For those liberals who say he's not liberal enough:
1. Even so, remember he is replacing Antonin Scalia. I've heard Garland described as being like David Souter. Replacing Scalia with Souter is something I'll take any day of the week and twice on Sunday's.
2. In any case there is a wide belief that he is a sacrificial lamb. As Garland will not be confirmed, it actually saves pick liberals are more enthused about like Sri Srinivasan.
3. He really seems like a nice guy. It was touching the way he fought tears when he was up with Obama being introduced.
4. In a way this is like the 2011 Grand Bargain where the GOP gets a pretty good offer and ends up punching itself out. Obama has now learnt to let them punch themselves out.
I mean the GOP should have taken what Obama was offering in 2011. Chained CPI, raising the Medicare retirement age and only ending the Bush tax cuts for those who make over $1 million per year.
They ended up with:
1. No Chained CPI
2. No raise in the retirement age
3. The end of the Bush tax cuts for everyone who makes over $400,000 a year. As Homer would say 'Doh!'
The reason the GOP doesn't want to do this is because of my point above: it basically means they are trading Antonin Scalia for David Souter. They're hoping they win back the White House in November.
But in a year where Donald Trump is the most likely nominee shouldn't that chance the calculus for them? What are the chances of them winning with Trump on top of the ticket? Not so good.
His odds of wining are only about 20 percent-in a normal year with a normal candidate, GOP odds would be about 50 percent. Meanwhile Hillary's chances are almost 80 percent against Trump.
https://electionbettingodds.com/week.html
And Trump is also directly hurting their ability to pick Scalia's replacement as he is likely to hurt some down ballot Republicans.
But then, even their anti Garland strategy is hurting some down ballot Republicans in swing states,
"As we've noted, endangered Senate Republicans, especially in the northern tier of the country from Wisconsin over to New Hampshire, are the Achilles Heel of the GOP 'three nos' SCOTUS blockade strategy. Now Sen. Mark Kirk (R-IL), facing a tough reelection battle, has gone from dissenting from the McConnell strategy to going on the attack against his own colleagues, telling a local radio station Friday that GOP senators need to "just man up and cast a vote."
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/the-achilles-heel
This is also why John Kasich is saying 'he'd consider' nominating Garland.
However, this exactly plays out, then we know how this ends: with the GOP punching itself out.
For an example of what that looks like see Chuck Grassley comparing Garland to a foreign dictator.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/grassley-compares-garland-to-foreign-dictator
1. Even so, remember he is replacing Antonin Scalia. I've heard Garland described as being like David Souter. Replacing Scalia with Souter is something I'll take any day of the week and twice on Sunday's.
2. In any case there is a wide belief that he is a sacrificial lamb. As Garland will not be confirmed, it actually saves pick liberals are more enthused about like Sri Srinivasan.
3. He really seems like a nice guy. It was touching the way he fought tears when he was up with Obama being introduced.
4. In a way this is like the 2011 Grand Bargain where the GOP gets a pretty good offer and ends up punching itself out. Obama has now learnt to let them punch themselves out.
I mean the GOP should have taken what Obama was offering in 2011. Chained CPI, raising the Medicare retirement age and only ending the Bush tax cuts for those who make over $1 million per year.
They ended up with:
1. No Chained CPI
2. No raise in the retirement age
3. The end of the Bush tax cuts for everyone who makes over $400,000 a year. As Homer would say 'Doh!'
The reason the GOP doesn't want to do this is because of my point above: it basically means they are trading Antonin Scalia for David Souter. They're hoping they win back the White House in November.
But in a year where Donald Trump is the most likely nominee shouldn't that chance the calculus for them? What are the chances of them winning with Trump on top of the ticket? Not so good.
His odds of wining are only about 20 percent-in a normal year with a normal candidate, GOP odds would be about 50 percent. Meanwhile Hillary's chances are almost 80 percent against Trump.
https://electionbettingodds.com/week.html
And Trump is also directly hurting their ability to pick Scalia's replacement as he is likely to hurt some down ballot Republicans.
But then, even their anti Garland strategy is hurting some down ballot Republicans in swing states,
"As we've noted, endangered Senate Republicans, especially in the northern tier of the country from Wisconsin over to New Hampshire, are the Achilles Heel of the GOP 'three nos' SCOTUS blockade strategy. Now Sen. Mark Kirk (R-IL), facing a tough reelection battle, has gone from dissenting from the McConnell strategy to going on the attack against his own colleagues, telling a local radio station Friday that GOP senators need to "just man up and cast a vote."
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/the-achilles-heel
This is also why John Kasich is saying 'he'd consider' nominating Garland.
However, this exactly plays out, then we know how this ends: with the GOP punching itself out.
For an example of what that looks like see Chuck Grassley comparing Garland to a foreign dictator.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/grassley-compares-garland-to-foreign-dictator
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