This morning I’m feeling a vague sympathy with a certain class of elite liberal law professors who I think imagined they were engaged in a contest of ideas with their conservative counterparts. I’m by no means talking about all of them. I mean the folks who write high profile OpEds which tell us that even though they strongly disagree with this or that Circuit Court or Supreme Court nominee they are nevertheless eminently qualified, a sterling mind and of judicious temperament. Across the country over the last week and with extra punch last night we are seeing Republican federal judges showing that they will mix and match any theories, manufacture theories, ignore basic traditions of constitutional interpretation all to arrive at decisions which boost Republican partisan advantage as much as possible. I’m speaking precisely when I call them Republican judges.
In a clutch – and this is a clutch – they’re dispensing with the formalities and appearances, to the extent they existed.