I really don’t understand Republicans’ Congressional strategy. The whole country is mad at Congress for being ineffective and incompetent and they still won’t do their jobs. Instead, of announcing he’s doing something, Richard Burr yesterday told us he’s not going to do his job and he’s going to continue to leave the federal courts in North Carolina short-handed.

Yesterday, Obama announced he is nominating Patricia Goodson-Timmons, a former North Carolina Supreme Court Justice, to the federal court in Eastern North Carolina. The news was barely out before Richard Burr announced he would block the nomination. The court has had the vacancy for more than ten years. That’s right. The seat has been vacant for a decade and Richard Burr has stood in the way of filling it.

Burr blames it on Obama. Of course he does. Republicans blame everything on Obama. To hear them tell it, it’s Obama’s fault that the Republicans in the Senate can’t approve his Supreme Court nominee.

The rest of the country, though, sees a dysfunctional Congress. Obama’s approval ratings are climbing while Congress is still in the gutter. Telling the voters that you’re not going to do your job is not instilling any confidence.

If Burr were smart, he would schedule hearings. If Timmons-Goodson really has problems, they’ll come out then. Instead, Burr is now on record blocking nominees. He’s not only making Congress appear to be skirting its responsibilities, he’s hamstringing the court system, too. For people concerned that government is broken, Burr and the Senate are just confirming their fears.

14 Comments

  1. Https://youtu.be/

    Some times its a pain in the ass to read what blog owners wrote
    but this site is rattling user pleasant!

  2. Hawkeye

    First , may I thank you, Thomas Mills, for supporting traditional (post 1972, that is ) Democratic Party policies , and maintaining this blog. I am on a fixed income and in debt , so I can’t contribute.

    Anyhow , I get regular emails from Burr because I have signed several petitions.

    Burr is living in another era. His posts are full of photo ops with GIs , schoolchildren and bankers.

    He touts his ‘Cold War’ legislation against the Atheist enemy and hippie environmentalists.

    I’m waiting to see him post a Photoshop with Beaver Cleaver and Wally.

    I’m sure he gets his advice in the traditional manner , from his barber.

    Unfortunately , the USA lives in an time far removed from my childhood , so an effective politician needs to be aware of that.

    Burr is either unaware or deliberately misleading his constituents.

    Then again, I live in , and support , the ‘Cesspool of Sin’ , Asheville , so maybe I’m the one who’s out of touch. Tolerance and compassion aren’t part of the traditional American way.

    Get a job!

    Oh there aren’t many paying jobs anymore ; everything’s Part-Time these days , not many steel mill jobs left that you can raise a family on. (or Gerber and Ball that used to be here.

    And that can’t be blamed on the Clintons anymore. The worst occurred during Dubya’s reign , and he didn’t do a damn thing about it (same thing for illegal immigration).

    Hey! It’s dog eat dog and pull yourself up from those hidden chains that Burr profits from.

    • JC Honeycutt

      Dang, Hawkeye–What’s your secret? I’ve sent countless e-mails and signed countless petitions directed to Burr, and I’ve never had a response from him–not even a “go to hell” note. I think of him as NC’s “stealth senator”: even Thumb Tillis sends some sort of response, but from Burr, seldom (i.e. never) is heard a word, discouraging or otherwise. Of course, I live in the coastal area: maybe he (and other Republicans) figure we’ll be underwater soon (due to their policies) and so it’s not worth acknowledging our existence.

      • Hawkeye

        Dang JC , you misunderstand.

        All I get from these guys is an automatic, digital , chain-mail reply, what was called in the old snail-mail times , junk mail.
        I have never received any comments to a reply , usually negative , that I have sent .

        They are useful in that I get a keyhole view into the kind of politics these phony Republicans are spreading among the under-informed , and over-indoctrinated.

  3. Charles Hogan

    Well, Burr’s ALEC “MO” isn’t surprising at all, considering he is also part of the congressional nut basket “ The Freedum Causus™ ” along with Virginia Foxx which is currently responsible for all the things wrong with the federal government.

    North Carolina has never learned to stop trusting the scams of Northern snake oil sales men and carpetbaggers. It never turns out well when we let non-native borns run our state ..

  4. Cosmic Janitor

    Funny thing, Obama has bent over backward appeasing outrageous republican Congressional demands since he has been in office, most often over the interests of the people, and so much so that it appeared at times he is himself a closet republican – particularly when it comes to passage of these corporate free trade deals that give corporations power over sovereign governments and promoting the too numerous neo-con/corporate wars for profit. As such, you’d think Burr would embrace Obama’s judicial appointments, but republicans are so rabid that they bite the hand that feeds them, and our congressional democrats are no better.

    • Matt Phillippi

      Is there anyone you don’t hate?

      • Cosmic Janitor

        I call out ‘deception’ where I find it in our supposed democratic government and if you bothered to fact check what our corporately owned media tells you, you will discover that our Peace Lauriate president has now killed more innocent civilians than even George Bush, and what Mr. Obama and his republican neo-con warmongers have done in Libya, Yemen, Syria and Iraq – supposedly fighting ISIS, though the US. Military actions there look more like an attempt at destroying what little is left of that country, are outrageous war crimes and crimes against humanity in league with 1930’s Germany. Is this the ‘hope and change’ you expected from Obama? Not to mention extrajudicial drone killings that somehow only hit wedding parties, schools and hospitals, that have killed thousands of innocent civilians – oh, and the second drone attack always follows the first in order to kill the emmergency responders trying to help – so you approve of Mr. Obama’s actions as president Warhawks?

        • Matt Phillippi

          Do I agree with everything the President has done? No. Am I a realist about the unpleasant things a modern american president has to do. Yes. Neither of us has had to make the choices he has so neither of us are fit to judge those decisions objectively. Finally, you’re comparing our current moderate, technocrat President to the Nazis; your argument is invalid.

    • Matt Phillippi

      I am of course referring to your casual backhand of the President’s (admittedly futile in retrospect) attempts at bipartisanship.

  5. Norma Munn

    Did anyone really expect anything else from Senator Burr? Why change at this point? Nominee is from Pres. Obama. Will this conduct continue if a Democrat is elected in November? Will we see utter and complete gridlock on everything from Congress? The notion of checks and balances has become only “checks” — no balance, no compromise, only partisanship. How is that democracy?

  6. Russell Scott Day

    Substituting Rome for the USA every time you hear it and not nominating Judges is odd, or stupid as David Hume would say. You are right since Senators of Rome liked having the Judges do the dirty work. Blame it on the Court, blame it on the Judges. Don’t know but “I wash my hands of it.” was the common go for a mob.
    Working people could hardly care as they look out no further than three weeks and rent day coming. The poor have the pawnshop.
    No Democrat made anything of the Transportation Bill 5 year authorizations. Price wrote as aimed at what I thought was the deal, NC will get what the Generals want far as how the coast contributes. Running that road, superhighway, I thought Burr was aiming to make that happen.
    Next news is he won’t vote to confirm the Judge. It is not necessarily not doing his job. We can characterize it as how he sees to the responsibilities to his people. There may be people we will never know were protected by the cases that are supposed to come to the courts.
    For a summation of the real meaning I would ask Judge Exum who last I knew was teaching law at Elon, now a University.
    That blacked out coalition protest that was going on in Washington, DC demanded that the practice of Gerrymandering be completely eliminated. NC is a conservative place on land that allows it.
    There are hide outs.
    Still it would make you sure that votes were fairly apportioned if Gerrymandering was done away with. One man one vote? The Supreme Court will just beat the working classes against the corporations you discover were supposed to serve a greater good or see their charters yanked.
    Appointing Judges that would ever take the view that the little man is equal to the big man in the courts is the power of a good king. When it comes to Defense, the President is a stone cold killer. There is something to an execution only he and his watch as if it were the opposite of the Moon Landing.
    We all watched that together.
    On with the concepts of democracy.
    There are now lots of bad Bonds out there.

  7. Jay Ligon

    Sen. Burr is one of those conservatives who just ain’t right. He’s been wrong about pretty much everything since he went to Washington with his pockets full of money from Charles and David Koch and Art Pope. He has been a disgrace on foreign policy. He wrote to the leaders of Iran to undermine efforts to reduce the nuclear threat to the United States, the single most traitorous act by senators since Iran-Contra. He did so with the ignoble intention of obstructing President Obama, but Burr’s hatred of our president could result in fallout for the country, figuratively and literally. Burr opposes veterans’ issues, clean air and water, and education. If it helps the people of North Carolina, Burr will oppose it – unless his sponsors tell him to support it.

    It would be big news if he did anything at all that helped North Carolina or the nation. Burr opposed North Carolinian Loretta Lynch for Attorney General, for no apparent reason. If it doesn’t help his benefactors, Burr isn’t going to vote for it. Pleasing the Koch Brothers and Art Pope is his only mission in life.

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