ACB Hearings

[Alan]

Perhaps it's time to re-open the discussion on what exactly the definition of "packing the courts" is.

To me, "packing the courts" means creating new court positions in order to gain an ideological advantage, something the Biden camp has refused to discount. That is different from filling existing openings due to death or retirement.

It was interesting to see that there used to be an unspoken rule that federal judge nominees of a lame duck administration would not be confirmed by the Senate. It's a shame that the Democrats abandoned that during the last days of the Carter administration, opening the doors for the Republicans to do the same.

[LDAHL]

Redefining or creating terms to meet the needs of the moment will probably take a new direction when the Democrats get a bit more power, although Georgia may determine the practical extent of their creative wordsmithery. We will hear less about superprecedents and norm-breaking, and more about judicial reform and regulatory reinterpretation.

New language may be required to explain the need to grant statehood to Brooklyn or put an addition on the SCOTUS or prune back the overgrowth in the Bill of Rights.

Brace for a linguistic revolution, probably based on a hybrid of wonktalk and wokespeak.

[jp1]

If the end result is the same how is what the republicans are currently doing any different than an administration ignoring the political norm of nine supreme court justices?

[LDAHL]

Oh, I think both parties have a proud history of ignoring history when it suits their purposes. And both do well enough at disregarding the beam in their own eye when the situation calls for it. Politics has always been more about power than virtue-signaling. That’s why checks and balances (aka obstructionism) are so important.