During the course of the last four years, we have heard every excuse in the book as to why Republicans can’t do something that they are entitled to do. Most of the time, it is some appeal to fairness, or justice, or some other appeal to emotion, but never do Democrats argue that the Constitutionally-appointed rules are being broken. The issue isn’t that Democrats are actually being treated unfairly. The rules have been clear. The communicating of ideals has been equal. They have run for the same offices, in the same states, in the same country as Republicans. It is that they have lost. Now that their failures have mounted to the point of cementing their legacy of failure for the next couple of decades, they want to change the rules.
We all know the rules of football. Should we start deciding who wins by who carried the ball more? In baseball, should we decide victors by who had more hits? In hockey, should it be who took more shots? Of course not. The rules of the game are written in advance so that all parties participating in the game, know how to succeed from the onset.
The rules for our country have long been written. Democrats know that to win the presidency, they need a majority of electoral votes. They know they need a majority of votes in the Senate and the House to push their agenda. They know they need a majority on the Supreme Court to defend their policy. The rules for the “game” are clear. Democrats don’t hate Republicans for their ability to conduct the business of government as they see fit. They hate the Constitution and many of the rules they’ve instituted because now, they’ve lost.
It isn’t like they haven’t tried to play the game. It’s just that… well… they suck at it.
This isn’t new either. Back in 1937, during the Roosevelt administration, Roosevelt was frustrated with the fact that he couldn’t act as emperor supreme (you know, besides that whole 4 terms as President thing) and enact his New Deal policies without them being ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. What did Roosevelt do? He suggested adding new judges to the court, to “pack the court” with judges favorable to his cause. While ultimately the measure failed, the idea was planted.
When Democrats exercised the “nuclear option” and changed the rules of the Senate in 2013 to eliminate the filibuster, almost every Republican spoke from the floor telling Harry Reid and the Democrats, “You’ll be sorry.” And sorry they are. Since the change of the rules, Trump has nominated and confirmed 2 (soon to be 3) Supreme Court Judges, dozens of circuit judges, and numerous other federal judges along the way. Trump’s agenda would have been greatly frustrated without Harry Reid’s rule change.
Throughout the Obama Administration, President Obama ruled by imperial decree executive order, stating that if Republicans were not going to go along with his legislative agenda, he would just do it himself. Republicans warned that doing so would set a precedent for future Republican Presidents to do the same. Democrats cheered as Obama bypassed the legislative process. Now they scream in horror when Trump does.
You’ll never stop hearing the shouts of “we won the popular vote!” Their calls for abolishing the electoral college don’t stop. Why? Because of the Democrats’ embarrassing defeat in 2016 showed them that when they have to play by the current rules, they lose. They want to impeach Barr for…. exercising his Constitutionally-appointed power. They want to impeach Trump again for… exercising his Constitutionally-appointed power. See a pattern here?
Here we are, beating the Democrats at their own game again and again, so what do they propose? Changing the rules again. Dems, instead of trying to appeal to voters in areas they know they are losing, are proposing to make D.C. and Puerto Rico states, thus awarding their party an additional 4 Senators. They have proposed reapportionment of Senators, because apparently, Wyoming doesn’t deserve the same amount of Senators as California, even though that’s exactly what the Constitution stipulates (as a part of the compromise between population-based apportionment in the House and State-based apportionment of the Senate). Now comes the threat that if Republicans use their Constitutionally-bestowed power to confirm a new Supreme Court Justice, the Democrats will “pack the court.” They want to expand the size of the court (though current rules limit the court’s size at nine) because they lost these three seats fair and square. Democrats aren’t mad that Republicans get to nominate and confirm a Justice of their choice. They are mad that they don’t. End of Story.
Which brings me to this thought exercise: Take a minute and try to think of a time, in the last 50 years, that Republicans have either changed procedural rules (or threatened to do so) in response to Democrats’ exercise of a legal, Constitutionally-appointed power? Sure, they’ve threatened to use the newly appointed power or rule change once they are in power, but when have they ever explicitly changed or threatened to change rules? Can’t think of a time? Neither can I. Now, do the same with Democrats.
The old sayings “the rules are rules” and “elections have consequences” have never been more true. The only difference is that Democrats don’t want to live by either. Sorry guys, those are the rules.
