Guest Columnist Carl Doerner: Disorder in the court The Supreme Court is shown Nov. 5 in Washington. AP Published: 6/29/2021 8:33:20 PM Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., refused to hold hearings upon President Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland to fill a Supreme Court vacancy — the longest vacancy in our history — hoping a Republican might next be elected to make such nomination. McConnell was fulfilling his stated intent as Senate leader to block efforts of a Democratic African American president at every opportunity he found. By contrast, when the dynamic Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died, her body was still warm when McConnell’s lurch to name a successor occurred, and a candidate was named before her body was laid to rest. In the current version of the Republican Party, her death was a prayed-for and heralded event.