Pondering the Pundits

“Pondering the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

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Joseph R.Biden, Jr.: The Senate’s Duty on a Supreme Court Nominee

IN my 36-year tenure in the United States Senate — nearly half of it as chairman or ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee — I presided or helped preside over nine nominees to the Supreme Court, from both Republican and Democratic presidents. That’s more than anyone else alive today.

In every instance we adhered to the process explicitly laid out in the Constitution: The president has the constitutional duty to nominate; the Senate has the constitutional obligation to provide advice and consent. It is written plainly in the Constitution that both presidents and senators swear an oath to uphold and defend.That’s why I was so surprised and saddened to see Republican leaders tell President Obama and me that they would not even consider a Supreme Court nominee this year. No meetings. No hearings. No votes. Nothing. It is an unprecedented act of obstruction. And it risks a stain on the legacy of all those complicit in carrying out this plan. I would ask my friends and colleagues — and all those who love the Senate — to think long and hard before going down this road.

Paul Krugman: Clash of Republican Con Artists

So Republicans are going to nominate a candidate who talks complete nonsense on domestic policy; who believes that foreign policy can be conducted via bullying and belligerence; who cynically exploits racial and ethnic hatred for political gain.

But that was always going to happen, however the primary season turned out. The only news is that the candidate in question is probably going to be Donald Trump. Establishment Republicans denounce Mr. Trump as a fraud, which he is. But is he more fraudulent than the establishment trying to stop him? Not really.

Actually, when you look at the people making those denunciations, you have to wonder: Can they really be that lacking in self-awareness?

Michael Winship: When the Poetry of Campaigning Becomes a Cheesy, Dirty Limerick

For a politician or a journalist, there was a time when citing the classics — as long as it wasn’t done in a pedantic or pompous manner — was a mark of wisdom and experience. If a candidate or reporter does it today, there’s a good chance they’ll be trolled and ridiculed for high-handed pretension. Cue Donald Trump shouting, “Loser!”

But in April 1968, there stood presidential candidate Bobby Kennedy, speaking to an inner city crowd at the corner of 17th and Broadway in Indianapolis. He had just told them the horrific news that Martin Luther King, Jr., had been assassinated. People fell to the ground in shock and despair, others angrily shouted for violence and revenge.

Kennedy calmed the spectators. He spoke — without notes — for nearly five minutes. “What we need in the United States is not division,” he said. “What we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence and lawlessness, but is love, and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or whether they be black.” [..]

Fast-forward to 2016. If, as the saying goes, campaigning is poetry and governing is prose, this year’s GOP presidential race has degenerated into a cheesy, dirty limerick. There’s Donald Trump insulting the size of Marco Rubio’s mouth and ears, and Rubio making fun of Trump’s spray tan and small hands. Not exactly the age of Aeschylus, is it?

Yanis Varoufakis: A United, Democratised Europe Is Our Only Weapon Against A Dark Continent

Dear Young European Greens,

Dear Florent, Julien, Karima, Michel, Rui , Vedran, Adam, Laura, Teo, Zakia, Patrick,

You are right: Dreaming of a united, democratised Europe is our only weapon against a divided, authoritarian, potentially Dark Continent.

Our common dream is the only antidote to the common nightmare already in the works. But to become an effective antidote we need to join forces.

We need to overcome the usual tendency of progressives to fall prey to the sirens of discord.

We need a broad coalition of European Democrats from across the Left, Green, Liberal and Progressive Conservative divides.

As Brian Eno put it in DiEM’s Berlin Launch, Democrats are people who know that they do not possess the answers but who, at the same time, remain convinced that, together, it is possible to come up with good answers, helpful actions, and sensible policies.

Amanda Marcotte: Trump cut down to size: The Donald takes a beating during the GOP’s dirty debate, but the attacks will only make conservatives love him more

As in the first Republican debate, also held by Fox News, in August, the debate was largely about moderators trying to take out the front-runner, Donald Trump. But, aside from these similar themes, Thursday’s Fox News debate couldn’t be more different from the infamous August debate, and not just because it had, in what will hopefully be a singular event in American history, a debate about penis hand size.

Back then, the aggressive questions were more unfocused and rooted in a confidence that Trump would be easy to displace. On Thursday, the questions were far more substantive, attacking Trump’s flip-flops on immigration, hauling out his long history of campaign donations to Democrats, and calling him out for his con artistry, an attack centered around his snake oil school “Trump University.”

Too bad none of it will work. Or at least not to keep Trump from winning the nomination. The general election is a very different story.