It has not been even six hours since news broke of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s passing, and ostensibly left-wing activists, politicos, pundits, and journalists are already calling for court-packing and riots.
“If they ever TRY to replace RBG we burn the entire f—ing thing down,” threatened former CNN staffer and part-time cannibal Reza Aslan.
Later, after the office of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell released a statement saying that “President Trump’s nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate,” Aslan added in a note that is almost certainly all talk: “Over our dead bodies. Literally.”
Sure, Aslan. You go first.
“If you can’t shut it down, burn it down,” said podcast host Scot Ross.
University of Waterloo political science professor (!) Emmett Macfarlane added elsewhere, “Burn Congress down before letting Trump try to appoint anyone to SCOTUS.”
Relatedly, Lincoln Project member Fred Wellman remained true to brand, remarking before the Senate Majority Leader had even responded to the news of Ginsburg’s death, “Mitch McConnell is an evil bastard. Burn the whole party to the ground. The GOP is done.”
Democratic Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts on Friday took a less violent but equally controversial position, saying after the news broke of Ginsburg’s death: “Mitch McConnell set the precedent. No Supreme Court vacancies filled in an election year. If he violates it, when Democrats control the Senate in the next Congress, we must abolish the filibuster and expand the Supreme Court.”
Nation contributor Joshua Holland added, “We can allow ourselves to be depressed. … Then we have to work hard to win the White House and Senate, and then push the Dems to kill the filibuster and expand the Court. If they push through a nominee they’ll really leave us no other choice.”
The uber-left-wing Daily Kos agreed, publishing an article titled “If Republicans fill Ginsburg’s seat, a President Biden would have no choice but to expand the court.”
Others had reactions that were equally dramatic but lacking in any specific call to action.
“All we can hope for in times like these is that Mitch McConnell has a stroke from laughing too hard,” said freelance journalist Katie Herzog, adding later, “To clarify: I don’t want him to die. I just want him to be brain dead. I’m not a monster.”
“The United States had a good run,” said Vox’s perpetually dim person Ian Millhiser.
Liberal activist Amy Siskind said, “Democrats you all better fight as hard and as dirty as the Republicans have before. No butter knives at gun fights — fight for us and we will have your backs.”
She cannot possibly consider the conduct of Democratic lawmakers during the nomination of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh as the equivalent of a butter knife at a gunfight. Or maybe she does. Yikes.
Here is a wild thought: If your first inclination following the death of your favorite Supreme Court justice is to call for riots and revolution, you were always just a fan of that justice’s politics, never the institutions she served.
Hell of a way to honor her memory.
