Barack Obama, the first Black president of the United States, was not even halfway through his first term when Mitch McConnell, the neo-Confederate senator from Kentucky declared, “the single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”
Well, Obama did win a second term, but due more to the ineptness of Mitt Romney’s Republican candidacy than to any shining accomplishments by the Democrats in Congress. McConnell made sure of that by torpedoing and obstructing Democratic initiatives throughout Obama’s two terms and–buoyed by that success–continues to wreak havoc on Joe Biden’s legislative agenda.
The United States is called a “democracy,” but it never has been and never will be a true democracy as long as a judge in a courtroom has the authority to overturn and make null and void the will of the majority. Those other two non-democratic political absurdities–the Electoral College and the Senate–are constitutionally difficult to change, thanks to the design of the slave-owning “originalist” founders, but the court system is always up for grabs, particularly when one can use that same Senate for the grabbing.
McConnell’s ultimate goal—the dream of all dictators–was to rig that court system to promote and defend the reactionary policies of the Republican party. Step One: stall the confirmation of Obama’s judicial appointments. Step Two: fill the resulting vacancies at some future time with young rightwing judges.
Think of Rocco, the gangster in the noir classic Key Largo played by Edward G. Robinson snarling to Humphrey Bogart, “you’re right, I wanted more! More!” Mitch’s eyes must have glazed over with the vision of packing the court system for a generation with racists and reactionaries. Surely he relished his future in the next world: a rousing welcome with high honors into that Old Confederate Home in the Sky. Imagine his thrill of hanging out for eternity with the likes of Nathan Bedford Forrest and James Eastland!
With the election of the Celebrity in 2016, McConnell’s opportunity to control the American future brightened considerably. Though personally all over the political landscape during his lifetime, the Celebrity remained constant on two issues: Wall Street and White Supremacy.
It was obvious from the beginning of his presidency that the Celebrity didn’t know much about governance, didn’t do his homework, and was unable to stay focused on a thought for very long, so his judicial appointments needed to be spoon fed to him like a baby in a high chair.
“Open up now, just a little more, there’s a good baby.”
The Federalist Society held the spoon; McConnell gleamed like a proud daddy.
Federalist who? Yeah, you read that right: the Federalist Society, a Koch/Chamber of Commerce-funded judicial appointment mill which promotes and vets appropriate (as in neo-fascist AKA “originalist”) candidates for the court system. The playbook worked like the old-time baseball double-play combination of Tinkers to Evers to Chance. But in this case it was FS to Celeb to Mac who fast-tracked Senate lifetime confirmations for all.
So, let’s look at the Celebrity’s box score after four years: 231 lifetime judicial confirmations in the Federal court system. One hundred and ninety two of those clucks (92%) are white, even though 40 % of Americans are people of color. Do you get it, now? Mitch is rocking! Hoist the stars and bars! James Eastland, I’ve got your back!
With the complicity of the Celebrity and the Federalist Society, McConnell’s Super Trophy was now attainable. We’re talking SCOTUS, baby! Three more appointments!
We all know what happened. Now sitting on the Supreme Court:
Neil Gorsuch, weaned on his mother’s ultra Reaganism; Brett Kavanagh, who rode a legacy ticket into Yale and beyond, and Amy Coney Barrett, a former “handmaiden” in a male-dominated Christian cult that speaks in tongues and is obsessed with sin. Their common thread: they were fascists to the bone, bred in white privilege and determined to defend it. Other than mediocre legal careers, the new SCOTUS trio shares a dedication to three tenets of fascism: the primacy of corporate business, white supremacy, and the subjugation of women. They joined a sitting group of like-minded “originalists,” political troglodytes Anthony Alito and Clarence Thomas, and the penultimate weasel of Wall Street and White Supremacy, John Roberts.
President Biden has just been given an opportunity to appoint a new justice. No matter who he appoints, Mitch McConnell will still have his 6-3 majority to control the fate of American life.
So, let’s all sing:
“Old McConnell Has A Court
E-i-e-i-o
And on that Court he put three fascists
E-i-e-i-o
With a fascist here and a fascist there
Here fascist, there a fascist, everywhere a fascist
Old McConnell has a court
E-i-e-i-o.”
Th-th-that’s all, folks. The yolk’s on us.