We don’t have to wonder how Brett Kavanaugh will rule on abortion, or almost anything else

https://www.washingtonpost.com ^ | July 12, 2018 | Paul Waldman

[NKP_Vet]

Abortion and the fate of Roe v. Wade are always near the center of the debate on any Supreme Court nomination. The controversy over nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh’s views on Roe offers a window into a system conservatives established a few decades ago to produce the kind of justices who would be fervent advocates for their cause, while also being just restrained enough in their beliefs to be confirmed. As a piece of political strategy, it’s absolutely brilliant, and it could hardly be working any better.

Among other things, it allows Republicans to finesse issues such as abortion on which their goals are terribly unpopular; only a third of the public believes Roe should be overturned. So Republicans rather shamelessly make self-contradictory arguments. On one hand, they are emphatically opposed to abortion rights, want to restrict those rights wherever they can, and fervently desire that Roe be overturned. On the other hand, especially when there’s a shift in the court’s ideological balance in play, they try to evade pointed questions about it, pretending that the nominee about whom they are so enthusiastic might not vote to overturn Roe, because you just never know. Recently, Vice President Pence — who is more hostile to women’s reproductive rights than almost any other politician in America — was asked whether he hopes Roe will be overturned, and he answered, “Well, I do, but I haven’t been nominated for the Supreme Court,” as though his feelings, or at least what he would reveal about them, would be different in that case.

[TBP]

He’ll be more solid than Kennedy, probably, but less so than some other judges on the list. This was one of the most Establishment names on Trump’s list.

[Lizavetta]

All I can say is Planned Parenthood must be one hell of a lucrative slush fund for the Democrats, for them to be squalling so loudly and endlessly about a threat to its legality.

And it has very little to do with their opinions on women or women's choice. It never does.

Follow the money.

[Lauren BaRecall]

Perspective is quite an amazing thing. Thanks for your posts.

[Mr. N. Wolfe]

Thanks.

[M Kehoe]

I’m sure Waldman understands that there has to be a case regarding abortion to make it to SCOTUS.

Don’t think one is in the pipeline either.

Another vacuous piece from the NYT.

5.56mm