Ep 18 ｜ Who Is Kavanaugh？
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Summary
On the heels of President Trump's announcement of Brett Kavanaugh as the next Supreme Court nominee, the reaction from both sides of the aisle and Ken Klukowski's interview with me on the First Liberty Institute, I discuss who Brett is and why he should be on the court.
Transcript
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What's up, guys? First ever Tuesday podcast. First podcast being videoed for CRTV.com,
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which is really exciting. As you guys know, Relatable is now going two times a week on
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Tuesday and on Thursday. This is the first week that that is happening. So I'm really happy about
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that. And we have a lot to cover today because last night, President Trump chose Kavanaugh as
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the nominee for the next Supreme Court justice. So I'm going to quickly go through who Kavanaugh is
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or everything that I know about who he is, the reaction of people on both sides of the aisle.
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Then I'm going to interview attorney Ken Klukowski from First Liberty Institute. That's an organization
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that fights for religious liberty. He is going to give us deeper insight into Kavanaugh, how we can
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expect him to judge and this crazy uphill battle that we're likely going to have over the next
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few weeks and months. So we'll be getting his expert opinion on all of that. As you can imagine,
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just like every other day since 2015, liberals and Democrats in Congress are very, very upset.
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They are mad, mad, mad, mad, mad, saying that Kavanaugh is some right wing ideologue who is going
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to overturn Roe v. Wade, ruin the environment and constantly side with big business. They have
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gotten right to their fear mongering. Actually, it happened before he was even nominated. I promise
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you that Trump could have nominated probably Maxine Waters herself or Mother Teresa incarnate,
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and they probably would have still been upset. But they are trying to work up the public. So the public,
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in turn, puts pressure on their senators to vote against Kavanaugh. This is all a political tactic
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going into the midterms. Like I said, they were upset about the Supreme Court pick before Trump even
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announced the pick. No matter what, they would have been outraged. They know that the more outrage they
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can drum up, the better their chances probably are come November. People were protesting with Planned
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Parenthood signs before the announcement was actually made. Elizabeth Warren, of course,
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was was ready with all of her talking points to go on MSNBC last night, right after it happened,
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telling us all just how completely awful this is, how this is just a political decision.
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Democrats are saying that the only reason that Trump picked Kavanaugh is because in 1998,
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so a long time, 20 years ago, Kavanaugh wrote that Congress should make a law protecting a sitting
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president from being indicted. They're saying that he picked Kavanaugh for personal, selfish reasons.
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That to me is just complete conjecture. And that also assumes that Kavanaugh doesn't have any other
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qualifications. And that's just not true. I think that Trump picked Kavanaugh because he has a lot
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of experience. He has spent 12 years on the D.C. Circuit Court. He has a lot of support from
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conservatives. Now, some people on the right are saying that Kavanaugh hasn't been conservative
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enough. A lot of people were hoping for Amy Barrett. I was hoping for Amy Barrett, who is
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outspokenly. I don't want to say she's outspokenly conservative, but she is outspokenly pro-life and she
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is a textualist and originalist. She's also younger than Kavanaugh, so she would have been on the court
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for longer. But still, people are saying that there is hope for her once another justice retire
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or sadly dies. For now, we have Kavanaugh. Ben Shapiro, for example, has outlined his concerns
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with Kavanaugh. And I am apt to trust Ben Shapiro on these kinds of matters. But most of the conservative
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analysis I've read is satisfied with Kavanaugh's history of jurisprudence. I'm not going to go through
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every single disagreement that conservatives have on this because you can easily look it up online.
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And honestly, the arguers probably do a lot better job of outlining their own positions than I can.
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But whatever the difference is, I think something that all conservatives, everyone on the right can
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agree on is that Kavanaugh is a much better pick than anyone Hillary would have picked. Democrats do
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have reason to be worried, to be concerned. If it was Hillary picking a nominee, Republicans would be
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doing the same things. In fact, we did do a lot of the same things. We did have a lot of the same
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concerns when Obama wanted to nominate Merrick Garland to take the place of Scalia. Kavanaugh is part of the
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Republican establishment in D.C. He worked for Bush during the election recount in 2000. Before that,
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he worked under Kenneth Starr, the independent counsel that led to or that led the investigation
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that led to Clinton's impeachment. And it was actually Kavanaugh himself that was the main author
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of the ultimate Starr report. So you can bet that Hillary Clinton probably wouldn't have nominated
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Kavanaugh. In 2006, he was hired to the D.C. Circuit of Appeals, where he's been a part of over 300
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opinions. He has a ton of history, and I think he's only 53. He clerked for Justice Kennedy,
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who was appointed by Reagan, whom he's obviously replacing now. He worked in the Bush White House
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for several years and is fully endorsed by the Bush family. George W. Bush sent a letter last night
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saying that it was a great decision by Trump. Now, his connection, Kavanaugh's connection with the Bush
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family actually at one point was working against him, according to Trump or in Trump's mind, because
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Trump doesn't like the Bush's, which, in my opinion, is stupid. But that's neither here nor there.
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Elizabeth Warren on MSNBC last night called Kavanaugh a political animal, whatever that means.
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I don't even I don't know what that means, but I highly doubt she knows what that means either,
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because everyone, especially every woman on the left, is just illogically and well, I won't say
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illogically because I understand, I guess, from their perspective why they're mad, but overwhelmingly
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upset because they claim that Kavanaugh is anti-choice. There are two recent cases that lead
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them to believe this. In 2017, he ruled against providing an abortion to an illegal immigrant
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teenager because it would make the U.S. government complicit in something it finds morally objectionable,
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or that's at least the quote that I found. I'm not sure if that's actually a direct quote,
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because what I've actually heard is that he just thought that it expanded abortion rights to be
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universal to people that are not citizens of the United States. And he thought that that was
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too much of an expansion, which makes sense. And in 2015, he said that Barack Obama's contraception
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mandate infringed on the rights of religious organizations who had objections to providing
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or covering contraception for their employees, which, duh, that's not a matter of being pro-choice
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or being pro-life. That's a matter of religious liberty, which, hey, if you like the Constitution,
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which we know Democrats don't, then you should be an advocate of religious liberty.
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Kavanaugh has never said, though, in all of that, he's never said that he would overturn Roe v.
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Wade. Now he's Catholic. He is a family man. He had his two cute daughters on stage with him last
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night when he was speaking. He is a Republican as far as we know. So I would guess that he is
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probably pretty pro-life himself, but he has restrained from commenting directly on Roe, which
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is probably partly why some conservatives think that he's not actually pro-life enough compared to
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someone like Barrett, who has made her views on abortion clear. But Democrats absolutely feel that
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Roe was in danger of being overturned. I want you to listen to what Cecile Richards,
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the CEO of Planned Parenthood, had to say about this on MSNBC last night.
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And I think one of the things to look at is not only who we're seeing in opposition to this
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nomination, but I noticed before I came on tonight, Lawrence, that every major national
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anti-choice organization is popping the champagne tonight, saying this is a huge victory,
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finally to get a, you know, anti-choice majority on the Supreme Court. So I think it is going to be
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incredibly important in these hearings to push this judge about where he feels and where he stands on
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a case that was decided 45 years ago, Roe versus Wade. I mean, that is music to my ears.
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That's music to my ears. I'm glad she's scared. I am popping champagne bottles. But see, here's the
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thing. The left does not care at all about the Constitution. They are only concerned with the
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protection of their political agenda. So you never hear them talk about the constitutionality
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of Roe v. Wade. You just hear them say, well, you know, it's settled law. It's been around for 45
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years. Well, yeah. Well, OK. Slavery was also settled law. Segregation was settled law. Women not having a
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right to vote. That was settled law. Since when is settled law an argument for the legitimacy or the
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morality of a case. And I think that liberals know that somewhere deep down in their little
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minds, they know that they know that Roe v. Wade was a poorly decided case. If they thought that it
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was a rock solid constitutional decision, do you really think that they would be worried? No. But
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they know that there is no merit, was no merit and still is no merit to say the 14th Amendment's
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right to privacy protects the murder of an unborn child. So they're scared. This is the number
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one thing that they are concerned about. They will be walking around, no doubt, in costumes from
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Handmaid's Tale for the next four months until the midterms convincing women that Kavanaugh hates
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hates them and is going to take away all of their rights, which is not true in any sense. Number one,
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you shouldn't have a right to kill someone. So you can jot that down. Number two, Roe v. Wade probably
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is not going to be overturned. I would I would love for it to be. I mean, you just heard Cecile
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Richards. It could be. But I think the most that we can hope for is that in its overturning
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that the the states would just have the freedom to do what they want with abortion if they so choose.
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If they want to ban abortion, they can. There will still be, unfortunately, a plethora of pro-abortion
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states where women can just get in their cars and go have an abortion. So the melodrama is really
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all a show. It is all politicking. It is all a ploy to encourage more outrage against Donald Trump.
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It doesn't matter that Kavanaugh went to Yale Law School, teaches at Georgetown, at Harvard,
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at Yale, or that he was hired at Harvard by Justice Kagan, a very liberal justice,
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or that according to his former classmate, he enjoys the company of a lot of liberal friends
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and he entertains a lot of different viewpoints in his everyday life. None of this matters because
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the progressive agenda is at stake. The Constitution be damned. The progressive agenda is at stake.
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And Kavanaugh is an originalist, according to quite a few people, including J.D. Vance,
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who is the author of Hillbilly Elegy, who had Kavanaugh as a professor. So yeah, to people who hate the
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Constitution, Kavanaugh is probably a little bit scary, but I don't really have that much sympathy for
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people who live in the United States and don't appreciate our founding documents. Forgive me.
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All in all, is he as conservative as Amy Barrett? Probably not, which could be why Trump picked him.
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He probably thought it would be easier for him to get through the Senate, which that's that's probably
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true, I guess. I don't I don't know, though. I don't know if that's true. Like I've said, I have a hard
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time believing Democrats in the Senate would be OK with anyone Trump nominated. So it's going to be
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a really fun few months. And by fun, I mean, really annoying, but but also exciting. That's going to
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give us a lot to talk about. OK, here to dig a little bit deeper is an expert giving his legal
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opinion. Ken Kulkowski from First Liberty Institute. Ali, thanks for having me. OK, so what do you make
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of Kavanaugh's nomination? I think that President Trump's selection of Judge Brett Kavanaugh for the
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U.S. Supreme Court is a solid win for the American people in the Constitution. I think this is promise
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made, promise kept once again on the part of the president. Judge Kavanaugh has shown over the 12
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years that he's been on the second highest court of the land, the D.C. Circuit. He's shown how brilliant
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he is, how eloquent he is. But most importantly, he has shown and he reaffirmed verbally last night
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in his televised remarks that he believes that the Constitution of the United States must always
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and only be interpreted according to the original public meaning of its words. And that is that kind
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of originalism is exactly what the American people should expect and even demand of their Supreme Court
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justices. And it's what President Trump promised that he would deliver. So there's been a lot of
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back and forth among conservatives about just how originalist, textualist he actually is. Do you think
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the concerns from some conservatives that he's not quite enough of a constitutionalist, do you think
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those are valid or not really? I do not think that they are. I've been reading through all of the
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decisions. Of course, I've been reading his decisions for, you know, for the better part of
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a decade. But it's as I've been reading through the decisions that people that certain activists have
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tried to flag. What about this one? What about that one? In each case, I've seen a judge who is both
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going as far as he's allowed to, but also has explicitly acknowledged that he is a judge on an inferior
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court. And as so, he is absolutely 100% subordinate to the Supreme Court of the United States. And if
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the Supreme Court hands down a liberal precedent, he as an appeals judge has no choice but to follow
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that precedent. So no, it seems like the only criticisms I've heard from some people, they've
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been criticizing him for not sort of acting in a as a judicial activist of striking the tone as if he
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were already on the Supreme Court and defying the court that the Constitution commands him to be
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subordinate to. So no, I see that as following the rule of the law and the Constitution.
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Right. Because some people are saying, like, for example, in the case with the illegal immigrant
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teenage girl who wanted to get an abortion, he ruled how conservatives would want him to rule by
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saying, you know, we should should not be granting that we would be morally complicit. However, some
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people are saying that he didn't go far enough in his decision that he didn't say he didn't talk
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about the damage that Roe v. Wade has done. Do you think that there is any credibility to that
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criticism? Not only do I not think it's credible, I think it would be improper for him to do so.
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An inferior court judge. And that's the term that the Constitution use is inferior courts. Inferior
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court judges do not criticize, should not criticize the U.S. Supreme Court. They are there as their
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subordinates. You know, you can't criticize your superior officers in the U.S. military. Lower court
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judges are not supposed to criticize the Supreme Court. He went as far as he could in the pro-life
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direction under existing Supreme Court precedent. He said that what the ACLU was trying to do in that
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case, he said, would be a radical expansion of abortion jurisprudence. So, I mean, when you're
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using words like radical, those are very, very strong words for a judge to use in an opinion.
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I saw that as a very solidly pro-life decision where he stayed within the bounds of what the
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Supreme Court gave him no choice on, but made him clear that he was going as much in the pro-life
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direction as possible. So, no, not only do I not think that he should, not only do I reject the idea
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that he should have been criticized for that decision, I think he should be praised for that
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decision because he struck a pretty bold move. You know, a lot of people on the left, for example,
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Cecile Richards, CEO of Planned Parenthood, she was on MSNBC last night and she was talking about
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how worried she is about Roe v. Wade being overturned. And she was saying there are at
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least a dozen cases that are just one decision away from going to the Supreme Court that are related to
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abortion. And I haven't even heard conservatives say that. So, to me, the fact that people on the
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left and pro-choice people are so worried about that tells me that Kavanaugh probably has a pretty
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strong pro-life constitutionalist record. If he didn't, then they wouldn't be so worried about that.
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But the fact that they are shows me, number one, Kavanaugh is probably not going to rule in the way
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that people like Planned Parenthood want him to. And then also, it shows me that they believe that
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Roe v. Wade isn't constitutionally sound. Because if Roe v. Wade was constitutionally sound,
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they wouldn't be worried about it being overturned, right?
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Well, I'll tell you, Ali, I think that the idea of overturning Roe v. Wade has been a scare tactic
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that the left has been using for decades now. The reality is there are nine justices on the Supreme
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Court. You need five to overrule Roe. There is only one justice on the Supreme Court who is on record
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saying he would overrule Roe, and that's Clarence Thomas. I'm a pro-life American. I want to see
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Roe v. Wade overruled. I believe and I hope that one day that's going to happen. I do not think it
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turns on this Supreme Court appointment. I do not believe that it is likely that Roe will be overturned
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any time in the near future. What I do believe will happen is that we will see a significant
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that what I think most Americans, what polls show most Americans see as common sense restrictions
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on abortion, such as stopping late-term abortions, stopping pain-capable abortions, where after 20
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weeks an unborn child, their nervous system is formed and they can actually feel the physical
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agony of being torn apart or burned inside a mother's womb. I mean, just horrible, horrible,
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barbaric practices. I believe that legislation like that would be upheld in the direction that
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the Supreme Court is going. And I think the left knows that the vast majority of Americans support
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those restrictions. And so instead, they try and make it all about overruling Roe, which frankly,
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I just do not believe turns on this Supreme Court pick. What do you think the possibility is? A lot of
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people are saying the same thing that you are, and also that it could go to the states. And so
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obviously, states already have the right to kind of make some of their own regulations on abortion. But
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would it be possible that a state could absolutely ban abortion if that happens from the Supreme Court?
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Oh, actually, I should make clear what happens. If Roe v. Wade were overruled, that's what it would do
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is send the issue completely back to the states. Okay. So there's not a way that Roe v. Wade is not
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overruled, and it goes to the states only if it was overruled, would all the power go to the states?
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Only in so far. If Roe is overruled, it doesn't criminalize abortion anywhere. If Roe is overruled,
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it doesn't create pro-life policy. What Roe did is it took a pure state issue, and it federalized it
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entirely in the hands of the U.S. Supreme Court. To the extent that the Supreme Court issues pro-life
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decisions, all they're doing there is handing authority a piece of the time back to the states.
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Overruling Roe would hand it entirely back to the states. When I speak about the Supreme Court
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upholding common sense restrictions on abortion, like, again, stopping abortions from pain-capable
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unborn children, or stopping sex selection abortions, saying that you can have an abortion
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just because you don't want to have a girl. So if it's a girl baby, you just go ahead.
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Oh, so that's something that's happened. I mean, I guess, yeah, that's something that would be
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happening in the United States. If you can get an abortion anywhere, what's stopping someone from
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just saying, you know, I don't want a girl, so I'm going to get an abortion? I hadn't even
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thought about that. In fact, it happens. It happens a lot. In some countries, it's a driving
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force. Right, like China. But in this country, Planned Parenthood has opposed legislation that
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would say that you can't do that. So I think it shows how radical they are on this issue and NARO and
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their supporters. Insofar as those would be the kind of restrictions that then a state would be able
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to pass that I think the new U.S. Supreme Court would uphold. So I think that kind of common sense
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issue of giving parts of this issue back to the state, not telling states that they have to do it.
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I'm sure if you live in New York or Massachusetts or California or Illinois, it's still going to be
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abortion on demand in those states. And even if you live in a state that passes some of these
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common sense restrictions on abortion, you might have to drive a couple hours to a pro-abortion
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state next door. But you're still going to be able to get an abortion. Yeah, that's exactly right.
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You could still, if you live in Indiana, interstate travel is a constitutional right. So you could still
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drive across state lines to Illinois and get whatever abortion you're trying to get there. So that's why I
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see this as such a scare tactic from the left where they talk about things that are just
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counterfactual that are not at all true. It's like they're, I mean, they're basically saying this is
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the handmaid's tale and that, uh, you know, Christian conservatives, which I am a Christian
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conservative. I would love, uh, if abortion didn't just go away, but also that women felt like it was
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unnecessary, that they felt like they had the resources that they need to actually raise the
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child or put the child up for adoption. And there's so many non-government pro or program or
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organizations really that are helping that and allowing that to happen. So my dream would be not
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only that Roe is overturned, that, you know, abortion is banned everywhere, which is probably
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never going to happen, but also that women don't feel like they need to have an abortion. But you never
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hear that from Democrats. You never hear, we want to create a world in which this atrocity of
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abortion is not even thinkable or necessary. It's almost like they celebrate it. And when they're
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talking about who they want on the Supreme court, you never hear Planned Parenthood or NARAL talk about,
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you know, we want someone who's going to uphold the constitutionality of Roe v. Wade. We want someone
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who sticks to the constitution and we believe that Roe v. Wade is going to be held up. They're only
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talking about someone who is a political activist. And I think that's why they would be so
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upset by anyone that Trump had nominated because they are only looking for someone that's going to
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uphold their agenda. That's not what the Supreme court is supposed to do.
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Well, and, and in this case, uh, again, it's, this is a discussion that we may all end up having
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five years from now where we may, may end up having 10 years from now, but right now in 2018,
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you know, the, the left is trying to obscure everything by saying that this is the issue,
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uh, that they're trying to make this about when again, I'm, I'm persuaded that even though I'm
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pro-life, that the fate of Roe does not hang in this nomination. Uh, there are so many issues
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beyond. Yeah. Go ahead. Why, why, why is that? Why do you feel like it doesn't hang on this nomination?
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Uh, because I'm not confident that we have four votes to overrule Roe right now. Like I said,
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we only have one on record. We might have two, we might have three. Uh, I I'd be, uh, maybe we have
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four, but I'd be surprised if we do. And if we're not at four, then this pick doesn't get you to five.
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Uh, and, um, and again, and that's where I think insofar as abortion is involved at all
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in this nomination, I think that that's where we're talking about common sense restrictions that
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the super majority and overwhelming majority of Americans support, but also it is, we're talking
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about the totality of law, the rule of law in this country. And that's every issue that's religious
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liberty. That's free speech. That's the free exercise of religion. That's the second amendment.
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That's the 10th amendment. That's immigration. That's healthcare. That's federal regulation.
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Right. Uh, that's the size and reach of the federal government. All of that is what's involved
00:25:14.340
here. And what that all turns on is the philosophy by which a justice interprets the U S constitution.
00:25:21.760
And that is the one thing that the critics in this situation do not want to talk about. They don't
00:25:28.800
want to admit that this is a choice about, uh, uh, about someone who says that he believes his role
00:25:34.540
as a justice is to follow the law, the way it's written and to interpret the constitution according
00:25:40.220
to its original meaning and leave all of these issues to the American people to decide for themselves
00:25:46.540
that he understands that the Supreme court is not designed as a super legislator to sit there as a
00:25:52.840
bunch of philosopher Kings dictating to all of us, every aspect of how we're going to live in our life
00:25:58.400
that in, that in our democratic form of government, unelected judges have a small and modest role
00:26:05.620
empowering the people to make most decisions for themselves. And that's what I heard judge Kavanaugh
00:26:10.740
promise that he would do as a justice on the Supreme court. That's what the president promised.
00:26:16.020
And that's what the American people want. At first Liberty, you guys focus on one of the things
00:26:21.800
that you just talked about, which is religious Liberty. Um, I, I know of one case specifically
00:26:26.600
in 2015 where Kavanaugh ruled that, um, you know, uh, Obama's contraception mandate, uh, put undue
00:26:34.460
burden or was unfair, discriminated against religious organizations who didn't want to be forced to
00:26:40.680
provide or cover, uh, contraception for their employees. Um, how do you think that he is going
00:26:46.920
to rule on cases of religious Liberty? I think judge Kavanaugh on the Supreme court is going to be
00:26:52.180
fantastic on religious Liberty. We've seen multiple decisions from him at the DC circuit where they
00:26:58.920
don't even get as many religious Liberty cases. So even without getting that many of them, the ones that
00:27:04.900
he has gotten, he's hitting home runs on, uh, as, uh, as, uh, the case that you referenced there,
00:27:10.740
the priest for life case, uh, that, uh, judge Kavanaugh was clear that, that, that federal law,
00:27:16.880
and even if the federal law were not there, I would say the U S constitution would do it,
00:27:20.540
but that federal law, the religious freedom restoration act, it's, uh, gives people of faith,
00:27:26.620
uh, the right not to participate and become complicit in abortion, that the Obamacare abortion
00:27:34.020
pill mandate was a substantial burden on religious faith and that in that it was illegal under RFRA
00:27:41.880
and under the U S constitution. That was a perfect decision. Uh, another one is Newdow V Roberts.
00:27:47.540
That's where, uh, a militant atheist activist sued to stop John Roberts as chief justice from using the
00:27:55.160
word. So help me God. When he was administering the presidential oath, uh, the, um, uh, the DC circuit
00:28:02.860
ruled against him with, with judge Kavanaugh writing to say, and this is so important because moderate
00:28:10.220
judges could have sided with using those words, but doing so with real weak milquetoast language called
00:28:18.560
ceremonial deism. And, uh, and where you say ceremonial deism is the idea that some things are
00:28:25.000
just hundreds of years old. So you don't really mean them. They don't really have real religious
00:28:29.900
meaning, but we say them as a matter of tradition, they're just antiquated, they're harmless. And so
00:28:36.060
we let them go because everyone knows they don't really matter. He pushed back against that in his
00:28:40.960
decision. He said that prayer is a sacred act that is a profound importance to countless Americans
00:28:47.660
that, that, that, that they regard it as a sacred obligation to ask for God's divine blessing and
00:28:54.260
guidance on what they're seeking to do. And that it's insulting and demeaning to those people to deny
00:29:00.380
that prayers have meaning to deny that those words mean something. He faced it four square and said on
00:29:07.880
the merits that these things are good. These things are right. And the U S constitution, not only does it
00:29:13.540
not forbid them, it affirmatively protects them. And I thought that was a very bold move in favor of
00:29:19.740
religious liberty. And I think it gave us real insight as to what judge Kavanaugh will be like
00:29:24.580
on the U S Supreme court. I think supporters of religious liberty should be a big supporter.
00:29:29.180
Definitely. I, I say that I think, uh, conservatives should be excited, but really it's anyone who cares
00:29:35.720
about the constitution, which unfortunately today seems to be a more political stance to make. It used to be,
00:29:41.700
I think that it was both Democrats and Republicans who cared about the constitution. There were just
00:29:46.360
different kinds of interpretations of, uh, you know, what you thought the constitution meant,
00:29:51.460
whether it was living and breathing or a dead document. Um, now it seems to me, and I don't
00:29:55.980
want to lump all Democrats and liberals into one category, but it does seem to be that if you care
00:30:01.840
about the constitution, you are a conservative. Um, and so I think conservatives and anyone who cares
00:30:07.800
about the constitution should be happy about this picket, it's clear that he's not going to be some
00:30:12.240
judicial activist. He's going to have a restraint, which I think is something that we can all celebrate.
00:30:17.380
Um, but what do you think, this is the last question. What do you think the battle is going
00:30:22.060
to be like over the next few weeks and months? I mean, is it going to go, is it going to go through?
00:30:28.520
I think Democrats are going to try and make this political Armageddon. I think they're going to throw
00:30:33.600
everything, including the kitchen sink at judge Kavanaugh. I think they will slander him. I think
00:30:40.220
they will vilify him. And at the end of the day, I believe he will get all 50 Republican votes. But
00:30:46.020
more than that, I'll tell you the 10 people who should be freaking out the most right now are the
00:30:51.240
10 democratic senators in Trump States right now, because I believe judge Kavanaugh is going to be
00:30:56.420
very popular in those States. And I don't know how those senators, Joe Donnelly in Indiana and Joe
00:31:02.920
Manchin in West Virginia, Heidi Heitkamp in North Dakota, their base will demand that they oppose
00:31:10.020
him, but the swing voters that they need, the moderate voters they need to get reelected will
00:31:15.120
demand that he vote for them. And I'll tell you all of those senators, every, the question they're
00:31:21.480
going to be asked every single day between now and the final confirmation vote is, Hey, Senator
00:31:28.340
McCaskill, are you voting yes or no on judge Kavanaugh? And I don't care if she says, Hey,
00:31:33.900
let's talk about North Korea. Let's talk about education. Let's talk about healthcare. Yeah.
00:31:38.080
They're going to say, Hey, we'll get to all that later. Uh, uh, back to my question. Are you going
00:31:42.280
to vote yes or no on judge Kavanaugh from the Supreme court? This just became the number one issue
00:31:47.740
in the 2018 midterm elections in every Senate race and every red state across the country.
00:31:53.980
And it's an answer. And it's a question where any answer that a democratic incumbent gets
00:31:59.500
is going to alienate hundreds of thousands, if not millions of voters that they need to get
00:32:04.720
reelected. So, you know, I mean, they're having a pretty rough day today.
00:32:08.260
Basically this is going to be, which I guess it always is, but especially right now, since it's,
00:32:13.440
it's game time, we only have a few months until the midterms, it's going to be a PR battle
00:32:17.720
because it's going to be certainly Democrats, uh, putting pressure on the public to call their
00:32:24.180
senators, to pressure their senators to, uh, vote against Kavanaugh. Um, but the right conservatives
00:32:30.600
or anyone who wants Kavanaugh to be, uh, appointed or nominated is going to, uh, is going to have to
00:32:37.360
do the same thing. So it's going to be a PR battle of people on the right saying he's such a great guy.
00:32:42.100
This would be great for the country, no matter which side of the aisle that you're on. And then
00:32:45.320
you're going to have people over on the left saying, oh no, he is going to ruin your life.
00:32:49.260
And this is just another step in Trump's America or, uh, Hitler's America is basically the argument
00:32:54.680
that they're going to make. So it's going to be an uphill climb, but Hey, that's been the case
00:33:00.120
since Trump became president. That's what makes this exciting, right? Oh, this is a fight that I
00:33:05.060
think the president should embrace. It's one that, and that I'm sure he does that he welcomes. Uh,
00:33:10.580
this is not frankly, if Democrats were smart, they would want to get this over
00:33:15.200
in a week. Yes. Instead, this is going to go until right up before the midterm election.
00:33:21.560
It will dominate the airwaves every single day in all of the races between now and then
00:33:26.100
every minute that is spent talking about the Supreme court. This is the number one issue for
00:33:31.840
22% of voters. They went for the president by a margin of 57 to 41. Every minute of airtime spent
00:33:38.760
on this issue is going to pick up voters for Republican challengers to those democratic incumbents
00:33:44.760
and give the president a Senate that he can really work with for the second half of this term.
00:33:50.980
You're I mean, I think that's a, that's a really good point because they're not going to be able
00:33:56.060
to focus on immigration, the things that are going on at the border. They're not going to be able to
00:34:00.480
use tariffs at a talk as a talking point, as long as this is going on, this is really all people
00:34:06.880
are going to care about. So I think that's a really good point that I hadn't thought about. Well,
00:34:11.400
I'm really appreciative of you for giving me all of your insight. That was excellent. And I
00:34:16.460
personally learned a lot. Thank you, Ellie. Thanks for having me. God bless. Yes, you too. Thank you.
00:34:21.620
Okay. So there you have it. Our expert on the matter. Um, we are going to stay up to date as this
00:34:27.700
fight ensues, but to end all of this, I'm going to answer a question that's not related to this.
00:34:33.600
You guys send me questions for the podcast on Instagram all the time. And I really appreciate
00:34:37.560
that. Please continue to, or you can send me an email, Allie at the conservative millennial blog.com.
00:34:42.500
I love getting your guys's questions. I get a lot of them, so I can't answer all of them,
00:34:47.180
but I try to answer, I try to answer a couple every week. Anyway. Um, the question that I got
00:34:54.900
is about how to stand firm and love well in a culture that is antithetical to Christianity.
00:35:01.240
And so I think first we have to define love and the world has a different, has a different
00:35:07.860
definition of love than Christians do. The world will tell you that to love means to fully accept
00:35:13.780
someone's lifestyle choices, no matter what absolute and unconditional tolerance. You're
00:35:19.200
not allowed to tell someone that the way they're living is wrong, even if it hurts them, even if you
00:35:24.080
disagree, um, that is not love by the Christian definition. Now, are we supposed to meet people
00:35:29.020
where they are? Are we supposed to love them, um, without judgment, serve them without judgment?
00:35:36.740
Absolutely. But that doesn't mean that we're not supposed to speak truth. To me, the most loving
00:35:40.940
thing that we can do, at least to someone that, you know, I'm not talking about walking up to someone
00:35:45.260
on the street and telling them that you disagree with their lifestyle, but someone that, you know,
00:35:49.680
a friend that you have is to speak the truth in love is to tell them, is to tell them what God says
00:35:55.620
in his word. I mean, there are so many different cultural, sexual, moral issues today that Christians
00:36:00.560
are not allowed to speak up on because we are going to be labeled bigots. But I think the best
00:36:05.360
thing that we can do is to show the world, not just through our actions and our service, our generosity,
00:36:10.920
our selflessness, our sacrifice, just how loving we are, but also in our willingness and our boldness
00:36:16.180
in speaking truth. Because at the end of the day, yes, sure. People are going to call us bigots
00:36:21.400
for taking a stand on particular unpopular issues. But I think that it's okay if we look a little bit,
00:36:31.480
if we look really weird. I mean, think about Christians throughout the centuries and how
00:36:36.680
they've differed from the rest of the world. I think the danger is when our love in our lives
00:36:41.520
start to look like everyone else's definition of how we should love and how we should live.
00:36:46.500
We're supposed to be different. We're supposed to be on the margins of society. Our love should be
00:36:50.560
sacrificial, but it should also be truth-filled. So that means that we need to have compassion as
00:36:55.820
well as moral clarity. So I hope that makes sense. Anyway, thank you guys so much for listening. This
00:37:01.060
was really fun doing a Tuesday podcast and it's videoed. If you don't already subscribe to CRTV.com
00:37:07.260
and you would wish to see my face while I am talking on this podcast, you should do that. You can use
00:37:12.280
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00:37:16.800
Leave a nice review if you want to. If you have constructive criticism or suggestions for what
00:37:21.960
we should do for this show, please email me. I love hearing your feedback. Like I said,
00:37:26.500
Allie at the conservative millennial blog.com and have a great day.