I did not like Biden's answer about packing the court and getting along with the Rs. IMHO, he should be taking at least somewhat of harder line against them, even though I understand that he wants lifelong Rs to feel comfortable voting for him. A better reply, IMHO, would have been something like this:
Look, McConnell and the Senate Republicans threw down the gauntlet first when they were in the minority and filibustered every nominee for the courts that Barack and I presented--that was an abuse of time honored minority rights in the Senate, they had more filibusters than any other Senate by far. Then when they got the majority in 2014, they refused to even bring up for a vote most of our nominees, they bragged about that abuse of majority rights and of course capped it off by refusing to allow a vote on Merrick Garland either in the committee or on the floor and in fact refused to even speak to him, even though members of their own caucus were fine with him. That was outrageous, that was outrageous. And the illegitimate proceedings that are going on this week and next with Judge Barrett have been the height of hypocrisy. Everyone knows that. Everyone recognizes that. I've never been in favor of tactics like packing the court but I've never been in favor of the things my friend Mitch has done over the past 10 years either. I don't know what we'll do, we'll have to see what happens in the election first. And if we are fortunate enough to be elected by the American people, then we'll have to see how the Republicans behave over the following months. If they are willing to be bipartisan, then so will I. But if they want to fight me like they fought Barack, then we'll fight too. |
