We begin with
The New York Times editorial board which writes in favor of the confirmation of Loretta Lynch as Attorney General:
By selecting Loretta Lynch as his nominee for attorney general, President Obama wisely hopes to avoid the drawn-out confirmation battle that a more controversial nominee, like Labor Secretary Thomas Perez, would have faced. [...] She deserves prompt confirmation by the present Congress, not only because she’s a solid choice but because a prolonged delay could open the door for political mischief in the next Congress, while leaving the Justice Department uncertain about its next boss. Attorney General Eric Holder Jr., who announced his resignation in September, says he will remain in office until his successor is confirmed, but it is in the nation’s interest to give the department a leader who can get to work as soon as possible.
Emily Badger at The Washington Post brings us more of Loretta Lynch's remarkable story:
In an earlier speech, she has also recounted the story of her great-great-grandfather, a freed man who re-entered slavery to marry the woman who became her great-great-grandmother. And she has described her own mother's history, picking cotton in high school so that her daughter would not have to. Of herself, Lynch said in a brief interview once, after graduating from Harvard Law School in 1984, she was often mistaken as a court reporter.
Her nomination suggests that the DOJ will continue its renewed focus under Holder on civil rights, both because of her record as a prosecutor and her personal experiences. But we may not hear her talk about them in quite the same way.
Much more on the day's top stories below the fold.
Ed Rogers:
To state the obvious, Republicans don’t need to be seen as gratuitously hostile to a black female nominee who has had a distinguished career in government service. Unless there is some stunning revelation that would disqualify her, Lynch’s nomination should be treated matter-of-factly, in a normal, mostly low-key process. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) set a positive tone by saying that the nomination process will be “an opportunity to refurbish the tarnished image of both the Senate and the Department of Justice.”
Another reason Republicans should have an accommodating attitude toward this nominee is that President Obama may end up regretting his selection. My experience in the White House and in observing Washington has taught me that the attorney general is the White House’s — and specifically the president’s — lawyer. This means that every now and then, the White House has to go to the attorney general and admit something has happened that needs to be kept quiet or handled in such a way that it doesn’t become a bigger problem. The president needs his lawyer to protect his interests; to be more than just a fine lawyer, but a friend, ally and protector.
Switching topics to the Affordable Care Act,
Dana Milbank takes a look at what's ahead in the Supreme Court:
So it turns out there is an Obamacare death panel after all.
It has nine members and it operates out of a marble building directly across the street from the Capitol.When the Supreme Court on Friday announced that it would take up another challenge to the Affordable Care Act in March, it delivered the threat of two mortal blows to the signature achievement of the Obama presidency.
First, it raised the possibility that the justices, who narrowly spared the law in 2012, will in June come out with a new ruling that would dismantle the law on different grounds. But even if the justices make no such ruling, the very act of taking up the challenge to the law will itself undermine the law. The justices announced their decision just a week before the open-enrollment period for 2015 begins — and the looming possibility that the high court will strike down the law will probably deter those who are considering signing up for its coverage.
Michael A. Cohen at The Boston Globe, though, says Obamacare isn't in such bad shape:
There’s good reason to believe that Obamacare is safe, but even if the Court were to rule against the government, it creates as many political problems for Republicans as it does for the White House. [...] At its core, the appeal has basically nothing to do with the law itself. Sure there are legal issues at stake, but they are patently ridiculous. For the court to rule against the government and strip away federal subsidies would be a political decision — not a legal one. That the at least four justices voted to take up this case is an indication of how politicized the Supreme Court has become.
Of course, that was also the case over two years ago when the Court first accepted a less flimsy but still rather suspect legal challenge and when Chief Justice John Roberts refused to fall in line with his other conservative/Republican-chosen colleagues and throw out Obamacare.
So it begs the question: Why two years ago, when killing Obamacare would have affected very few Americans and politically resonated almost completely in favor of Republicans, did Roberts fail to join his conservative colleagues — but two years later, after Americans have already begun benefiting from the law and when the political impact is hardly a slam dunk for Republicans would he decide to make a purely political decision now and eviscerate the law?
On the topic of voting rights,
Catherine Rampell sums up Republican voter suppression tactics:
Voter suppression efforts may have changed the outcomes of some of the closest races last week. And if the Supreme Court lets these laws stand, they will continue to distort election results going forward.
The days of Jim Crow are officially over, but poll-tax equivalents are newly thriving, through restrictive voter registration and ID requirements, shorter poll hours and various other restrictions and red tape that cost Americans time and money if they wish to cast a ballot. As one study by a Harvard Law School researcher found, the price for obtaining a legally recognized voter identification card can range from $75 to $175, when you include the costs associated with documentation, travel and waiting time. (For context, the actual poll tax that the Supreme Court struck down in 1966 was just $1.50, or about $11 in today’s dollars.)
Tom Keane says despite crushing loses, Democrats will rise again soon as the economy continues to improve:
Yes, things aren’t perfect. The rebound is slower than we’d like. Moreover, labor participation rates are still low (meaning many have simply given up looking for a job) and earnings for the middle class are rising slowly, if at all. Still, the latest data showed a drop in unemployment even as labor participation improved and concerns about economic inequality would seem to be a natural for Democrats.
So why didn’t Democrats get credit for this in 2014? Some argue that people just didn’t “feel” the rebound, and there’s much truth to that. Dry statistics weren’t enough to counter the waves of fear from the Great Recession that continue to wash over us.
Eventually those waves will recede. Thing will settle down and the mood of pessimism will lift. Politics tends to go in cycles. Democrats were in ascendency six years ago; Republicans are up now. That too will change as broad worries give way to narrow concerns, creating the perfect opportunity for Democrats to rebuild their coalition piece by piece by piece.
Lee Fang says the president can reform elections simply with a stroke of the pen:
There’s a powerful solution for disclosing the secret-money sloshing around in our political system. It does not require an act of Congress or action from any of the effectively toothless campaign-finance watchdogs, like the Federal Election Commission. In fact, this solution could be passed in an instant, and the only requirement for action is political will.
President Barack Obama can issue an executive order today that requires government contractors to disclose their dark-money campaign contributions.
Why doesn’t he? And why don’t campaign-finance-reform organizations push for such a fix?
Finally, if you read and share one article today, let it be this one by
Carl Chancellor and Richard D. Kahlenberg on class and inequality:
Three years ago, Kelly Williams-Bolar, a poor, single mother, stood in a Summit County, Ohio, courtroom facing a number of felony charges, including one count of grand theft. Her crime: stealing an education—estimated to be worth $30,000—for her two daughters.
According to prosecutors, Williams-Bolar, who lives in public housing in Akron, a once-booming industrial city that has fallen on hard times, illegally enrolled her two daughters in the affluent Copley-Fairlawn school district, a neighboring community in Summit County.