Reading the possible scenarios that could ensue if the Republican Senate refuses to do its Constitutional duty and confirm a ninth justice to the US Supreme Court, we cats think that least of those would be that the original Originalist, Antonin Scalia, would be spinning in his grave.
Nope, the really scary one is that our system of government could end up collapsing. (Although Transvaginal Bob McDonnell no doubt is petrified that he'll probably have to go to jail.) With an evenly split 4-4 SCOTUS, and lower-court rulings standing, the country could face the spectacle of citizens' Constitutional rights changing as they cross state lines.
That's just not sustainable. The Founders crafted such an ingeniously interlocked system that truly, all three branches must do their jobs to keep it going. Even though we know from all the vacations that George W. Bush took that depending upon who's in it, the executive could be the least-important branch.
So while all this terrifying stuff is being tossed around, we cats are wondering what Chief Justice John Roberts thinks of it all.
He won't speak publicly, of course. But he must be quaking in his robe. We don't agree with much of anything John Roberts says or does, but from his occasional votes — say, his two on Obamacare — we get the impression that he cares deeply about the reputation of his court and its institutional integrity. "We don't work as Democrats or as Republicans," he said at a banquet in Boston just a couple of weeks ago.
We have no clue, really — but is John Roberts freaked out about this pending Constitutional crisis, and is he making some furtive calls to Republican Senators? We were wondering why Charles Grassley suddenly walked his "no nomination" position back. At first we thought that maybe a home-state paper took him to task — but maybe he looked down at his ringing smartphone and saw "SCOTUS" pop up instead. Stranger things have happened. We cats PURR.
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