All of a sudden President Obama wants Congress to work within the system? When did this start?
Immediately after Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia died, politicians on either side of the aisle began salivating over the future after his demise.
The Republicans in the United States Senate do not want to confirm President Obama's nominee to Supreme Court. There is no secret about this; Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said right away that he was not interested in holding hearings and that he believed the rest of the Senate majority agreed with him.
When asked if he would entertain a meeting with a prospective nominee, he was quoted in a Politico article as saying: "I don't know the purpose of such a visit. I would not be inclined to take one myself."
That was a month ago. We now have a nominee with a name, a face and a resume.
Merrick Garland is the chief judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit; President Bill Clinton appointed him in 1997. Judge Garland is every bit qualified to be a Supreme Court justice. He graduated from Harvard Law School magna cum lade, was a member of Harvard Law Review and clerked for Supreme Court Justice William Brennan Jr.
Judge Garland is definitely a compromise choice -- so much of a compromise that some in the liberal wing of the Democratic Party are calling his nomination a missed opportunity.
There's always the possibility that President Obama nominated Judge Garland expecting the Senate to shut down his nomination, or at the very least vote it down in hearings held just to help the GOP save face in an election year.
President Obama has taken this fight with the Senate Republicans head-on from the very beginning. In his speech nominating Judge Garland to the bench, President Obama said, "It is tempting to make this confirmation process simply an extension of our divided politics, the squabbling that's going on in the news every day." He continued: "But to go down that path would be wrong. It would be a betrayal of our best traditions and a betrayal of the vision of our founding documents. This is precisely the time when we should play it straight."
Remember, however, that President Obama has often used executive orders to get his way on hotly contested issues such as gun control and immigration. Democrats often point to the number of executive orders written by President Obama compared to his Republican counterparts; however, when it comes to executive orders, the difference really lies in the quality rather than the quantity.
President Obama decried executive orders at a town hall in 2007; when he was running for president, he said: "I taught the Constitution for 10 years, I believe in the Constitution and I will obey the Constitution of the United States. We are not going to use signing statements as a way of doing an end run around Congress."
So now the president wants Congress to either take action, after he's been taking the "end run" that he promised in 2007 he would not, or fail to act and look shady in the process.
If Judge Garland is a sacrificial lamb in this process, it's unfortunate. His resume and reputation are solid. He's the kind of candidate who after a proper vetting process could potentially make a very good Supreme Court justice.
President Obama said of him, "Over my seven years as president, in all my conversations with senators from both parties in which I asked their views on qualified Supreme Court nominees ... the one name that has come up repeatedly from Republicans and Democrats alike is Merrick Garland."
He's definitely the type of compromise candidate both parties could rally around -- which is starting to show. NBC News claims that 16 GOP senators now support holding hearings for the nominee. CNN polls show that two-thirds of those polled believe that hearings should be held for Judge Garland.
Regardless of what happens, this political gamesmanship is cause for considerable consternation on both sides. Let's not pretend one side is behaving better than the other in this fight. It's ugly politics, plain and simple.
If the Senate majority wants to use their power not to hold hearings and hold up this nomination, they should -- particularly after all of President Obama's political shenanigans over the years on the issues of immigration and gun control. In the end, the people will decide who is right at the ballot box.
Mike Dingman is a fifth-generation Alaska born an raised in Anchorage. He is a former UAA student body president and has worked, studied and volunteered in Alaska politics since the late '?90s. Email, michaeldingman@gmail.com.
The views expressed here are the writer's own and are not necessarily endorsed by Alaska Dispatch News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary@alaskadispatch.com. Send submissions shorter than 200 words to letters@alaskadispatch.com or click here to submit via any Web browser.