The Kavanaugh Kourt

In my term summary for the Supreme Court, I observed that whether Gorsuch or Kavanaugh is more conservative is a complicated question, in that a Court with Gorsuch as the median vote would produce even more completely nutty far-right results, but since Gorusch’s idiosyncrasies make him more likely to cast material votes with the liberal bloc on this Court he probably leads to more liberal results than Kavanaugh. And in the sense of “who is least likely to produce a 5-4 liberal majority” the most conservative judge on the Court is Alito. (In the long term, the question is more complicated, as the concurrences and dissents of Thomas and Gorsuch can help push the aspirations of complete party-liners like Alito to the right in ways that are difficult to quantify.)

Anyway, the point here is that Kavanaugh is going to be a really, really awful Supreme Court justice:

“Going forward,” Brett promised, “you can count on me to be the same kind of judge and person I have been for my entire 28-year legal career: hardworking, even-keeled, open-minded, independent and dedicated to the Constitution and the public good.”

One Supreme Court term later, Brett has a record. We now know how he behaves when liberated from having to follow precedent, and when he is free to express his unvarnished views. That record tells us something important. It tells us that, in the crucible of his entitled madness, we saw the real Brett.

“What goes around comes around” is the real Brett Kavanaugh. We know this because we know how he’s behaved on the Supreme Court.

The details are all in Ian’s piece. I hope all the Yale liberals who lied about him enjoy the clerkships of their students.