I say YES. YOU say NO....Numero Tre! Enjoy!
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Only Democrats
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thought this was for all cancer patients
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beep, I wasn't addressing you in the second paragraph. Only the first one was addressed to you. Please leave this thread, Mods are very strict that this place is a safe place for liberals to chat. This one is for the conservatives: https://community.breastcancer.org/forum/84/topics...
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Or like me.... I am neither.... I would vote for either party, if the nomination was honest, trustworthy, not an egomaniac, nor so full of himself he can't see straight. I would vote for a qualified politician! One who knows his a$ from a hole in the ground.
In other words never again a reality show host, nor someone who thinks their money can buy their election, no matter their politics or beliefs. And NEVER someone who places only their friends and family in our government!
Doesn't matter what party.... JUST ELECT A QUALIFIED PERSON! Is that too much to ask?
Again, Republican used to stand for Grand Old Party.... GOP.... Not anymore! Trump has ruined the party and our white-house. Not to mention losing complete control of a pandemic, that he chooses to forget, and believes it will just go away. What an idiot!
Edited to add.... Wait.... I MUST be a Democrat! And I will vote that party, just to get this whole administration out of my America!
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LOL.
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Just remember, nobody died when Clinton lied. 200,000 plus died as tRump lies.
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ErenTo, I recall Gore v Bush and those chads and the nightmare of it.....I never felt that election was fair....just as I didn't feel 2016 was...I'm girding my loins and every other body part for November.....
November 2016 was when I found you guys here on BCO's special site...I remember those first posts....wow....
But look---> we survived. We're HERE. We have each other and a place to blow off if we need to. . .
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SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 2020
RBG From the Point of View of the Universe
by Michael C. Dorf
"President Trump's nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate." -- Majority Leader Mitch McConnell in a statement released yesterday that pivoted from gracious praise of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to doublespeak about how 2020 is supposedly qualitatively different from 2016.
"[T]he funeral baked meats [d]id coldly furnish forth the marriage tables." -- Hamlet (in Act I, Scene II), chafing at how soon after the death of his father the king, his mother, Queen Gertrude, remarried the new king, Hamlet's uncle Claudius.
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It was inevitable that the news cycle would not pause to reflect on the extraordinary career and life of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg before turning immediately to a discussion of whether there exist at least four Republican Senators who are not utter hypocrites. Still, I might have thought that savvy-if-evil politicians like Senator McConnell would have waited at least 24 hours before announcing their schemes for how they intend to reshape the post-RBG Court, if not out of common decency then perhaps because appearing to take time to grieve would be good politics. Call me naive.
I shall no doubt have much to say about whatever comes next, but for today I want to take a moment to celebrate Justice Ginsburg in broader perspective. I shall do so using a trope that my father, who also died in this annus horribilis, often invoked. My dad was a couple of years older than Justice Ginsburg and, although they did not know each other, moved in some of the same circles. That included overlapping for a couple of years at Cornell when she was an undergrad and he was a graduate student here.
My dad studied philosophy and liked to use an image from the English philosopher Henry Sidgwick: the point of view of the Universe. Sidgwick was a utilitarian who embedded that turn of phrase in a claim that one oughtn't to favor one's own interests over those of others (except to the extent that one knows one's own interests and is better able to advance them than to advance those of others). My dad and Justice Ginsburg were both notable for putting the interests of others -- both those close to them and strangers -- ahead of their own interests in many ways, but my dad, who knew what Sidgwick meant, liked to use the term in a different way. When dealing with one of life's minor or not-so-minor setbacks, he would say that it helps to see it from the point of view of the universe. He used the phrase less as a utilitarian and more as a stoic (in the original sense, not in the colloquial sense of joyless).
RBG was undoubtedly a stoic too. Given her repeated triumphs over cancer, it was tempting to see her as a kind of benevolent version of Rasputin: unkillable. But RBG did not think of herself that way. She repeatedly accepted the cards she was dealt and played them more successfully than one would think possible, by applying her enormous intelligence, sound and sensitive judgment, and phenomenal work ethic.
I did not know RBG nearly as well as those of my friends who clerked for her. I clerked at the Court when she was still on the DC Circuit. Still, I like to think of myself as connected in some way. As a teacher of two subjects that were dear to her (civil procedure early in my career and constitutional law throughout), I studied and assigned her many important opinions and dissents. We shared affiliations with the same four universities (Cornell, Columbia, Harvard, and Rutgers). And I did have the good fortune to talk to her on occasion. I'll relate one.
Some years ago, we were on a panel together. I don't now remember the topic, but in the course of my remarks I repeated the conventional wisdom that RBG had cleverly chosen a litigation strategy of bringing to the Supreme Court claims for sex equality with male plaintiffs. Unoriginally, I said that this was clever because such cases both appealed to the then-all-male members of the Court and underscored how legal distinctions based on sex that relied on stereotypes disadvantaged everyone, regardless of their sex.
When it was her turn to speak, Justice Ginsburg corrected me. I don't have a transcript, but I remember her saying something very much like this: Michael, you know everyone says that, but it isn't true. We had plenty of female plaintiffs. It just happened that in a few of the key cases the plaintiffs happened to be men.
I was happy to be corrected and have no reason to doubt that Justice Ginsburg was accurately recounting her triumphs as a lawyer. And yet, I think she sold herself short. Her legacy includes the proposition that sex-role stereotyping--regardless of who nominally benefits--is the central evil at which the sex equality norm takes aim.
We scholars and pundits make much of the fact that Justice Anthony Kennedy, a conservative, authored all of the Court's leading gay rights cases, and that Justice Gorsuch wrote and Chief Justice Roberts joined the Court's Bostock decision this past term, finding that sexual orientation and gender identity discrimination are forms of sex discrimination. All three deserve the praise they have received for those opinions and votes. But let's not overlook what is taken for granted--that of course the liberal justices, including RBG, would vote for the LGBTQ+ plaintiffs in such cases. And they did.
Well, isn't that just what it means to be a liberal? Sure, it is now, but it wasn't always that way. Long after Stonewall, the Supreme Court, including Justices we regard as liberal, didn't see LGBTQ+ rights as continuous with other civil rights struggles. That only changed beginning in the 1980s, when four Justices dissented in Bowers v. Hardwick. It changed, I want to suggest, in no small part because of how RBG had changed the conversation. It would be another 17 years before the Court overruled Hardwick, but the groundwork had been laid much earlier.
RBG has been justly called the Thurgood Marshall of the women's rights movement. She may also rightly be called the Charles Hamilton Houston of the LGBTQ+ rights movement--as one whose initial work was crucial to what came after.
Was it all for naught? If four or more Republican Senators cannot be found to balk at the hypocritical plans of Mitch McConnell, Neil Gorsuch will become the median Justice. If Trump somehow wins re-election, that position could next be held by Brett Kavanaugh or even someone to his right. Will a Court that moves far away from Justice Ginsburg's views on abortion, affirmative action, campaign finance regulation, capital punishment, guns, and so much much more mean the end for her legacy?
No. For one thing, the Supreme Court is a lagging indicator of public opinion. On the question that mattered most to her--sex discrimination--there is unlikely to be more than a little backtracking at the margins.
More importantly, we ought not and do not measure anyone's accomplishments by the failures of their successors. We remember Marcus Aurelius as the philosopher-king. No one thinks less of him because later Roman emperors did not follow his path, much less because Rome eventually fell.
Some day the American Republic too will be no more. Maybe it will take a thousand years or perhaps it will happen on and after November 3 of the current wretched year. From the point of view of the universe, it matters hardly at all.
If, as Keynes said, in the long run we're all dead, what then, does matter? It is not my place to offer a definitive answer to a question with which the greatest minds in history have struggled. I'll conclude by saying that I've long thought the best answer is a kind of existential one that the best-lived lives exemplify. Here is how Ronald Dworkin put the point in one of his last essays: "It is important that we live well," he said, "not important just to us or to anyone else, but just important."
RBG lived well. She worked extremely hard. She served her country with courage and determination. She stood up to power on behalf of the powerless. Those of us who take inspiration from her life will do what we can to build on her accomplishments, but nothing that comes next can change or undercut what she did.
POSTED BY MICHAEL C. DORF AT 11:41 AM
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20 HOURS AGO
To Honor Ginsburg, Democrats Have One Choice: Go Nuclear
They will have to bring a bazooka to the GOP's gun fight.
John Duricka/AP
For indispensable reporting on the coronavirus crisis, the election, and more, subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily newsletter.
It's a popular sentiment on the left: Don't mourn, organize. But with the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, that won't be enough. Ginsburg, a hero of female empowerment and of the Supreme Court, deserves much mourning. But Democrats and progressives can waste no time prepping for the battle royale that lies ahead. After all, it took Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell mere minutes after the news of RBG's passing to declare that the GOP-controlled Senate will vote on whoever Donald Trump sends its way to fill the Supreme Court vacancy—a direct eff-you to the Democrats after McConnell in 2016 refused to consider President Barack Obama's SCOTUS nominee Merrick Garland with the phony-baloney argument that the Senate should not consider new justices during an election year. So yes, Dems will have to organize, but they must do more: They have to get ready to rumble.
Yes, Dems will have to organize, but they must do more: They have to get ready to rumble.
What is coming, at least as the Republicans see it, is a grand political clash. They have been hellbent on reshaping the entire federal judiciary and especially drool over the prospect of locking the highest court into a right-wing course that will last decades and counter demographic trends that favor Democrats. This is their Holy Grail. After all, nothing galvanizes conservative evangelical voters more than the courts. For political consultants, it has long been conventional wisdom that right-wingers obsess over the composition of the courts and the Supreme Court far more than progressives. So Ginsburg's departure is a gift for Trump. If there has been any erosion occurring on the edges of his conservative and evangelical base, his effort to shove another anti-choice, pro-corporate conservative on to the highest court could certainly shore up that ground for him. Here's something Trump can campaign on for the next six and a half weeks, without breaking a sweat or fielding a tough question. It's his lifeline. A cure for his coronavirus problem.
It will be bare-knuckles politics from the right. Do or die. By any means necessary. To replace Ginsburg with a young right-wing extremist. And for the Democrats to have a chance of thwarting them, they must realize that this fight is not only a matter of persuasion. They will not win by writing well-reasoned op-eds. Cable host tirades will be of little use. Panel discussions will be irrelevant. Clever ads highlighting GOP hypocrisy won't do the trick. Angry editorials in the New York Timeswon't help. Not even a freckin' David Brooks column ("conservatives should realize they have an interest in preserving democratic norms!") will do them any good. Passionate speeches on the floor of the US Senate? Fuggedabout it.
This is about power.
Sure, the Democrats and influential voices in the political media world might focus on a few GOP senators and, appealing to that good ol' American sense of fair play, urge them to preserve institutional norms and refuse to go along with McConnell's night ride against democratic governance. But that is a long shot. Susan Collins, hero of the Republic? Do you want to bet? (She did tell a reporter earlier this month she wouldnot seat a Supreme Court justice in October and would oppose doing so in a lame duck session if Biden wins. Yet…) Mitt Romney might be willing to throw his body on the tracks. And Lisa Murkowski has already said (before Ginsburg's death) she won't vote to confirm a new SCOTUS appointee until after the inauguration. But if the Dems round up this trio, you got a tie, with Veep Mike Pence eager to break the deadlock to please his lord and his Lord. Are there other Rs willing to derail the Trump-McConnell express? Don't wager the mortgage. (One interesting wrinkle: If Arizona Democrat Mark Kelly defeats incumbent Sen. Martha McSally on November 3 in what is a special election, he could be immediately sworn in, and the Democrats might pick up a vote. But don't think for a moment that McConnell hasn't already taken that possibility into account.)
It will be bare-knuckles politics from the right. Do or die. By any means necessary.
The win-over-reasonable-Republicans-with-reason strategy is weak sauce. That leaves the Democrats with one other choice: total political warfare. The Senate's Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer—with the backing of Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi—needs to threaten massive retaliation. Should McConnell try to ram a Trump nominee through, Schumer ought to vow that the Democrats, if they win back the Senate and Biden is elected president, will demolish the filibuster, which will allow the Senate to proceed to make Washington, DC, a state (two more senators, who are likely to be Democrats!) and that they will move to add two or four more seats to the Supreme Court. (There is nothing in the Constitution that limits the court's size to the current nine justices.) In other words: They will implement a Republican nightmare (which, as it happens, can be justified on arguments of equity and fairness).
Schumer should utter this declaration publicly to lock the Democrats in. Of course, this could further propel Republicans to the polls. But it might do the same with Democrats. (The stakes in this election are now higher than they already were.) Crucially, there would need to be buy-in from Biden. The veteran Washington player will have to put aside his somewhat admirable (if misguided) desire to return to the older and more genteel means of legislating and compromising in the nation's capital. But with conservative voters fired up by the dream of replacing Ginsburg with a thirtysomething right-wing firebrand, the Dems will have to counter with more than a this-isn't-fair argument. Bring a gun to a knife fight? They will need a bazooka. Sorry if that sounds violent. But, as one sage person likes to say, we are in a fight for the nation's soul. And sometimes you don't get to choose the weapons or levels of intensity.
Ginsburg was an uplifting force in the ongoing American experiment. She was a feminist pioneer. She was an inspiring champion of equality, fairness, and perseverance. She wrote eloquent opinions that advanced and expanded progressive values and that made the United States a more perfect union. She penned blistering dissents that kept alive those values, even when they experienced setbacks. Her memory deserves more than passionate remembrances and praiseful eulogies. It warrants a fight. And perhaps a fight like one never seen before. One that will be damn notorious.
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This didn't print ...was in the above article....
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Interesting perspective from Dave Wasserman.
(I love "porn for base Dems" myself....)
I've heard some analysts argue a SCOTUS fight will help Trump by shifting "what 2020 will be about" from his mismanagement of COVID to a more straightforward partisan cage match. That could happen, but I've always seen some big risks for Trump in a pre-election SCOTUS fight...Namely, the potential for the Roe v. Wade/abortion issue to tear Trump's coalition apart. Much of his 2016 support came from voters who disliked Hillary Clinton, liked his rhetoric on immigration/trade, but are *pro-choice* - especially secular, blue-collar women.This morning, I dove into 2016 CCES data (50,000+ person national survey). Only 15% of Clinton's voters at least leaned pro-life and 11% held mixed views (74% at least leaned pro-choice). But 22% of Trump's voters at least leaned pro-choice and another 13% held mixed views.·Although Trump downplayed abortion in 2016, voters w/ mostly pro-choice attitudes made up more than a fifth of his support in plenty of battleground states: 25% in Iowa 24% in Florida 24% in Pennsylvania 24% in Michigan 21% in Arizona 20% in Wisconsin 20% in Ohio.For decades, many of these blue-collar, pro-choice Trump voters had voted for Democrats because they saw Republicans as the party of "Bible thumpers" who moralized against abortion & gay marriage. Then Trump came along, and they didn't mind him as much. Now, there may actually be an opportunity for Dems to win back many of these voters by tying Trump to the "DC swamp:" Mitch McConnell and Rs who want to "end Roe v. Wade, cut more taxes for billionaires" etc. In fact, Biden is *already* winning many of these blue-collar voters.The under-utilized Dem message Rs should be most scared of probably goes something like this: "In 2016, Trump promised to drain the swamp. Instead, he became the swamp: he let Mitch McConnell and stock-dumping, ultra-far right GOP senators write his entire domestic agenda." After all, the Obama-Trump voters Biden needs to win back may have been yearning for a political "outsider" in '16 but are still: 1) extremely against tax cuts for wealthy Americans 2) decidedly against repealing the ACA 3) substantially pro-choice.Btw, I'm not sure groups like @ProjectLincoln, whose ads mostly feature anti-Trump messaging that amounts to porn for base Dems & NeverTrump Rs, have demonstrated they understand this type of swing voter yet.Bottom line: the millions of Obama-Trump voters who will decide the 2020 election are *not* persuaded by attacks on Trump as divisive, bad person. But they *do* despise McConnell and "DC swamp/establishment" Rs.0 -
MinusTwo- an orange gibbering idiot
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Ruth--WOW!!!!!
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Collins is being her sniveling, waffling self again. As a last-ditch effort to keep Sarah Gideon at bay, she said today she would oppose a floor vote to confirm a new Justice before the election. But to keep from losing her own base, she also said she would be open to holding hearings even now, and to confirming a Trump appointee during the lame duck session. I do not hold out hope for any GOP Senators doing the right thing during the lame duck session--especially those currently up for reelection because after Nov. 3, regardless of whether they keep their seats, they'll have nothing to lose (and especially if they lost their seats, will eagerly flip the giant bird--a lame duck--at everyone who voted them into retirement starting January 4).
We have to win back the Senate, and come Jan. 4 (when the new Congress is sworn in) kill the filibuster (period), eliminate "legislative holds" (in which ONE Senator can block a bill or nomination from consideration), and immediately enlarge the Court. SCOTUS should be an apolitical check on both of the other two branches.
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I'm in favor of everything you've proposed, ChiSandy. I'm glad you're not calling it "packing the Court " Iike so many others do. That's seen as a negative thing to do. I've been calling it expanding the Court, so that it more accurately reflects the majority of American voters. That gets a much better response from the people I talk to.
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Sandy-- Absolutely 100%!!
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Sandy, yes to your vision.
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100%
and a David Corn bazooka.
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An artist friend created this wonderful avatar pix....
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Have to tell you all how incredibly reassuring it is to see so many folks in here who I already liked/respected out in the broader forums. Seriously reassuring.
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Yes, and I'll sooner believe that camels hula-hoop, bears polka, and electric toothbrushes painted the Sistine Chapel......
....and oh, yeah, sooner believe THIS one:
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From When Great Trees Fall by Maya Angelou....
...when great souls die, after a period peace blooms, slowly and always irregularly. Spaces fill with a kind of soothing electric vibration. Our senses, restored, never to be the same, whisper to us. They existed. They existed. We can be. Be and be better. For they existed.
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Would love nothing better than to see the first man on "Nars" be Donald Trump.....
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There is a serene and settled majesty to woodland scenery
If you go off into a far, far forest and get very quiet,
that enters into the soul and delights and elevates it,
and fills it with noble inclinations.
- Washington Irving
you'll come to understand that you're connected with everything.
- Alan Watts
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Perhaps drump uses NARS foundation - it is a cosmetic line that includes 'complete concealer' and 'radiant creamy concealer'
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