2020 headlines which were not anticipated

From Pelosi Calls CNN ‘Apologists’ For Republicans In Heated Interview With Wolf Blitzer by Henry Rodgers.  

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi slammed CNN and anchor Wolf Blitzer in an interview Tuesday when he pressed her on passing a coronavirus stimulus package.

In the interview, Blitzer pressed Pelosi on why she would not accept the $1.8 trillion dollar deal the White House and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin had proposed. She responded by saying it is still not enough money. Blitzer then went on to read a tweet from Democratic California Rep. Ro Khanna which urged Pelosi to take the deal from the White House.

“I don’t know why you’re always an apologist and many of your colleagues are apologists for the Republican position … Ro Khanna, that’s nice. That isn’t what we’re going to do,” Pelosi said to Blitzer in response.

A great example of Scott Adams' argument that there are always at least two movies of each set of events.  In Swedish they say "andre volk, andre art", other people, other ways.  Still, that's a striking claim - CNN are apologists for Republicans.  

In another example of two movies, I saw some articles on the Kamala Harris questioning of Amy Coney Barrett from yesterday's Senate confirmation hearings.  Half of them were crowing about how Harris destroyed Barrett.  Half of them were championing Barrett's complete take-down of Harris.

I tried to watch a video of the hearings but it was both too painful, too boring and too predictable.  Harris took ten minutes of her thirty to deliver a campaign speech and then spent twenty minutes talking about everything except Barrett's qualifications.  Harris wanted to talk about Harris's policy positions and Harris's forecast of Barrett's decisions.  BORING.

All, of course, self-serving and irrelevant to the purpose of the hearings.  And all with the same leaden display of banality.  The Senators hold all the cards.  They have massive staffs to research minutiae, they control the agenda, they interrupt, they misrepresent.  The target is constrained to be respectful.  It is a pretty disgusting asymmetry.  

Maybe I missed some highlights of wit and sparkle.  I certainly did not see any in the segments I sampled.  

The only element of drama was when Harris asked whether Barrett was aware of statements by Trump that he would only appoint judges who would overturn Obamacare.  An interesting question but not for Harris's gotcha reasons.

Has Trump said that his Supreme Court appointees would overturn Obamacare?  I don't recall him saying that and yet Harris is treating it as obvious and also treating Barrett's response that she did not recall any such statements as not credible.

I follow the news with probably greater attention than a good majority of fellow citizens.  I am not aware of Trump having ever made such a statement.  Plenty of statements about finding judges who would return Roe vs. Wade to Congress or to the States.  Plenty of criticisms of John Roberts' legal gymnastics to make the linchpin of Obamacare both a tax and not a tax.  Clear disdain for the both the process and product of the Obamacare legislation. 

But a clear demand by Trump that he would not appoint a judge who would support Obamacare?  I do not recall such and I am not finding it in Google searches.  What I am finding are a lot of statements by him to the effect that he thought the Obamacare case was wrongly decided, that Roberts went far past interpreting the law and into territory of trying to find a means to salvage a law despite is flaws and internal contradictions, and plenty of statements of intent that he would only appoint judges who would interpret the law as written, not take on the responsibility of salvaging badly written laws.

Does affirming that he would only appoint judges who subscribe to the originalist philosophy constitute a clear predicate demand that his nominees reject Obamacare?  He didn't have to seek a commitment from a nominee to overturn Obamacare.  All he needed to do was appoint originalists which is what he has done.  

It is like making the decision to buy a Ferrari versus making the decision to buy a high end sports car made in Italy with stylish features.  The requirements specified (cost, type, style, etc.) don't have to include that it is a Ferrari.  They just make it very likely.  Similarly, if you want to avoid badly crafted Congressional laws which need to be flexibly interpreted by the courts instead of fixed by legislation, then you pick an originalist.  

Unless Google is missing articles with the clear statements Harris is asserting, I think she is making a multi-step series of plausible conclusions to let herself make a claim of something that did not happen.  Given that Trump speaks in headlines rather than crafted paragraphs, it is possible that there are some headlines somewhere that are actual quotes of an intent to require that his appointees overturn Obamacare.  Everything I am reading is more subtle than that and comes back to Salena Zito's key observation during the 2016 campaign.  That Trump's supporters take him seriously but not literally.  That his opponents take him literally but not seriously.  

I suspect that both Harris and Barrett are correct.  Harris is referring to her interpretation of Trump's choppy statements, choosing to hear him literally and reaching her conclusion that Trump made a litmus test requirement of his nominees.  Simultaneously, Barrett is (probably) correct that she doesn't recall Trump making such a claim because she took his argument seriously (he wants originalists who interpret the law as written and using that approach will accomplish his goal) and not literally.  

It is kind of moot anyway.  Ever since Bork, presidents have been careful to avoid asking nominees for litmus test requirements and nominees have been careful to avoid making such litmus test commitments.  They all truthfully decline in the hearings to forecast how they might decide a hypothetical case and they all testify that they have not made any commitments to decide cases towards one outcome or another.

It is understandable that opposing Senators would try to read the minds of the nominees but it can only be a shallow display of inference and accusation.  Not particularly courteous or edifying. 

And always with the two movies.