What Went Down At The CNN Republican Debate

Trump’s rhetoric on Planned Parenthood is fascinating, and offers a glimmer of the hodge-podge of political views he’s held over his lifetime. During this 2016 run, he’s taken the standard Republican line that he would defund Planned Parenthood because the group provides abortions, but Trump went on tonight after giving that answer, to offer a line about the organization that you hear most often from Democrats, that it provides cancer screenings and regular checkups for many women. Moments like that stick out in this group of Republicans.

As the candidates debate the fate of the Supreme Court, many existing cases will end up in a 4-4 tie, leaving lower courts’ decisions intact. In some cases, like affirmative action, that may favor liberals; and in others, like a Texas abortion case, it may favor conservative positions. Anecdotally, in my conversations with voters, the fate of the Supreme Court nominations comes up heavily. But most Americans, according to a brand new Pew research study, don’t know much about the court or how it works, and 20 percent didn’t know Justice Scalia was conservative.

Is replacing Scalia on the Supreme Court a case where the hyperbole of its importance is warranted? Seems like Scalia’s replacement really does have the potential, depending on who’s confirmed, to reshape the court, and therefore the law?