US Senate must do their Constitutional job - vote on Judge Merrick Garland

"...Former colleagues also recalled that Mr. Garland insisted on doing the (Oklahoma) investigation by the book, like obtaining subpoenas even when phone and truck rental companies volunteered to simply hand over evidence, to avoid any future trial problems. He also made sure there was a prosecutor responsible for keeping victims and relatives informed about the case as it developed."- The Atlantic

Attorney Stephen Jones supports qualifications of Judge Garland to serve on the US Supreme Court - quoted in The Atlantic

Certainly, it makes no sense for Republican US Senators to rudely ignore the nomination of qualified Supreme Court nominee Judge Merrick Garland, when many of them meet with all sorts of other controversial people.  Somehow, Senator Mitch McConnell has lost his political way by leaping to the untenable conclusion that the American people must chime in on who the next Supreme Court justice should be, when the Constitution is clear about the issue in Article II Section II. 

Obviously, Senator McConnell, in defying the Constitution, by refusing to "advise and consent" the nomination of Judge Merrick made by President Obama, is putting himself above the law.

Judge Merrick is an American citizen who deserves the opportunity to meet with anybody in the US Senate. For example, if Judge Merrick wanted to meet Senator McConnell, for the purpose of discussing any issue related to the tragic Oklahoma domestic terrorism bombing on April 19, 1995, how would he be received? Obviously, the Oklahoma Republicans Senator Inofe and Senator Lankford would have something to say about such a meeting.

How Did the Oklahoma City Bombing Shape Merrick Garland?

President Obama’s new Supreme Court nominee called his work on the case “the most important thing I have ever done in my life.”

The Atlantic Reports

In announcing his nomination of Judge Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court on Wednesday, President Obama made special mention of Garland’s work in the wake of the Oklahoma City bombing.

“In the aftermath of that act of terror, when 168 people, many of them small children, were murdered, Merrick had one evening to say goodbye to his own young daughters before he boarded a plane to Oklahoma City,” Obama said. “And he would remain there for weeks. He worked side-by-side with first responders, rescue workers, local and federal law enforcement. He led the investigation and supervised the prosecution that brought Timothy McVeigh to justice. But perhaps most important is the way he did it. Throughout the process, Merrick took pains to do everything by the book.”

As the president noted, Garland has called his work there “the most important thing I have ever done in my life.”

The April 19, 1995, bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City killed 168 people, including 19 children. It was the deadliest terrorist attack on American soil until September 11. Timothy McVeigh was ultimately convicted of the bombing and executed in 2001. Terry Nichols was sentenced to life in prison without parole. A third man, Michael Fortier, testified against McVeigh and received a 12-year sentence for failing to warn the government about the planned attack.

What was Garland’s role in the case, how did it affect him, and does it offer any window into how a Justice Garland might approach the law?

At the time, Garland was principal associate deputy attorney general, a top aide to Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick. 

When the bombing happened, Janet Reno’s Justice Department quickly took command of the case, sending Garland and Gorelick to Oklahoma, as Obama noted Wednesday. Garland was on the ground on April 21, two days after the bombing. “He not only volunteered,” Gorelick told The New York Times in 2010, “he basically said, ‘You need to let me go.’” 

But Garland’s direct work on the case was short-lived. Later that spring, he was promoted to lead the Justice Department’s criminal division and returned to Washington, replaced as lead prosecutor by Joseph Hartzler, but retaining a supervisory role from D.C. According to the Times, Gorelick rejected Garland’s request to directly try the case. Hartzler told Savage that Garland had not micromanaged him.

“I used him as a sounding board,” he said. “He didn’t tell me what to do, and he never made me feel as though I needed to consult him before making a decision. But I often consulted him because he gave such good advice.”

Stephen Jones was the lead lawyer for McVeigh in the case. When I reached Jones on Wednesday, the first thing he told me was that he was “a partisan Republican. I’ve been a Republican since I was 12 years old.” (Jones was the GOP nominee for Senate in Oklahoma in 1990, but lost.) Then he proceeded to praise his former opposing counsel at length.

“I agreed with everything the president said about Judge Garland,” Jones said, adding that he was encouraging the Sooner State’s two Republican senators to back Garland. “Personally he’s above reproach. He has integrity. He has the skills.”

He remembered Garland as a responsive, humble, and meticulous prosecutor in the Oklahoma City case. “He certainly returned every phone call,” Jones said. “If he said he was going to get back in touch that afternoon, you could rest assured that by 5 o’clock he did that.” He said Garland would dial Jones directly and gave him his cell phone, rather than working through secretaries—a level of courtesy to be hoped for but not always met in officials at his level.

Although The Atlantic article is an in depth analysis of how Judge Garland performed in the Oklahoma bombing prosecution, the personal testimony of attorney Stephen Jones pretty much sums it all up......in fact, the US Senate must now interview Judge Garland in compliance with their jobs defined in the Constitution....and vote! Otherwise, for the Senate to neglect their Constitutional duty, as Senator McConnell has decided, is irresponsibile and, in my unofficial mind, even illegal.

Keystone pipeline - where's the return on investment?

Mitch McConnell, the new Senate majority leader, says he wants to use a bipartisan bill that approves the Keystone pipeline to prove the Senate can be a chamber of open debate. In other words, Senator McConnell would rather make a political power statement than evaluate the long term impact of the Keystone Pipeline.

Senator McConnell's ability to lead will be tested in this debate. Nevertheless, the imminent Presidential veto of the Keystone has cast a "wasting time" shadow on any effort to establish "who's in charge" in the Senate. Let's put it this way, the Keystone pipeline from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico isn't going through Senator McConnell's Kentucky back yard, so he has nothing at stake if the bill passes with bipartisan support.  "It's not in his back yard."

Americans who live in the path of the proposed pipeline, that proposes to bring Canadian oil to the Gulf, would likely appreciate seeing a risk versus benefit analysis of the project.

In other words, what's the return on putting their "back yards" at risk for environmental pollution or unforeseen hazards when the pipeline needs maintenance?

I suspect the long term return on investment with this Keystone pipeline will diminish over time. Obviously, the pipeline will be an environmental albatross when it becomes outdated, no longer needed or just not efficient anymore.  

Senator McConnell wants to create a leadership style or win a political power struggle with the Keystone vote. I

McConnell is obviously not looking out for the long term public interest.

Whether or not the Keystone Pipeline will have any long term benefit to the American economy, the fact is, the vote for or against it should be based on a risk versus benefit debate. 

A leadership statement made based on this important Keystone debate is no way for a Senatorial leader create a legacy.  

If the risks of the pipeline outweigh the benefits, the Keystone Pipeline should never be approved. Rather than create a leadership style by raising a vote on the Keystone Pipeline, Senator McConnell should, instead, explain how the project will create long term and lasting benefits to the American economy. 

Perhaps Senator McConnell should stand in the back yard of the property where the Keystone Pipeline is supposed to travel, before he demonstrates how he can pass a bill that he won't be able to, ever, recall.

Shakespeare in the Senate? A Reality Drama

Shakespeare- "Gregory, o' my word, we'll not carry coals."

 It's a familiar scene in Shakespeare's plays, the side scene where principal characters conspire about whatever's going on in the plot. "Gregory, o'my word, we'll not carry coals" (Romeo and Juliet Act 1 Scene 1) in Shakespeare speak means "listen here, we aren't taking this anymore, no more guff~!"

In the US Congress, it was a reality scene today when Republican Senator Mitch McConnell and Republican Senator Rand Paul (both R-Kentucky) were caught off microphone speaking about the political version of "carrying coals". McConnell and Paul were caught in a Shakespearean moment, conversing like conspirators, about their entrenched right wing position to keep the federal government in a preventable shut down. They aren't going to budge in their selfish and harmful positions.

These two Republican Senators collaborated, while being heard in a "hot mic" discussion, meaning they didn't know they could be heard. They whispered loudly enough for the microphone to hear them discuss "poll testing" certain key phrases to "win" the argument about how to keep government closed, regardless of the harm this recalcitrant position causes to our government and citizens.
If only the scene were Shakespearean, because we the audience would not be fearful of the story's ending.


Huffington Post reports Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) were caught on a hot mic Wednesday discussing talking-points for the shutdown. This is what they said: "I just did CNN (an interview) and I just go over and over again 'We're willing to compromise. We're willing to negotiate.' I think... I don't think they poll tested we won't negotiate. I think it's awful for [Democrats] to say that over and over again," Paul said.

McConnell responded: "Yeah, I do too and I, and I just came back from that two hour meeting with them and that, and that was basically the same view privately as it was publicly," McConnell agreed.

Paul added, "I think if we keep saying, 'We wanted to defund it. We fought for that and that we're willing to compromise on this', I think they can't, we're gonna, I think... well, I know we don't want to be here, but we're gonna win this, I think."

Isn't it disgusting for our Senate leaders to play with America like they're evil characters in a Shakespearean drama? They simply don't understand how Democracy works. Their GOP 2012 candidate Mitt Romney lost the Presidential election. Now the spiteful Tea Party is holding Americans hostage by forcing a government shut down, as a result. Republicans were unable to force their right wing agenda on voters, who didn't support them in 2012, so they want to take over government, rather than wait their turn to present a winning candidate of their own in the next Presidential election. In fact, Republicans have a 2016 winning candidate in Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey, but he's not right wing enough for the Tea Party so they don't give him the political time of day, so to speak.

Standing on the stage of public opinion while getting caught on the hot mic is a despicable way to affirm what Americans already know.  We know how Republicans don't care about democracy and they don't care about the American people. In their Shakespearean moment, their right wing leadership was caught on hot mic scheming about "poll testing" catchy phrases, rather than creating a strategy to get Americans back to work. This conspiracy to undermine the government because Tea Party extremists don't happen to like the Obamacare health care reform law is equivalent to sedition. In some non-democratic countries they'd be ousted in a no-confidence vote. Some countries would even expel them.

In a Democracy, the people voted for the health care reform law, it was upheld as Constitutional by the US Supreme Court and President Obama won re-election by supporting his signature legislation.

There is no compromising about the Obamacare law.

Senator Paul Rand has not "poll tested" the phrase "Obamacare is the law" or, if he has, it's a concept he doesn't want to defend. That's because Obamacare is law, just like the Second Amendment is law. Yet, Paul knows there's no way Democrats will hold government hostage to force a repeal of the gun rights of Americans.

Democrats must use this apologist argument more effectively. They need to remind Americans how we got in this shut down situation. Republicans are demanding a repeal of the Obamacare law. It's a law. Republicans are using the phrase "Obamacare" like it's profanity while Democrats appear to be defensive. Meanwhile, uninsured people by the millions are seeking coverage under the newly formed insurance exchanges, because they're finding insurance they can finally afford to buy.

Shakespeare's dramatic plays often ended tragically.  Americans can only take so much of this preventable budget drama before we finally remove all lawmakers in a "United States Spring". But if the government fails us with these obsessive right wing tactics, we may be unable to wait until an election to replace these third rate political actors. The entire Congress should be recalled for incompetence unless they obey the law, pass a budget, fund Obamacare and pay America's bills by lifting the debt ceiling. To do otherwise is an unpredictable reality we don't want to consider.

Americans certainly won't carry coals much longer.