Upon brief reflection, this week's actions at the Supreme Court were very predictable:
- The Court heard a case challenging a 1977 precedent which had ruled that public employee unions and government employers could require that employees join the union or pay a "fair share" of dues (about 80%) to cover the non-political activities of the union. Justice Scalia died after the case was heard, but before the 4 to 4 vote was taken in 2016. The new case was brought by a state worker in Illinois who claimed that being forced to join the union forced him to support political advocacy with which he did not agree, in that all public employee union activity is inherently political. The unions have been bracing for the defeat - which they estimate will cost them 10 to 30 % of their membership - for two years.
- The validation of the president's authority to establish reasonable guidelines for granting visas on national security grounds is a no brainer. To have looked beyond the explicit language of President Trump's directive (version 3.0) to find unacceptable motivation would have established a terrible precedent for future presidents. The legal maxim "difficult cases make bad law" could have applied here if the liberal minority of the Court had prevailed. It is also likely that the "conservative" Supreme Court justices are not pleased that liberal activists have been shopping for sympathetic lower court judges.
- Confirming rumors which have abounded for months, 81 year old Justice Kennedy's decision to step down at the end of this year's term was highly predictable. Likewise, the likelihood that President Trump will nominate someone from the mold of Judge Gorsich, from the evolving list initially proposed by the Federalist Society and the Heritage Foundation. Likewise the Republican desire to have the new justice in place before the next term begins in October - and before the November election. Likewise the Democrats' freaking out.
It is easy to predict the past; the future is a bit more difficult, but not too much.
- The Senate will approve Trump's Supreme Court appointment over furious Democratic efforts to recruit Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska (both of whom will be concerned about abortion and healthcare), and Jeff Flake of Arizona and Bob Corker of Tennessee (both of whom are retiring and might want to take a parting shot at Trump.) Despite Chuck Schumer's pleading, it will be suicide for vulnerable Red State Democrats to follow the directive to preemptively reject anybody on Trump's list of 25 as being unqualified - Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota; Joe Donnelly of Indiana; Joe Manchin of West Virginia; Claire McCaskill of Missouri; Jon Tester of Montana; Sherod Brown of Ohio; Bill Nelson of Florida; and Bob Casey of Pennsylvania who are already on the wrong side on taxes and immigration. The candidate will have no track record on abortion, and will dodge all questions about Roe v Wade.
- The old Democratic Party is imploding.
-- Exhibit One is the New York primary victory of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of the Democratic Socialists of America over Joe Crowley, the fourth ranking Democrat in the House. In addition to the bolt to the far left, the Democratic theme of victimization of women and people of color by old white males has the progressives eating their own.
-- Exhibit Two is Maxine Waters leading the charge for civil disobediance targeted at anyone in the Trump administration. For those with long term memories, this feels like the lawlessness of the 60's which contributed substantially to the election of President Nixon.
-- Exhibit Three is the twenty or more Democratic House candidates who have committed that they will not support Nancy Pelosi for party leadership - some because she is not progressively activist enough, some because she represents the old establishment, and some (like moderate Conor Lamb who recently won a special election in western Pennsylvania) because she is too liberal. Prediction - if the Democrats win the House, she stays as leader; if they lose, she goes.
-- The Democrats who get the most mention as presidential candidates for 2020 will look a lot more like Kamila Harris and Corey Booker than Joe Biden or Terry Mcauliffe. Barack Obama's legacy is the demonstration that the country can elect an African American as president; the offset is that it doesn't need to again.
- Mitt Romney will be the voice of moderate Republicans in the Senate. To this point they have had only a few shrill voices without the ability to develop a national following - Bob Corker; Jeff Flake; John McCain; Rand Paul. Romney deferred to Jeb Bush in the 2016 primaries, thus avoiding the conflagration that was Trump, and has some credibility as an alternative to the president. And he has the political skills to walk the narrow line.
- As to the November elections - it's the economy stupid, and it is the strongest in decades; for some groups the best ever. What could go wrong? Well, trade wars with China, Europe, Canada, Mexico, Japan, and others - but we really do have the advantage in that foreign trade is a smaller part of the US economy than that of China or Germany, that there are imbalances that can be fairly simply improved, and that we are more important to the German Mercedes manufacturers and the Chinese trinket makers than they are to us. The stock ,market is worried, but only a little - on the assumption that Trump's team has laid down negotiation positions, but major problems will be avoided.
In the world of Trump each day brings a new controversy, but as of June 29, 2018, the safer two year predictions are for the continued success of the conservatives.
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This week's video is a convincing advertisement used by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as part of her campaign, which was funded in large part by Brand New Congress, a group founded by veterans of the Bernie Sanders presidential campaign.
bill bowen - 6/29/18
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