Whine whine whine: Marc Thiessen wonders why Republicans are so "awful" at picking Supreme Court justices. Liberals get to be liberal all the time waaaaah -- which couldn't possibly be because the Court has had only four of them for a long time, could it? And according to his scorecard, John Roberts is a complete failure as a conservative based on one decision. Gonzalez v. Carharrt, Morse v. Frederick, Citizens United v. FEC, Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1 -- none of these make Mr. Thiessen's scorecard; if he admitted them as evidence, I suppose he'd have to whine less. And he actually suggests that the mandate's fine for noncompliance wasn't a tax just because Mr. Obama said so, just so he can claim Mr. Roberts "rewrote the statute." And the final paragraph executes a bait-and-switch so obvious I bet even Jonah Goldberg would be embarrassed to have written it.
Meanwhile, dig this: the North Carolina legislature overrode a gubernatorial veto of a fracking bill because one Democratic House Rep pushed the wrong button and accidentally voted to override the veto, and then Republicans wouldn't let her reverse her vote. At least that's the story -- I don't know Rep. Carney well enough to know whether it was really an accident or not, but she's being appropriately apologetic, which I'm sure will be of great comfort to anyone whose tap water gets set on fire by gas drillers. Why Democrats are whining about the process, I can't say -- if you screw up, you bums, don't complain about the opposition taking advantage, just stop screwing up. After all, the last time something like this happened -- anti-"free" trade Rep. Charles Taylor (R-NC) voted for CAFTA because of a computer glitch -- Heath Shuler got to go to Congress. So, Reps and Senators, be careful out there, because actions have consequences.
UPDATE. That North Carolina fracking vote was even worse than I realized: as Chris Kromm of the Institute for Southern Studies tells us, another Democrat voted to override the fracking veto -- mere hours after Republicans inserted a "technical correction" to a budget bill that delivered $60 million in film industry-related tax breaks to said Democrat's district. Heckuva job, North Carolina!
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