Markos Moulitsas: A bad week for the GOP

If you’re one of the nearly 20 Republicans running for president next year, you need to find a way to differentiate yourself from the herd — so you’re probably grateful to the conservative-led Supreme Court for chumming the waters last week. 

To be sure, Americans by and large rejoiced as a majority of the court made marriage equality a reality across the land. But that didn’t stop Republicans from trying to get themselves cast as villains in a future movie about the gay civil rights struggle. 

{mosads}“The Supreme Court has spoken with a very divided voice on something only the Supreme Being can do — redefine marriage,” said former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who is apparently running for ayatollah instead of president. “I will not acquiesce to an imperial court any more than our founders acquiesced to an imperial British monarch.” 

By comparison, Bobby Jindal’s attempt to keep up with the fire and brimstone seemed timid: “Marriage between a man and a woman was established by God, and no earthly court can alter that,” said the Louisiana governor.

Similarly, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s complaint that access to equal protection under the law shouldn’t be decided by “five lawyers” (unlike the 2000 presidential election, and the opening of the floodgates to unlimited corporate money in politics) was pretty weak tea for the Tea Party. 

But Ted Cruz brought the fire, even as he revealed himself to have a tenuous grasp on the basic tenets of the U.S. Constitution. “[The decision] is lawless, and in doing so, they have undermined the fundamental legitimacy of the United States Supreme Court,” he said. The Texas senator added that the decision was “some of the darkest 24 hours in our nation’s history,” which puts into perspective the minor inconveniences of the winter at Valley Forge; the attack on Pearl Harbor; the assassinations of Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr.; the internment of Japanese in World War II; and, of course, 9/11. 

And if the marriage equality victory wasn’t a big enough blow to conservatives, the court also reaffirmed the Affordable Care Act, this time by a comfortable 6-3 margin. 

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio decried the court for “once again err[ing] in trying to correct the mistakes made by President Obama and Congress in forcing ObamaCare on the American people.” Apparently Rubio wants the court to legislate from the bench. 

“There isn’t a ‘do-over’ provision in our Constitution that allows unelected, SCOTUS judges power to circumvent Congress & rewrite bad laws,” said Huckabee on Twitter, somehow under the impression that the court had rewritten anything, as opposed to affirming the intent of Congress. Of course, the entire Republican field promised to “repeal and replace” the law, despite having no viable replacement proposal at hand.

Lost in the hubbub of those two epic decisions was another allowing nonpartisan commissions to draw legislative districts. With the GOP’s declining appeal among mainstream Americans, Republicans increasingly depend on gerrymandering to maintain their legislative majorities. Fair, contiguous borders are their greatest enemy. Subverting democracy is their greatest hope.

The court did give conservatives some good news. It made it more difficult for the EPA to limit arsenic and mercury emissions from power plants, while also upholding the barbaric use of midazolam to execute death row inmates. 

But, all in all, as much as conservatives love poisoned air and torturing people to death, it was a bleak week for those hoping that the conservative court would rid them of affordable healthcare and loving relationships.  

Moulitsas is the founder and publisher of Daily Kos.