The Associated Press reports Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy is retiring. President Donald Trump will have the opportunity to nominate a second appointee to the Court.
Kennedy has been the swing vote on an evenly balanced Court, voting sometimes with conservatives and sometimes with liberals. This has made him, in the opinion of many, the most powerful jurist in the nation, as he was often the fifth justice in a 5-4 decision, the other foursomes tending to vote reliably either "liberal" or "conservative." With him gone, liberals' hopes are dashed.
Presuming Trump selects a staunch conservative to appoint, I expect Democrats will do everything up to, and perhaps including, civil war to prevent that person being confirmed. This is likely to be the hill Democrats choose to die on.
A conservative court with a reliable 5 vote majority can roll back quite a lot of the so-called "social progress" Democrats have achieved. Expect to see the "resistance" increase by one or more orders of magnitude.
If someone reinvents another Weather Underground, by whatever name, I will not be surprised. Brace yourself, we live in interesting times.
