Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Judge Kavanaugh Confirmation Hearings: Kabuki Television
Japan’s Kabuki theater tradition is over four-centuries-old. Kabuki performers are heavily made up, ornately dressed, and engage at a snail’s pace in a highly stylized dance-drama, the meaning of which is a total mystery to Occidentals.
Pundits in the U.S. have come to use the term “Kabuki theater” in describing a performance that is posturing—all show and no substance.
Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s Senate confirmation hearings began Monday. The senators will not dress like Geishas or wear white pancake makeup. But, when the lights and cameras are on each senator, his or her performance will be 100 percent posturing.
Why is the Senate hearing pure Kabuki theater? Because each senator has already made up his or her mind on Judge Kavanaugh.
Every Democrat senator in a blue state, and every Democrat senator not up for re-election on November 6 will give Kavanaugh the thumbs down. Those Democrat senators up for re-election in states that President Trump carried decisively—Joe Donnelly(D-IN), Heidi Heitkamp(D-ND); Joe Manchin(D-WV); Claire McCaskill(D-MO), Bill Nelson(D-FL), and Jon Tester(D-MT)—will probably vote to confirm.
All Republican senators will vote to confirm, even Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski, Maine’s Susan Collins, and perhaps even the aptly named Senator Jeff Flake (R-AZ).
So, why the need for the hearing?
It’s simple. Every senator covets time in the glare of the klieg lights. It’s free media, wall-to-wall television exposure to the senator’s constituents and donors. Each senator’s time on camera furthers the only two issues each really cares about: 1) re-election, and 2) raising money for re-election.
Unfortunately, Supreme Court Kabuki confirmation hearings have been orchestrated this way since 1987 when Senator Ted Kennedy destroyed Judge Robert Bork’s nomination and reputation with a compendium of lies and demagoguery broadcast live to the nation.
Judge Kavanaugh will not be required to give his opinion on an issue that might come before the Supreme Court during his tenure. This is the “Ginsburg Rule,” followed since 1993 when it was invoked by the Democrats to protect Ruth Bader Ginsberg from probing questions about her representation of the ACLU and other leftist causes. The Senate vote to confirm her was 93-3.
Brett Kavanaugh, 53, graduated from Yale Law School in 1990. He clerked for Justice Anthony Kennedy on the U.S. Supreme Court, worked in the George W. Bush White House, and in 2006 was appointed by President Bush to the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeal.
In his 12 years on the DC Circuit Court of Appeal, Judge Kavanaugh authored over 300 opinions covering a wide range of issues.
Although the White House has authorized the production to the Senate committee the largest number of documents in the history of judicial confirmations, Senate Democrats are claiming to need another 100,000 documents from Kavanaugh’s tenure in the White House. This late demand is a stall tactic by Democrats, who are doing their best to delay, then deny President Trump his nominee.
Legal scholars agree that Judge Kavanaugh’s 300 opinions establish that he is an originalist, has a healthy distrust of administrative overreach, and is a strong proponent of the separation of powers.
Everything any honest arbiter needs to know about what kind of Supreme Court Associate Justice Judge Kavanaugh will be is contained within the four corners of his 300 Circuit Court opinions.
Remember, the senators are staging a Kabuki hearing. Judge Kavanaugh’s answers are not important to the senators—only their questions are.
The Democrats oppose Judge Kavanaugh because he is conservative. Democrats should heed the words of their President Barak Obama, who lectured us in 2009 that “Elections have consequences, and at the end of the day, I won.”
Published in Politics
Perhaps they should.
If one is going to posture and perform then the audience deserves full value. If Schumer is not out there in full makeup and regalia I simply cannot take him seriously.
Would it be wrong for Mr. Kavanaugh to ask his inquisitors “Senator, are you asking me my viewpoint on a political issue?”. It might be interesting to hear the answer, if any.
While the entire first day will be bloviating by Senators, I would be interested in whatever Judge Kavanaugh may have to say about the “Chevron” doctrine, guiding courts to give significant deference to the decisions of a quasi-judicial nature made by administrative agencies.
Given the increasingly unrestrained actions by the administrative state, and much related litigation in the courts, this question I expect will become increasingly important.
Beat me to the punch aardo vozz!
Great minds…🙂
I’m embarrassed for the country every time there are Congressional hearings. There is almost never any new information out of these hearings. 99% of the time it’s just a demonstration to the voters back home what a tough bulldog they have working for them. Look at them tear into that witness! Any useful information is an unexpected side benefit.
I am so disappointed.
After the speeches and applause of the past week for the late Senator McCain, I expected the Democrats as a group to ask that the hearings be ended and that Judge Kavanaugh receive the committee’s unanimous vote of approval by acclamation.
“Judicial appointments should not be the subject of partisan politics,” I hoped to hear the Democrats announce, in the “Spirit of McCain.”
“We are all Mavericks now!”
I mean, what was all that funeral stuff about, anyway?
The Democrats and leftists (but, I repeat) are such petulant children.
This upcoming session, the Canuckistani Senate will have video cameras in the chamber for the first time in its history.
It means the end of our Senate’s life as the chamber of “sober second-thought”. That august chamber held out as long as it could (our House of Commons started broadcasting proceeding way back in 1977), but the insatiable media machine has finally succeeded in its quest to facilitate her descent into triviality.
I heard Hugh Hewitt and a Law Dean discussing administrative law. Apparently, Kavanaugh was instrumental in the new Major Issues (I think that’s what it was) doctrine which says when regulatory agencies or boards issue rulings that deal with Major Issues they are using a power the legislature could not possibly have intended to hand off. So the usual judicial deference of the Cheveron rule is not applicable in those cases. Not much, but a good start.
Other countries broadcast their legislative proceedings on the web, and I’ve taken the time to watch English speaking countries make their own legislative sausage.
Some of the theater is quite entertaining to watch, the UK’s Prime Minister’s Questions (abbriviated to PMQ) is an example, usually.
But in the end, it’s all Kabuki. We have nothing to be embarrassed about, and I roll my eyes when someone makes that argument about our legislative antics. It’s base human nature on display, minus the physical fighting and killing.
I heard an opinion recently that nominees, especially Supreme Court nominees, shouldn’t appear before the committee at all. After all, the nominee has already visited many of the senators, probably every member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, along with media coverage from at least the senator’s home state, including photos.
The hearings should have witnesses for and against, and the result is the senators won’t look quite as, well, stupid.
The real job interview took place during Kavanaugh’s visit to individual senators.
And in general, job interviews are overrated and whether the interviewee under performs or over performs doesn’t usually give a good measure of a candidate’s actual job performance.
There are exceptions for some people-person jobs, but is a Supreme Court Justice a people-person job? Not in my view.
If anyone has watched the hearings, you know it’s simply an opportunity for the Dems to take pot shots at the president and whether Kavanaugh will sanction an impeachment. It’s also obvious that some Dem group has organized protests to further demean the hearings. It’s pretty disgusting.
This photo was taken outside the Kavanaugh hearings, reportedly:
So, far this has been the general response to that photo:
In Canada, you may have it better than you think: I’m resigned to the idea that if the U.S. Senate ever reached triviality it would be an ASCENT.
<sarcasm off>
<cynicism always on>
Instead of Kabuki theater… College Basketball came to my mind with all the disruptions during the attempt to open the Brent Kavanaugh Senate hearing. When a basketball player is in the spotlight at the free-throw line the opposing fans create a background spectacle by making lots of noise while waving around their arms or generally creating a ruckus of some sort. The intent is of course to break focus on what is going on and to hopefully cause the player to miss his shots. Seems like a topic for an amusing meme or satire.
I share your concern about administrative agencies and their overreach.
You might be interested in knowing this: From the link on bottom line of this post: Administrative Law Judges: MYTHS AND REALITIES
On July 10 of this year, the White House issued an executive order giving agency heads the authority to select their own administrative law judges (ALJs).
The Washington Post editorial board expresses concern that, under this executive order, political appointees will pick like-minded ALJs to better serve their agendas.
https://walkingcreekworld.wordpress.com/2018/08/02/to-gbd-administrative-law-judges/