Apropos of absolutely nothing but the fact that I'm writing this piece on President's Day, I was reminded earlier that it's time for my annual perusal of Article II of the U.S. Constitution.
During this year's reading - again, for reasons entirely unrelated to any events that might have transpired over the weekend - a couple of clauses really grabbed me:
“Section 1: [The President of the United States] shall hold his office during the term of four years […].
“Section 2: [...] and he shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint [...] judges of the Supreme Court […].”
Straightforward enough, right? The president gets to be president for four years (per term), and it's the president's job to appoint new Supreme Court justices. Two simple but all-important mandates from the majestic scroll that governs this great republic.
But why did these clauses, in particular, stand out to me?
Well, I kinda lied about it having nothing to do with the events of this past weekend. You see, despite my usual aversion to hard drugs, it seems that on Saturday evening I slipped into a feverish crack dream in which a sudden vacancy on the Supreme Court drove America insane.
In this dream, a pack of crazed, power-hungry horror clowns - between gnaws of each other's flesh-stripped clown bones - shrieked at the prospect of the sitting president nominating a new justice. He should wait, they snarled, for one of them to take his place so they could fill the vacancy with their Dark Lord Pennywise.
Meanwhile, Senator Jowly McChickenjowls (a.k.a. Mitch McConnell) tried to convince America that Article II was nothing more than a flight of whimsy dreamed up in a sappy Aaron Sorkin drama. He argued that all presidential authority goes limp after three years, and he vowed the Senate wouldn't advise and consent to the president's Netflix queue, let alone any judicial nominee he had the gall to field in an election year.
The argument went that only a mad, ruthless tyrant would seek to fill a high-court vacancy before the people (no, not those people who voted for Obama in 2012 - some other people) had had their say.
These opponents claimed that doing so would shatter a precious American tradition that had stood for millennia, and swore on the holy shrine of their sainted Spirit Father (Ronald Reagan) that the exact same transgression definitely hadn't occurred 28 years earlier. You know, when he didn't nominate Anthony Kennedy, who was confirmed in the last year of his presidency.
* * *
For his part, the tweedy Constitution-nerd of a president stubbornly refused to heed such concerns, ignoring, as usual, those who only asked that he relinquish all power, admit his election(s) had been a freak accident of history, and hurl himself into the fiery abyss.
Instead, he brazenly announced his intent to keep on doing president stuff and comply with his Article II, Section 2 directive.
At this, the Senate's Meathead Caucus - while confessing that none of them had ever actually gazed upon the Sacred Parchment (but promising they would totally get to it at some point) - howled that such an outrageous power grab was soooo not cool, and threatened to run President Poindexter's court-packing shorts up the filibuster flagpole.
Yes, they would risk a republic-torching constitutional crisis just to show that goody-goody buzzkill in the White House what's what. Because patriotism.
* * *
Now it's Monday, and what a relief that I've awoken to sweet, serene reality.
No cynical hacks selectively voiding Article II clauses. No nakedly partisan attempts to diminish the president's effective tenure. No denial of the chief executive's right to nominate Supreme Court justices. Because that kind of insanity can only be conjured in the fog of a psychedelic night terror.
Thankfully, we exist in a world where responsible Constitutional Conservatives are running the show - righteous guardians who would never subvert a single clause of our cherished founding document, or ever dream of shirking their own constitutional obligations.
So, reassured in the knowledge that Article II of the Constitution still stands, and that the unbridled stupidity of a constitutional showdown isn't upon us, it's time for me to go online for the first time since Saturday morning and see what news, if any, might have broken over the weekend.
Happy President's Day.