Observations of an Irishman: 6 things the new justice SHOULD say, but likely won't

July 12, 2018

MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images

Contributor

Last Monday night, President Donald Trump announced Brett Kavanaugh to replace Justice Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court. Over the coming weeks, we will get to witness a circus with politicians and the media competing with each other to see who can say the most outrageous thing about the candidate nominated and highlight who they would have nominated. We will then witness the main event – the hearings in the Senate where Kavanaugh will be asked questions with an agenda and a bias. Below are 6 things he (or any future nominee) should say, but will he?

Ideology

The folks in media on BOTH sides are looking for a nominee who shares their ideology. Our friends on the left want a nominee who is liberal and many of our friends on the right want a nominee who is a conservative. As the next Justice of the Supreme Court, I state clearly that while I have my own personal ideology and belief system, I will leave it at the door of the Supreme Court when I am working.

The idea of a Justice having and ruling with an ideology is wrong and not part of the job description – my job is to review cases, listen to all arguments and base my sole decision on whether the case is constitutional or not. My own opinions are irrelevant and at times may involve me ruling against my personal opinion.

Loyalty

Loyalty is a big word in politics and politicians love to demand it from people they help and nominate. As the next Justice, I should state I have no loyalty to any party, any ideology, or to any President; even to President Trump who nominated me. MY loyalty only belongs in one place – that is in the Constitution and in the oath I will take on a successful appointment, which in part reads:

I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same.

Loyalty to anything but the Constitution is going against the wishes of America's founders and not part of my job description.

Role of Government

During any confirmation hearing, you will hear questions from politicians who will bring up cases and prior rulings to gauge what side of the issue they share and to see how they rule. Would Kavanaugh show the courage to highlight the Constitution and remind those in the hearing that he won't always rule on their side, but he will enforce the Constitution that is violated on a daily basis by Congress? He should use the opportunity of a hearing to remind this and future governments that the Constitution calls for three co-equal branches of government and they all have very different roles on responsibilities.

The Constitution is very clear when it comes to the role of Congress – there are 18 clauses under Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution which grants certain powers to the legislature and everything else is to be left to the states. If Congress passes a law that is not covered under those 18 clauses, would he vote against it and define it as unconstitutional? Likewise, the Constitution is very clear when it comes to the role of the Presidency. The role of the President has grown un-Constitutionally since President John Adams and 1797 Alien & Sedition Act. If any President acts outside the clear boundaries of Article 2, or decides to pass laws and act without Congress, would he vote against it and define it as unconstitutional?

Damaged Constitution

Will Kavanaugh point out one of the worst rulings of the Court - the ruling of Marbury v Madison in 1803? This increased the power of the Court and started the path of making the Court the sole arbiter and definer of what is and is not constitutional. We saw this with President Bush when he said (around 2006/2007) that we should just let the Supreme Court decide if a bill was Constitutional or not.

This is not the government America's founders had in mind.

Every two, four, and six years, new and returning members of Congress take an oath of office to preserve, defend, and protect the Constitution of the United States. Every member of Congress, the President, and the nine justices on the Supreme Court hold a duty and responsibility to decide on whether a bill is Constitutional or not.

America's founders were very clear about having three co-equal branches of government.

America's founders were very clear about having three co-equal branches of government. It's time members of Congress and the President start to take their oaths more seriously and the people demand they do.

It is wrong for someone to abdicate their responsibility but it also puts Americans in danger of tyranny as the Supreme Court has gotten many decisions wrong including the cases of Dred Scott, Korematsu and Plessy v Ferguson.

Decision Making

If you have ever listened to any argument before the Supreme Court, or even read some of the decisions, you will notice two common threads. You will notice the Constitution is rarely mentioned or discussed but what we call precedent or prior case law is discussed the most.

Will Kavanaugh clearly state that while he will listen to any and all arguments made before him and that he will read all the rulings in prior cases, they will only play a very small part in his rulings? If a law violates the constitution, should it matter how many justices ruled on it previously, what precedent that case set, or even what their arguments were? Would he publicly dismiss this and state their decisions will be based largely on the actual Constitution and the intent behind our founder's words?

Role of SCOTUS

Lastly, will Kavanaugh state that there will be times when they have to make a ruling which they personally disagree with or that will potentially hurt people? Despite modern thinking from people like Chief Justice Roberts, it is not the job of a Supreme Court Justice to write laws.

The sole job is to examine laws and pass judgment on their Constitutionality. A law can be passed in Congress and can have the best and most noble intentions, but those feelings and intent are irrelevant if it violates the Constitution.

Conclusion

When you watch the media over the coming weeks, how many of these points do you think will be debated on either side? When you watch the confirmation hearings, do you think Brett Kavanaugh will make any of these points?

Lastly, put yourself in the Oval Office. If you knew someone would make these points, would you nominate them? Would your friends and family?

BAKED LOBSTER? Maine restaurant owner sedates lobsters with marijuana before cooking them

OMAR TORRES/AFP/Getty Images

A restaurant owner in Southwest Harbor, Maine, has taken to sedating her lobsters with marijuana to help ease the pain of being being boiled alive — a popular way of cooking the crustaceans.

The owner of Charlotte's Legendary Lobster Pound, Charlotte Gill, said she feels bad for the lobsters she serves in her restaurant, noting, "there is no exit strategy" for them.

"She wants to get the lobsters baked before they're boiled," Glenn said on Thursday's episode of "The Glenn Beck Radio Program."

He wondered if marijuana actually made the lobsters more paranoid, recalling an "all-time classic" comic involving a paranoid lobster and a swipe at Glenn himself, a self-described "optimistic catastrophist."

Watch the video below to catch more of the conversation.

Of course Spooky Dude is connected to Kavanaugh hit job

OLIVIER HOSLET/AFP/Getty Images

You know it's kind of crazy how blatantly transparent Democrats have been during the Kavanaugh hearings. I'm definitely not saying this in any kind of positive light. I'm just amazed at how the left is giving the entire country a direct insiders look on how they go about their business. I mean, this entire confirmation charade has got everything… from "mic checking" to shout down your opponents, to political grandstanding to gain favor for future elections, to shady plots involving big money donors advancing progressive agendas. This is truly a look inside the Left's political playbook. It's open for everyone to see, and they don't even really appear to give a crap to try and hide it.

RELATED: Well that escalated quickly

Take for instance the Ford sexual assault allegation. Grassley has given Ford until tomorrow to commit to a testimony that would be conducted in the next 72 hours. He wants it complete by Monday so they can move on with a committee vote. But Ford and her lawyer are delaying. They want the FBI to do an investigation, but procedurally that's not how this works. Ford's lawyer, Debra Katz, knows this. So why delay?

Well, it's pretty obvious. Again, the Left isn't trying to hide what they're doing here. Democrats want this delayed as close to the November midterms as possible. They study history just like anyone else does. When this nearly identical scenario happened with Clarence Thomas and Anita Hill back in 1991, it triggered what is now known as "The Year of the Woman" in the 1992 elections. Dianne Feinstein, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, was a product of that Democrat surge.

But the Ford accusation reveals a lot more. Back in August, a large group of Left-leaning groups co-signed a letter to both Senator Feinstein and Senator Grassley demanding Kavanaugh records. It was basically the same narrative that Cory Booker and Kamala Harris were using during the opening day of the confirmation hearing. One of the groups that co-signed the letter was called the Project on Government Oversight, or POGO. The vice chair of POGO is a woman named Debra Katz - YES - the same Debra Katz that is now the lawyer for Kavanaugh's accuser. Don't worry, this gets even more ridiculous. POGO is directly funded by - guess who - George Soros and the Open Society Foundation.

We're seeing a play-by-play political hit job live as it all plays out.

Soros' fingerprints are all over this. In June the Daily Caller reported that a group called Demand Justice had launched an effort to try and stop Kavanaugh's confirmation. They allocated five million to the project. Wanna take a guess where they get their money? Demand Justice gets their funding from something called the Sixteen Thirty Fund, and their funds come directly from George Soros and the Open Society Policy Center. They've given over two million in recent years.

We're seeing a play-by-play political hit job live as it all plays out. If you thought Netflix's House of Cards was fiction… I give you the Kavanaugh hearings.

Daily Wire’s Jeremy Boreing: Social media platforms want publisher’s rights, but not the liabilities

KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV/AFP/Getty Images

Jeremy Boreing, COO at the Daily Wire and executive producer of "The Ben Shapiro Show," joined Glenn Beck on Tuesday to weigh in on the ongoing debate about whether the government should regulate digital media such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google.

In reference to leaked documents that revealed a "secret meeting that happened with Media Matters and their strategic plan," Glenn asked Boreing for his thoughts on "raw data" sharing (by social media platforms) and the suppression of conservative voices in digital media.

Boreing noted that Cambridge Analytica is under fire for using techniques, supplied to them by Facebook, to collect the same data sets that Media Matters has apparently collected.

"This is a pretty classic example of the left not being happy when the right does the same things that they are doing," he said.

"How do [conservative outlets] survive if you have Media Matters guiding Facebook and Twitter and Google on who to suppress and who not to?" Glenn asked.

"Unfortunately, I think that there's going to be a certain amount of lawfare that has to become a part of the tool belt of the right," Boreing said. "But specifically with these social media platforms, because of the Communications Decency Act in section 230, they sought protection from the government with being held liable in certain instances because they said 'we're not publishers, we're platforms.'"

"Now, they're trying to have it the other way. They're trying to say, 'No, we can act as publishers. We can determine what kind of opinions we want stated on our networks,'" he added.

Watch the clip below to catch more of the conversation.

This article provided courtesy of TheBlaze.

Dennis Prager: The crisis in America is the greatest since the Civil War

Dennis Prager, syndicated radio host and founder of PragerU, joined Glenn on Tuesday's episode of "The Glenn Beck Radio Program" to weigh in on the volatile political climate in America today.

"I think that the crisis in America is the greatest in my lifetime and the greatest since the actual Civil War," Prager said.

"I never engage in hyperbole," he explained. "I may, like anyone, be wrong. But I took a vow 35 years ago when I started radio, that … I [would] try to tell the truth. And I've never been accused of a lie, I'm proud to tell you. I've been called every word, but not liar. And I took another vow, don't even exaggerate, because it works for about a year. But gradually people understand, 'He doesn't really mean that. He's just overstating the case. So, I am not overstating when I say we are in a civil war in the United States."

He noted the tremendous "gap between the left and the rest of the country" and gave an example of the now "normative" practice of not calling children "boys or girls" in schools because it's considered wrong to impose a gender identity.

"That is sick to the point of child abuse," he said. "We are watching crazy people take our country."

UPDATE: Here's how the discussion went on radio. Watch the video below.

This article provided courtesy of TheBlaze.

Glenn's Show Prep