Sucker Play: The Supreme Court Card
"Our country can survive the occasional infelicities and improprieties of Donald Trump. But it cannot survive losing the Supreme Court to liberals and allowing them to wreck our sacred republic. It would reshape the country for decades." -- Bill Bennett
How seriously should we take this prediction. Not at all.
How seriously should we take Bill Bennett? Even less.
Let's consider Bill Bennett. He was the Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy from March 13, 1989 -- December 13, 1990. He failed. The office should never have been created.
Before this, he was Secretary of Education from February 6, 1985 -- September 20, 1988. The office should never have been created. Reagan promised he would abolish it if he was elected -- another Reagan promise that was lost in the mists of patronage.
Before this, he was Chairperson of the National Endowment for the Humanities from December 24, 1981 -- February 6, 1985. The office should have been abolished. He was the neocons' choice over the truly great conservative intellectual and professor of English, M. E. Bradford. The New York Times reported this.
WASHINGTON, Nov. 13-- The Reagan Administration has decided against appointing a conservative political theorist from Texas to head the National Endowment for the Humanities. It has chosen instead the president of a scholarly research center in North Carolina.A high-ranking White House official said today that the new chairman would be William Bennett and that the appointment would probably be announced next week.
Mr. Bennett said when reached by telephone today that he was not aware that the decision had been made.
The same was true of the disappointed candidate, Prof. M.E. Bradford, an English professor at the University of Dallas, whose scholarly writings criticizing Lincoln aroused opposition from many Reagan supporters, especially those described as "neoconservatives."
Bennett later put his name on a compilation of old primary source documents, The Book of Virtues. It was published in 1996, a decade after he was Secretary of Education. He was not able to get anything changed in American education -- certainly not the addition of virtues. Federal money either drowns out or buys off virtues.
He made millions in book royalties for a bunch of documents. Sadly, he gambled away $8 million.
Bennett is cited as an authority in an article titled "Pascal's Wager -- Bet On Trump." When it comes to betting, be on the other side of the betting -- the house side.
THE SUPREME COURT CARD
Bennett is playing the Supreme Court card. Politically, it really is the conservatives' trump card. If we elect a Democrat, we are assured, the Supreme Court will be filled with leftists.
That depends on whether we elect a Democrat Senate. The Senate can block any appointment. Wikipedia reports:
A simple majority vote is required to confirm or to reject a nominee, but a successful filibuster threat could add the requirement of a supermajority of 60 needed in favor of cloture, which would allow debate to end and force a final vote on confirmation. Rejections are relatively uncommon; the Senate has explicitly rejected twelve Supreme Court nominees in its history.
So, Hillary needs at least 60 Democrats in the Senate to get any nominee onto the bench.
Second, the Supreme Court can decide only a few cases. We got ObamaCare because of Chief Justice Roberts, a conservative (hahahaha -- gotcha again, suckers!).
The action is not in the Supreme Court. The action is in the executive. Lawless bureaucrats called administrative law judges decide what the law is. They are hired by the executive agencies that are prosecuting someone. The administrative law judges serve as judges, juries, and executioners. This is taking place all over the West. It has been going on for over a century. It is the triumph of bureaucracy. The great legal historian Harold Berman's Introduction to Law and Revolution (1983) tells the story.
The betting sites in Great Britain say that the odds are three to one against Trump. I pay no attention to polls. I pay attention to betting sites, where people have money on the line.
So, let's assume that she wins. What will Bennett's fallback position be in 2020? He has announced the coming of the apocalypse: our country "cannot survive losing the Supreme Court to liberals and allowing them to wreck our sacred republic. It would reshape the country for decades." He has shot his political wad. There is no comeback from this. If Trump loses, all is lost! This is the Spartans at the pass!
Nope. It's just business as usual. The Supreme Court keeps rolling along. The Progressives' agenda has been dominant ever since FDR's Court-packing scheme, which went nowhere in Congress -- his only major defeat -- but which scared the Court so much that it began validating all of his programs from then on.
We lost the battle in 1937. But Bennett, not understanding U.S. history, thinks it's the decision of the century this November.
In the words of Garet Garrett back in 1938, "the revolution was."
There are those who still think they are holding the pass against a revolution that may be coming up the road. But they are gazing in the wrong direction. The revolution is behind them. It went by in the Night of Depression, singing songs to freedom.There are those who have never ceased to say very earnestly, "Something is going to happen to the American form of government if we don't watch out." These were the innocent disarmers. Their trust was in words. They had forgotten their Aristotle. More than 2,000 years ago he wrote of what can happen within the form, when "one thing takes the place of another, so that the ancient laws will remain, while the power will be in the hands of those who have brought about revolution in the state."
This sort of thing has been going on all of my life. I have heard it since 1960 -- Nixon vs. Kennedy -- but it was standard fare in 1952. Eisenhower promised Gov. Earl Warren the first opening on the Supreme Court if Warren delivered California at the Republican convention. Warren did -- easy-peasy. Then the Chief Justice died.
Eisenhower kept his word. The voters had kept Stevenson out. Eisenhower even got a Republican House and Senate -- the only President since 1930 who did until Bush II got it for a few months in 2001. What good did it do conservative Republicans? None. They got the Warren Court.
The Supreme Court card is a fake. It has been a fake ever since 1931. It is the last-ditch plea to vote Republican. It's always the end of the world.
Then, when the Republican loses in November, the argument is shelved for four more years. Have no fear. Like a bad penny, it always comes back into circulation.
Don't fall for it. No matter who wins in November, the Supreme Court will only be marginally better or worse in four years.