Justice Antonin Scalia died last night in a Texas resort. Within hours of the news Senate Majority Leader McConnell once again announced his intent to thwart President Obama’s constitutional duty to execute the authority of the President. You’ll remember that on the very night of his first inauguration Republican luminaries of both the House and Senate met to plan their obstruction of the new President’s goals and actions. Now they’re doing it again.

“The American people should have a voice in the selection of their next Supreme Court Justice,” McConnell said in a statement. “Therefore, this vacancy should not be filled until we have a new President.”

This statement makes no sense whatsoever except to the fever-ridden right wing. The American people have a voice in the selection of the next Supreme Court Justice; they re-elected the current President by a wide margin just three years ago to do this part of the job as well as all the other things Presidents do.

If the President sends up a perfectly well-qualified nominee and the Senate Judiciary Committee refuses to hold hearings or vote, which is something the Chair of that Committee, Senator Grassley of Iowa intimated he’d do, it’ll be a test of nerves. How long can the Republican Senate stand it if the President comes out every day to the Rose Garden or to the Press Room at the White House and demands his nominee be approved? You know the evening news programs would play it up every evening.