It became clear in yesterday's first day of hearings on Judge Neil Gorsuch's nomination to the Supreme Court that filibustering him will be futile and self-destructive.  The words "Central Casting" were used to describe him by multiple pundits, for he comes across as the ideal type of a good judge: from his gray hair and handsome face to his measured words and judicial record.  It is almost impossible to make the case that he is out of the mainstream when his 2,700 appeals court votes have been in the majority 99% of the time.

Yet the lunatic left base of the party demands savaging him.  In one of the most pathetic displays, Jennifer Sisk, a 2016 graduate of the University of Colorado Law School, where Judge Gorsuch lectured part-time, tried to go for Sandra Fluke status by making ridiculous charges.  Kelsey Harkness of The Daily Signal summarizes:

Jennifer Sisk, a 2016 graduate of the University of Colorado Law School, wrote a scathing letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Sunday. In the letter, Sisk detailed her account of Gorsuch's telling his law students that "many" women manipulate their employer's maternity benefits after giving birth. (snip)

In her letter to the Judiciary Committee, which is overseeing Gorsuch's nomination process, Sisk details a back-and-forth conversation between Gorsuch and his students. His comments, she said, "implied that women intentionally manipulate companies and plan to disadvantage their companies starting from the first interview."

Sisk said in her letter that she shared her experience with the committee because Gorsuch's "values shared during that class were concerning and should be explored further during his confirmation hearings for the United States Supreme Court."

This is absurd.  Law schools use the Socratic case discussion method, in which the role of the teacher is to raise provocative questions and force students to confront the limits of their mental frameworks.  A lawyer friend of mine aptly comments: "Sisk's comment does snowflake injustice to the types of provocative questions asked in law school ethics classes."

Of course, that didn't stop Sandra Fluke from tweeting and retweeting in support of Sisk with the hashtag #StopGorsuch.

Sisk's embarrassing confession that she does not understand the nature of pedagogy in the law school she just left seems to have been motivated by two factors.  First of all, she is a left-wing activist.

Harkness reports:

Sisk is a former political appointee in the Obama administration and also worked as an aide to former Sen. Mark Udall, a Democrat from Colorado.

Her work in Udall's office is documented in the University of Colorado's Alumni Association Magazine. Her time in the Interior Department during the Obama administration is confirmed on page 83 of the government's 2012 "Plum Book," a publication containing data on "over 8,000 federal civil service leadership and support positions." The book lists Sisk as a "SC appointment," which stands for "Schedule C Excepted Appointment."

According to the "Plum Book," "Because of the confidential or policy-determining nature of Schedule C positions, the incumbents serve at the pleasure of the appointing authority (usually the agency head) and may be removed at any time."

The second reason is even more venal.  Sandra Fluke is living proof that making a name as a whiny victim that slanders a GOP target pays off.  Fluke tweeted out to the 70,000+ followers from her job at progressive pressure group People for the American Way.

The left-wing media bought into Sisk's childishness quickly, failing to note that she is a political operative.  The dupes included NPR, which was so ashamed that it revised its online post (listeners who heard the original report during morning drive time were poorly informed by the taxpayer-supported NPR, whose federal funding evaporates in the Trump budget):

Editors' note 12:55 p.m. ET: Since this story was first published, we have added material from another former student and former law clerks of Gorsuch, as well as more information about Jennifer Sisk's political affiliations.

So NPR added fuel to the fire of critics supporting Trump's zeroing out its federal funding.  What are Democrats going to do?  Do they want to inflict analogous damage on themselves?

If they filibuster Gorsuch's nomination now, they provide convincing evidence that they are extremists.  More to the point, they will justify the GOP's use of the nuclear option (or maybe call it the "Reid option" since Harry Reid abolished the filibuster for lesser judicial nominations).  Once the filibuster is abolished for the SCOTUS, President Trump will be free to appoint more justices and see them confirmed, should Kennedy retire (as rumored) or if the Grim Reaper makes his rounds soon.

I, for one, hope the Dems fall into the trap of launching a filibuster in order to satisfy the ravings of their base.  But I will happily settle for a base that mutters disgust at its leaders in the Senate.  Why should the GOP be the only one?

President Trump's nomination has put the Dems in a no-win situation.  What's not to like?

Update. Mark J. Fitzgibbons excoriates a legal publication that should know better on its treatemnt of Gorsuch:

The subject line of my daily email from the legal publication Today’s General Counsel was “Gorsuch Said Women ‘Manipulate"’Maternity Benefits.” The story reads that Gorsuch:

told students in a course at the University of Colorado Law School last year that employers, specifically law firms, should ask women during the interview stage about their plans for having children, according to a letter written by former student Jennifer Sisk.

The National Public Radio story that formed the basis for this fake news clickbait had also quickly spread through other disseminators of fake news such as NBC, CNN, Slate, Vogue, and more.

Fortunately, the admittedly and honest conservative media reported that Ms. Sisk, whose written testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee was disputed by some of her classmates, is a Democrat appointee, making her this year’s Sandra Fluke for testimony with an underlying political agenda.

As reported at The Daily Signal, “Sisk is a former political appointee in the Obama administration and also worked as an aide to former Sen. Mark Udall, a Democrat from Colorado.” Newsbusters chimed in with the headline, “Rerun? NPR's Nina Totenberg Promotes Feminist Accuser of Gorsuch, Skips Her Democrat Resume.”

Legal publications such as Today’s General Counsel should know better. The good law professors, especially those teaching classes in ethics, ask provocative questions to train law students to be able to think and operate in a world not completely filled with snowflakes. Instead, they ran with the fake news subject line for clicks. Such corporatists!