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Alito, an empty chair, and Democratic cowardice [1]

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Date: 2024-05-30  

In many ways, Samuel Alito is a perfect encapsulation of today’s Republican Party:

A radically partisan, extreme, religious zealot who has also clearly demonstrated he is … ethically bankrupt; astoundingly arrogant and shameless; quite comfortable with lying; one who has contempt for the institutions he professes to care about, precedent, and the right to vote; Someone whose partisan bias would suggest an allegiance to this party’s self-proclaimed (albeit laughable) label of “personal responsibility” and yet who repeatedly throws how own love, dear Martha, under the bus at the very first opportunity; Oh, and also like a large swath of today’s GOP, a harborer of insurrectionist / coup supporting tendencies.



The problem, of course, is that he has a lifetime appointment to the highest court in our land, and in that role, is helping to dictate policy for the rest of us for years, likely a generation or more, to come.

In the wake of Alito’s latest outrage — his arrogant dismissal and rejection of the calls from the January 6 related cases — Senate Democrats need to get off your collective asses and act. Of course, this should have been done immediately after these flag stores first broke. (I still can’t believe The Washington Post had the initial story 3 years ago — and sat on it!!!). I have called for this in another piece here recently. But this is getting absurd. Sternly worded letters are an unfunny joke at this point, Senators Durbin and Whitehouse and Schumer — Alito, and Thomas and Roberts are mocking you at this ;point, and spitting at the notion of the Legislature being an equal branch of government.

You say you view this as potentially the worst ethical crisis in the Court’s history, and that the very legitimacy of the Court is at stake. Well then act like it for g-d’s sake. In addition to launching an investigation — ideally up to and including researching the idea of impeaching Alito, although that will of course never happen —

We talk of Trump’s laughably nonexistent Infrastructure week, or the House GOP’s recent push to highlight all kinds of nonsense on alleged overreach on various appliances.

How about you actually do something about this historic crisis and convene a week-long series of widely publicized hearings on the Court and its manifold crises of its own making:

Devote one full day to the corruption of Alito and another to that of Thomas. (If you must, combine those into one day.)

Devote another day to the real world implications of Dobbs and the impacts it has had on women across the country,

Devote a third day to the evisceration of the Voting Rights Act since 2013, and the real-world implications that has had.

Devote a fourth day to a real discussion of Court reforms — term limits, court expansion, other ideas

Close the week out with a 5th day on, I don’t know… you are Senators. Get creative. Surprise me.

So you apparently need GOP consent to issue subpoenas for Roberts or Alito or Thomas to testify, which of course, treasonous Trump asskisser — spineless Lindsey Graham — will never give. No problem. Invite each and all of them to attend.

When they inevitably refuse to do so, conduct the hearings with an empty chair for each and every one of them, with their name plates on full display. Panelists of experts / historians on the judicial ethics, appearance of. bias, flag and stop the steal experts, etc etc.

Turn them into empty chairs.

This is not rocket science. And will it substantively change anything in terms of getting Alito to recuse from any of these cases? Of course not.

But to do nothing but wait and hope and whine to the cameras without doing a damn thing beyond writing a couple of easily dismissed letters is political malpractice of the highest order, Not to mention a really disappointing display of weakness in the face of a historic threat,

And yes, a prime display of epic Senate Democratic cowardice.

DO SOMETHING.

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