer than to come to resemble the forces we oppose in their disrespect for human dignity?”

      Maybe it is respect for human dignity that so separates Biden from Trump, Democrats from Republicans, and progressives from conservatives. Look at the quotation again, and then reflect on the sickened and dying in our communities in the midst of a crippling pandemic. And then take as a clarion call that Trump, the Republicans and the conservatives in those same communities are fighting to deny access to healthcare to millions yesterday, today, and tomorrow. That is depraved. That is inhumane.

      If Joe Biden does not win the presidency, those with a palpable disrespect for human dignity will surely further stain America. If Biden is victorious, there will be a renewed urgency for progressives to step to the fore to stress that any new administration must commit to a respect for human dignity as the core principle required to elevate America to be so much better than it is. If Justice Ginsburg knew this, maybe the rest of us can learn it, some for the first time.

      We must make that commitment for ourselves, for our nation and as a final tribute to the extraordinary Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

      *[This article was co-published on the author’s blog, Hard Left Turn.]

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More