People have been having fun with our poll questions, especially so last week with the one on "Saturday Night Live." This week we turn to a very big deal, Donald Trump's pick for the vacant Supreme Court seat.
The Supreme Court pick being up is what got Trump elected. Many Republicans showed up to vote for that reason or otherwise might have sat this one out. So at the rate that new White House breaking stories are being generated on a daily basis, we thought that we better get this one aired out now while we had the chance!
Before we get to that, let's finish up on the "Saturday Night Live" debate. The Post got a lot of letters and emails about that column and poll topic last week. On our Weekly Poll, 53.5 percent of you agreed that it has been "Hilarious! I can’t get enough."
The last episode of Saturday Night put Melissa McCarthy's version of Sean Spicer on a podium again, this time with a motorized set of wheels. I imagine the 53.5 percent liked that too. It was pretty funny.
They will need to find some new material soon, though. According to 29.8 percent of you, it has already gotten stale and unfunny: "Time to retire the boring and unfunny show." And an additional 9.5 percent are leaning that way: "It was funny at first but now it’s played out." When you add that to the 7.2 percent of our readers who feel that "It can be funny, but also a bit too disrespectful" - that's 46.5 percent who are not finding it totally hilarious.
The whole idea of a comedy show openly having a partisan mission I find very troubling. But it is equally troubling that President Trump keeps inviting this on himself so what can you say, really? I mean, when the President of the United States keeps attacking people on Twitter, what have we come to?
In a previous column, I predicted Trump will very possibly not survive one term and that it will be his own party that pulls the plug. That still looks very possible to me. I hope he can get his administration, the media and the country settled down soon for the good of America, but the verdict is sure out on that one.
On a brighter note, I personally think that Trump's nomination of Neil Gorsuch to fill the Supreme Court seat – vacated by the unexpected death of the conservative but highly respected Antonin Scalia – was his first home run.
You never know about how a judge will be once they get on the court. In general, it is likely that liberals will not like him and conservatives will. Politics aside, I just think that picking a judge with good legal and academic credentials was important for Trump to do at this crazy juncture in time.
Gorsuch is a strict interpretationist that will respect the Constitution and individual liberty. I like that. I don't think he is going to be the lightning rod that Scalia was, but this seems to be one of Trump's saner decisions so far, and he needs some of those! Some Republicans could end up being a bit disappointed like they were with John Roberts, but this seems to me to be the right call for a Republican president right now.
It can certainly be debated whether it was right or wrong for Republicans to hold up Obama’s pick, Merrick Garland, for nearly a year. Garland was well qualified as well, just from a somewhat different persuasion than Gorsuch. The hyper-partisan way our country's politics has developed today, my guess is that the Democrats would have done the same if the situation had been reversed last year.
Sad, but it is what it is, I guess.
So that brings us to this week's Reader Poll question: Is President Trump’s pick for Supreme Court Justice, Neil Gorsuch, a good choice? Go to your local Post website or our combined thepostnewspapers.com to let your fellow local readers know how you feel.
You have 'till Tuesday. Hurry, the fate of the union may be in your hands!