Gorsuch will continue the judicial assault on voting rights, on women's right to reproductive-health services, on equal rights for the LGBTQ community. He will revive the conservative majority on the Court to push its effort to establish corporations as superhuman in the law, so that corrupting our elections becomes protected speech, depriving employees of basic rights becomes protected religious freedom, regulation becomes suspect intrusion. Democrats should be informing Americans why his nomination should be rejected, no matter what Putin and Trump did or didn't do.
This is a question of focus. Democrats can and should pursue an independent, forceful investigation of Russian interference in our elections. But they, and the resistance that drives them, should concentrate their energy and resources not on the past election or Trump's constant circus but on the corrupted policies that he seeks to inflict on America.
We've seen a variant of this before when Newt Gingrich's Republican Congress pursued the impeachment of Bill Clinton. There the offense and legal violation -- lying under oath -- were known. Republicans pounded on that; Clinton focused on jobs and protecting Social Security and Medicare.
An organization named MoveOn was formed, enlisting millions to demand that the Congress move on to address the issues of concern to the American people. Gingrich ignored the call. Republicans got slaughtered in the midterms and Gingrich resigned as Speaker.
Trump mortifies with his antics and corruptions, but he is savaging Americans with his policies. Democrats must expose and resist those policies while showing Americans that there is an alternative.
cross-posted from The Nation
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