Guess there really are limits to kingship.
Obama will not push through a Supreme Court appointment this week, will wait to nominate until Senate is in session -White House official
— Jeff Mason (@jeffmason1) February 14, 2016
Let me save everybody some valuable time: the answer will be ‘no.’ Can we move on now? Let us move on, now.
If Barack Obama makes a recess appointment of a Supreme Court justice – and he may be able to [UPDATE: Link fixed, sorry] – it will largely benefit just Barack Obama. The Democrats actually would like a real fight over this, because they don’t want the precedent set that both sides are permitted to be partisan over judges. So if Barack Obama short-circuits the entire looming fight, he is pretty much cutting off his own party’s partisans at the knees AND making them have to pretend that they really wanted this to happen, ya, you betcha. Meanwhile the GOP will of course come out of this in decent long-term shape; we probably have some bad decisions this year, sure, but we’ll get that seat opening up next year with a new President and we stuck to our guns. Not our fault that Barack Obama thinks that he’s a king.
So, yeah, Barack Obama will back-stab his fellow-Democrats. Who will then be forced to act as if this was a brilliant ploy. Not my optimal solution, but not the end of the world, either. [UPDATE: Or maybe he won’t,]
