Power Begets Power

I was raised in a very conservative family, in a very conservative town. I grew up listening to how the Republicans were the adults. The party of principles. The law and order party. My parents would say that the older I got, the more conservative I would become. Time, however, has shown that the older I get, the more I despise the Republican party.

When House Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell said that he wouldn’t even consider President Obama’s nominee (who most agreed was a great selection) because it was less than a year from the election, his position was that the people should have a voice. Sure, he had some extra bullshit about how no one had ever been nominated in a similar situation, which was of course false. But I could kind of understand where he was coming from, even if I disagreed.

Now the tables have turned, and McConnell has shown his true priorities. Power. He doesn’t care about the will of the people. He doesn’t care about the rule of law. He doesn’t care about principles. He cares about power. Plain and simple. He supports Trump because it has helped solidify the power of the Republican party.

Back in 2016, Senator Lindsay Graham said that if the a justice was nominated in 2020 under Trump, he wouldn’t support it. He said we could use his words against him. He had principles. He didn’t want to be accused of perpetuating a double standard. Until Trump said he’d nominate a justice in 2020 to fill the seat vacated after Judge Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s death. Now, all of a sudden, he does plan on voting for the justice.

Like, if the Senate even simply had a vote on potential Justice Merrick Garland, and voted against him, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. The Constitution states that it’s the job of the current president to nominate a supreme court judge. It’s the senate’s job to give it’s consent. Checks and balances. What bothers me isn’t so much who is on the Supreme Court, it’s how they got there. It’s the blatant hypocrisy. Either the president gets to nominate a judge or they don’t. It doesn’t matter if the president is from one party or the other. It doesn’t matter if the president is in their first year, or eighth. It doesn’t matter if the Senate is mostly Democrat or Republican.

It’s either their job, or it isn’t.

Trump claimed he wanted to drain the swamp. I completely agree. The swamp starts with McConnell. Vile little reptile with malice instead of a spine, and a heart consumed by a lust for absolute control. Trump’s a moron. His horrible ideas are caused by incompetence and ego. McConnell is actual malevolence. He’s calculating. He has an agenda. That agenda does not rest with helping the people. It doesn’t even help the people of his own party. It only serves to help him and the party stay in power.

Here’s the problem. As I’ve discussed, when it comes to the issues, the population of this country is actually more left leaning that you’d expect. In a fair system, the GOP would be forced to either adapt to the changing opinions of the people, or simply die off. However, if you’re a ranking member in that party, and your career depends on it surviving, what can you do? First, you gerrymander the system so that even with fewer votes, your team stays in Congress. Next, you limit the ability of your opponents to vote. Lastly, you slowly move the checks and balances away from the Legislative branch over to the Judicial branch.

Who do we turn to if our government is misbehaving? The courts. Who is picking the judges in the courts? The president, with approval from congress. Who really decided the 2000 election? The court system. Not the people. Not even the electoral college.

As part of his 2016 argument, McConnell claimed that he wanted the people to decide on the President and Congress, and that would decide who should nominate the next Justice. Yet, of the current Supreme Court Justices, 5 (soon to be 6) of them were nominated by presidents who lost the popular vote. Those presidents, of course, were Republicans. So where is this “voice of the people” McConnell supposedly wants?

We now live in a system where Republicans change the borders of jurisdictions in order to ensure they have seats in Congress. Then they ensured that left leaning minority adults can’t vote. Then if a Republican candidate loses the popular vote, the electoral college protects them. And if you have a problem with it, just take it to the Supreme Court, who has been picked by… previous Republican candidates who lost the popular vote. All of this, because the majority of the people in this country are no longer completely Republican.

Before Trump, I used to say that I voted for candidates based on their policies and ideas, instead of party affiliation. But that only works when everyone is playing by the same rules. I used to roll my eyes at people who would only vote for their party. The Republican party is clearly unscrupulous from the top down. Sure, a handful of Republican Senators have said they’d not vote on the nominee. Oh joy. 1% of the party isn’t evil.

Sadly, the future of this country is at stake. I truly am a person with principles. I am a patriot. I can’t sit idly by while this Machiavellian manipulative monster desecrates the flag he claims to respect. So I’ll never vote for a Republican again. Not at the federal, state, or local level. Not if the candidate agrees with me on every issue. The current GOP has shown us through it’s actions and inaction that it is a thoroughly corrupt organization. The only way to beat them is at their own game. There’s no longer room for compromise. We have to vote for the future.

Oh, and side rant: What’s the point of all of this? McConnell is the Senate Majority Leader, yet refuses to pass any legislation. So what’s the point? He’s got the power, but doesn’t seem to do anything besides hold onto that power.