Considering how crazy and dysfunctional Congress is at the moment, I consider it a minor miracle that the Senate voted today 98-0 to confirm the first openly gay man to a position on any Federal Circuit Court. Judge Todd Hughes almost definitely would have received 100 votes if all the senators had participated, as it was two Democrats (Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire and Mark Udall of Colorado) who missed the vote.
There is now a majority of Democrat-appointed judges on the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which is something most people won’t care about, but that still matters a lot. They handle everything from issues affecting federal employees, including veterans, to patents and international trade. There are even some energy policy issues under their jurisdiction, so climate change could be positively impacted.
For the record, Senator Marco Rubio quickly made the Senate dysfunctional again when he withheld his support for William Thomas’s nomination to the U.S. District Court. Rubio said it was because Judge Thomas went soft on a drunk motorist who hit a bicyclist (never mind that the prosecutor in the case says Thomas ruled correctly) and because Thomas ruled a confession inadmissible in another case (a ruling which was affirmed on appeal in a case where all the defendants were still convicted or plead guilty). I’m 100% sure the fact Thomas happens to be a gay African-American has nothing to do with Rubio’s opposition.
See, that would be accentuating the negative.
This court is what screwed up the patent system. Maybe they can reverse some of the damage so the people who work there will stop getting blamed š
The Tea Party will go
crazycrazier!