Tag: GOP is now the party of corruption

Cashing in on justice

Three Senate Judiciary members outpace colleagues in contributions from judicial nominees

Before they put on their robes, dozens of federal judges appointed during the Trump and Obama administrations made significant campaign contributions to Senate Judiciary Committee members and their home-state senators — the very people who could make or break their nominations.

And three Republican senators — Ted Cruz and John Cornyn of Texas and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina — got more money than the rest of the Judiciary Committee combined. Virtually all of those contributions came from judicial nominees they ultimately backed.

Home-state senators who haven’t served on the panel also wield considerable influence on who becomes a federal judge. They’ve received significant contributions from donors who ended up on the bench. A Democrat — Bob Casey of Pennsylvania — tops that list. Continue reading.

Republicans want to either rule America — or destroy it for everyone else: political scientist

AlterNet logoIn a scorching column for the Daily Beast, David Rothkopf writes that the refusal of the Republican-controlled Senate to agree to hear witnesses in the impeachment trial of the Donald Trump is one of the darkest moments in U.S. history — ranking up with the start of the Civil War.

Getting right to the point, he wrote, “Jan. 31, 2020, was the worst day for democracy in America since April 12, 1861, when South Carolina forces opened fire on Fort Sumter. Both days represented a moment when an old guard representing a dying way of life placed their own survival ahead of that of the United States and our Constitution,” before adding, “It is an irony that the GOP was founded as an anti-slavery party, a harbinger of the changes to come in the mid-19th century, and today has become a reactionary force surviving by stoking fears of the massive U.S. social transformation that is already well underway.”

Focusing on the Senate impeachment trial that is expected to culminate with the acquittal of the president along party lines, he explained, “What took place in the Senate on Friday when it voted not to hear witnesses in the trial of Donald Trump— when witnesses such as John Bolton were available who could corroborate his guilt—may have been the most damaging blow of all. Because this decision effectively ensured that Trump would not only be acquitted of crimes he certainly committed, it also ensured a number of key points made by Trump and his defenders would in months and years to come be supported by the precedent of the momentous Senate action. These include a virtual ratification of the idea that anything a president might do to win reelection would be acceptable.” Continue reading.