Judge Brett Kavanaugh, Trump's Supreme Court pick, is a stitch up job

The reason that Brett Kavanaugh was standing on the dais as Donald Trump's new Supreme Court pick this week is because he believes that presidents should never be indicted.

In fact he believes they should never even be placed under investigation.

In Kavanaugh's world, presidents are apparently infallible, so their powers should be unfettered. It's an alarming view because it's so profoundly un-American.

We elect presidents, we don't anoint kings. Trump is a ordinary politician elected by the people, he is not an anointed monarch selected by God.

But Kavanaugh clearly believes that Trump, like all presidents, is above the law. In his view no one has the right to investigate him or take legal action against him based on whatever their investigations may find. The president is and will remain untouchable.

Read that again because it's very important. Kavanaugh is saying that if he sits on the Supreme Court he will be a rubber stamp that absolves the president of any and all charges and misdeeds, even before those charges have even been heard.

That's why Donald Trump picked him, critics contend. The message that Trump is sending to Democrats is that he is gaming the Supreme Court, so even if they find ample evidence to impeach him, his carefully hand picked judges will absolve him of any and all culpability.

And most worryingly of all, now we hear that the months long process to appoint him began with the efforts made to reassure the retiring Justice Kennedy that his only successor would be his longtime mentor and friend Brett Kavanaugh.

If true, that means we no longer have a separation of powers in this country. That means Kennedy's chair could be on lock for 60 years. If it's true that a “deal” was made between the Supreme Court and The White House, it has arrestingly grave implications for the nation.

Source familiar tells NBC that Justice Kennedy had been in negotiations with the Trump team for months over Kennedy’s replacement. Once Kennedy received assurances that it would be Kavanaugh (his former law clerk) Kennedy felt comfortable retiring - @LACaldwellDC & @frankthorp

— Geoff Bennett (@GeoffRBennett) July 10, 2018

Yesterday on CNN the White House deputy press secretary Raj Shah did not deny an NBC report that Justice Anthony Kennedy had “received assurances” from Trump that if he retired, Kavanaugh - one of Kennedy’s former clerks - would be nominated to be his replacement.

Let's consider Kavanaugh for a moment. He's a reminder of just how far you can rise far in the game of life by sucking up and punching down. We have all seen it happen countless times in our professional lives, haven't we?

“The punishment for wanting to wear a mask is that you have to wear it,” wrote Oscar Wilde once, insightfully. Wilde was referring to the deeper notion that in order to become a thing, you sometimes have to give something up. Wilde often saw life as a sort of cold Faustian bargain, but one where the borrower often refuses to pay the bill when it comes due.

Wilde's most famous character was a distinctly Faustian creature named Dorian Gray. In his book The Picture Of Dorian Gray Wilde's title character expresses the desire to sell his soul to ensure that his picture ages and withers rather than him. His wish is granted. All of his ambition and cruelty and corruption wither the portrait, not the public man.

The world rewards his ambition, it indulges all his vices, and its the portrait that becomes twisted and misshapen over time as the man remains unlined and untouched.

Looking at the blank canvas face of Brett Kavanaugh as he was announced as Donald Trump's Supreme Court pick last night I saw a portrait of Dorian Gray. Kavanaugh is 53 years old but his face is weirdly characterless and – for his age – dramatically unlined, it's a blank portrait of a face really, leading to the question what lies beneath?

Beltway born and bred, Kavanaugh rose by placing himself within the orbit of powerful men like Ken Starr and George W. Bush. All of his life he has backed presidential power against the little guy, a sort of David versus Goliath in reverse.

Unlike Wilde's Dorian Gray, Kavanaugh's curiously characterless face is failing to hide the barely concealed extremism of his views. We should never give our political leaders complete impunity.

Nor should we sit there impassively when we are being baldly lied to. In his first speech to the nation Kavanaugh said this week: “No president has ever consulted more widely or talked with more people from more backgrounds to seek input about a Supreme Court nomination.”

Really? The world now knows Trump reportedly made his pick in close discussion with Kavanaugh's predecessor. Apparently it was a stitch up job.

Aditionally, Trump picked a white conservative married male. That's not exactly groundbreaking is it? And he picked him to cover his own posterior, not conduct the nations business. That's why Kavanaugh's appointment must be so strongly rejected.