Upsetting America’s impeccable balance
Complaining about delegates and obstructing the Supreme Court nominee are tantamount to throwing rocks at a system that has performed a 230-year high-wire act.
The Executive Branch selects its nominees and eventual winner based on a somewhat parliamentary process of voters electing delegates and based on that selection, suggesting who their preference is. In the end, within the parties it is up to their party delegates to choose their nominee. So yes, it’s rigged. In this case and the case of the Electoral College, one person=one vote is not how it works. See Gore “victory” in 2000.
The Legislative Branch is what you’re looking for when it comes to one person/one vote. Those elections are pretty much based on popularity.
The Judicial Branch, on the third hand, is — beautifully — intended to be based on fate. When our nation was born life expectancies were lower and the sitting president would simply appoint a nominee based on whenever the heavens created a vacancy. This makes the balance of the court shaped almost mystically, influenced partly by a long winning streak by a single party in the presidency. The balance of the court up until Justice Scalia’s death was tilted conservative since the early 70’s but it had only a slight edge because generally the presidency has been passed back and forth evenly. Reagan (8 years), and the Bushes (12 years between them) appointed 5, Clinton (8 years) and Obama (8 years) 4. Fate would have that the balance will tilt by one, with Democrat Obama filling a previously conservative-leaning vacancy, during his presidency.
Now, in this case a “rigged” system of selecting the president does influence the “mystical” judicial nominee system. But the Senate selected by “1 citizen=1 vote” advises and consents on the selection.
Party rule + one vote + fate. Three forces come together to shape our government. The recent complaining about the delegate process and the stonewalling of the Merrick Garland nomination threaten to throw this beautiful system out of balance.
