Jesse Ventura: Constitution gives Obama right to pick SCOTUS justice

Both sides are politicizing the nomination of one of the most crucial roles in our nation. In an unprecedented move, President Obama even took to the SCOTUS blog, saying he will move forward on selecting a replacement for the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

It’s obviously important to President Obama and the Democratic party that he nominates a Supreme Court Justice while he’s still in office during an election. They don’t want to lose that opportunity and want to the party to continue to hold the White House.

If Republicans refuse Obama’s nomination, this will likely rile minority voters, which could tip the scales of the presidential election in the Democratic party’s favor.

Let me state again that I am not a Democrat or Republican. My view is this: President Obama should absolutely make the pick for Supreme Court Justice. He would be going against the Constitution if he doesn’t. The Constitution gives the President of the United States that right. The ‘Thurmond Rule,’ named after former U.S. Senator Strom Thurmond, has been thrown around a bit recently, claims that judicial nominees shouldn’t be confirmed 6 months before an election. But that rule is made-up (by Thurmond himself), not even legally binding, and we still have time to go. Republicans always talk about following the Constitution, but, now, they only want to follow the Constitution when it benefits them.

This is how ridiculous these two parties have gotten. I know Democrats are guilty of this as well. You see the same arguments being made from both sides at different moments in time.

If a Republican were president - say Mitt Romney - do you think for a moment the GOP would be saying we should wait until after the election? This is so politicized, it makes you want to throw up.

We have over nine months left and cannot wait longer to nominate a Justice. Rather than doing what’s best for the country, they’ll do what’s best for their political party and donors.

The point of the matter is we should follow the Constitution. That’s the fabric of country and it doesn’t put a time limit on how much time the president has left.

Case closed.

-Jesse Ventura

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