Depressed (Part 3)

I had only intended for this to be a two part series but then this was posted on Facebook.

Senate Confirms Dangerous Religious Extremist Allison Rushing As Federal Judge
Pathos
By Michael Stone
March 9, 2019

More of that Christian theocracy: Allison Rushing, a dangerous religious extremist and former warrior for an anti-LGBT hate group, has been confirmed to a lifetime appointment as a federal judge.

Rushing was confirmed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit by the Senate earlier this week on a 53-44 party-line vote, with all present Democrats voting against her, and all present Republicans voting for her.

The confirmation makes Rushing, 37, the youngest federal judge in the country, and also one of the most dangerous.

Before being confirmed Rushing worked for the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian organization that has been classified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

In her writings, she has rejected the separation of church and state while arguing that “village secularists” and other “offended observers” should not be allowed to challenge government actions that violate the Establishment Clause which guarantees the separation of church and state.

As I wrote this morning this “judge” is sitting on the second highest court in the nation, she had no experience as a judge and her she was appointed to an appeals court… why?

The Washington Post wrote this about her,

Rushing’s confirmation drew quick condemnation from Democrats and civil rights and LGBTQ groups. Many cited her internship with Alliance Defending Freedom, an Arizona-based conservative, Christian legal nonprofit, which played an integral role in recent Supreme Court cases, including Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, in which it defended the Colorado baker who fought for the right not to bake a cake for a gay wedding. ADF was also successful in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, securing a ruling that allowed companies to opt out of covering contraceptives for employees because of the owners’ religious beliefs. In addition, Rushing defended the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, which defined marriage as between a man and a woman, and said she supported the four conservative justices who dissented when the Supreme Court struck down the ruling in 2015.

As the title of this article said… “She’ll serve for life.”

What Sen. McConnell did to President Obama judicial nominees, tore apart the Constitution. The Constitution says,

[The President] shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the Supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States…

McConnell failed in that duty for political advantages.

PBS Frontline reported,

When he took office, Trump had more than 100 vacancies to fill in the lower courts, including 17 in the U.S. courts of appeals — all of them lifetime appointments. The Supreme Court hears around 80 cases a year, while the courts of appeals handle tens of thousands of cases annually — often making them the last word in most cases that impact the lives of Americans
[…]
“I don’t know why Obama left that,” he added, referencing the vacancies. “It was like a big, beautiful present to all of us.”

That present, however, wasn’t from Obama. Just as McConnell helped cement a conservative majority on the Supreme Court for decades to come, judicial experts and journalists who spoke to FRONTLINE for Supreme Revenge, a documentary examining the political battle over the highest court, credit him with the holding the vacancies that Trump filled with conservative federal judges at a breakneck pace.

McConnell “completely changed the nature of congressional warfare against Obama and Democratic judicial nominees,” Norman Ornstein, a political scientist at the conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute, told FRONTLINE.

He politicized the judicial system for an entire generation and I do not know if the country will ever recover from the judges they were appointed because they put the Bible ahead of the Constitution.