What sort of Court do Americans want?

Back in February, Pat Buchanan defended the Republican refusal to even consider an Obama nominee to replace Scalia with the ludicrous idea that he was a lame duck and so the seat ought to be left to the winner of the 2016 election to fill.

That, he said, was the right and democratic and legitimate thing to do.

That would be letting the American people decide what sort of court they want.

What kind of Supreme Court do the American people wish to have? 

That is a question to be decided in 2016 — not by a lame-duck president, but by the American electorate in November.

Does the nation want an activist judiciary to remake America into a more liberal society, as Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor would like to see it remade?

Or do the American people want a more constitutional court that returns power to the people and their elected representatives?

Let’s have it out.

Republicans should tell the American people that when they vote in November they will be deciding not only the next president, not only which party shall control Congress, they will be deciding what kind of Supreme Court their country should have. 

Which is as it should be.

Of course, when he wrote that he was still taking for granted, and letting us take for granted, the fundamental legitimacy of the electoral process and the right of the majority of the people to make that sort of choice, however indirectly, by choosing their legitimate rulers, the President included, and he has since then abandoned that view when it suited his hero, Il Duce, to do so.

But, anyway, and not that I want to jinx it, I will for the moment assume a Clinton victory and say I can't wait to see whether Pat urges the new senate not only to provide due and formal consideration for her nominees but also to actually confirm enough of them to fill up any actual vacancies on the Supreme Court. 

Somehow I don't think so, especially in light of his commitment to the claim that the election, if the people choose Clinton, is rigged and the process illegitimate.

But even putting all that aside, most of the GOP leaders who have said anything about the question have been promising their voters that if Hillary wins the White House they will not allow her to appoint a single judge to the Supremes, anyway.

And throughout the Obama years Pat Buchanan has been a staunch supporter of all of the most radical demands and behaviors of Republicans in Congress.

I fully expect him to go back on his word if Hillary wins and angrily and vociferously urge the Republican senate to refuse to confirm any of her nominees, and perhaps even to refuse to give them proper formal hearings.

Update, 11/15/2016.

A clear majority of the people gave Hillary their suffrage so Trump, an Elector College only victor, has no popular mandate to do anything at all.

The people voted for Hillary.

Will PB now insist that the people have indeed chosen what kind of court they want, and it's the kind Hillary wants, so Trump should let Hillary choose his nominees and the GOP senate should confirm them?

Ho Ho Ha Ha.