Compare and contrast: 1) Democrats praising Chief Justice Roberts’ pushback against Trump’s claim that judges are political. 2) Democratic senators (and Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz.,) trying to block a judicial nominee for political reasons.

"We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges," read a statement from Roberts on the eve of the Thanksgiving holiday. "What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them."

And of course, Roberts was showered with praise from the left side of the aisle.

Fast-forward one week later, and every single Senate Democrat has locked arms in a political play against a Trump judicial nominee.

The nominee’s name is Thomas Alvin Farr, and he’s been waiting to find out his fate since July 2017. His opposition claims that putting him on the federal bench would be a blow to minority voting rights. Farr’s political resume includes working for former North Carolina Sen. Jesse Helms and working on voter ID and redistricting procedures in the Tarheel State.

But I thought that federal judges were purely non-political? Surely once he’s nominated he would be just like the rest of the judges that Justice Roberts referred to — completely free of any baggage from the president who nominated him and simply doing his “level best to do equal right?”

The bottom line is that all judges are fallible human beings in robes who can and do make mistakes and therefore cannot be treated as inerrant priests of human government. We could also acknowledge that the process to appoint and confirm them is indeed political; at least it is somewhat accountable to the people through their elected officials.

So no, federal judges are not above criticism for their words, actions, and decisions. They are not only subject to public assessment and denunciation by elected officials, but they and the courts on which they sit are subject to congressional checks, including impeachment of judges and Article III control over the courts’ jurisdiction, size, and very existence.

We could have that conversation, but this is American politics in the Trump era. Fawning over vapid platitudes and dealing in shrieking intellectual dishonesty are much more in fashion.

A group of young activists, in conjunction with the survivors of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting bus tour, are planning a “National March on the NRA” for Saturday, the Washington Post reported Friday.

Protestors, who according to the report have “no illusions about changing the [NRA]’s political positions,” told the Post why they will nevertheless loudly demonstrate their dislike for the NRA.

“The NRA has the ability to be the organization that fights for Second Amendment rights while also fighting to protect each and every American citizen, but they choose not to,” Lawrence Nathaniel, executive director of the National Organization for Change, told the Post. “They’d rather threaten and antagonize us than sit down and talk about how we can work together to make sure every American has a quality and safe life.”

Nathaniel did not mention any attempts to sit down and have a discussion with the NRA, prior to organizing the admittedly futile protest outside the NRA's weekend-vacated office building.

Because any group that’s opposed to gun control obviously would never behave in a civil manner anyway so you might as well beat them at their own game, or something like that …

Right?

Supreme Court retirements under President Donald Trump cause an extra measure of heartburn for Democrats. They nominated Hillary Clinton and her seven-mile train of scandalous baggage for president, and that's jake. They elected Bill Clinton as president, who perjured himself and sullied his office. Not a problem.

The one guarantee with Trump appointing Judge Brett Kavanaugh is that the Democrats, fueled by their mindless street mobs, will try to destroy him. It's how Democrats behave. It is not how the "news" media should behave. Is there anyone who disputes that? But it is how they will comport themselves, because they are one with their Democratic brothers and sisters.

One by one, leftist Democrats have been making preposterous comments since the moment Trump made his announcement. Sen. Kamala Harris, for instance, immediately described Kavanaugh as a deadly threat, saying, "his nomination presents an existential threat to the health care of hundreds of millions of Americans."

The "news" media reaction to Democratic rants? Nothing but airtime.

Leftist websites like the Daily Beast presented Trump's short list of candidates as a plot by "Catholic fundamentalist" puppet masters. Where are the news reports about Kavanaugh being slandered for his Catholic faith? To beat this old saw, what if National Review had attacked Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's nomination as a plot led by Zionist puppet masters? You could have heard journalist heads explode.

Instead, reporters like NPR's Nina Totenberg — who not only smeared Associate Justice Clarence Thomas with unsubstantiated sexual harassment bilge but also openly allies herself in public appearances with Justice Ginsburg these days — are warning that Kennedy's retirement will be the "end of the world as we know it," leading to "a hardcore conservative majority of a kind not seen probably in three-quarters of a century."

To conservatives, that sounds great. But this reaction underlines why people don't trust the liberal-media fun house anymore. Under President Barack Obama, the Democrats tried to socialize health care with Obamacare. They pushed same-sex marriage, and the Supreme Court imposed it on 50 states. Obama also imposed radical federal "guidance" on public schools with "inclusive" policies for transgender students.

Our liberal TV anchors and taxpayer-funded Totenbergs never described all this as the "end of the world as we know it." It wasn't the work of a "hardcore leftist" administration. But now the idea of reversing any of this is called a shift "sharply to the right."

When Obama nominated then-Judge Sonia Sotomayor and then-Solicitor General Elena Kagan to the court, no journalists talked about extremes. They gushed like schoolgirls. Try ABC's Claire Shipman (Mrs. Jay Carney) on Sotomayor nine years ago. This sounds like an Obama campaign advertisement: "Even as a little girl, growing up in a drug-ridden South Bronx housing project, stricken with juvenile diabetes, she had that trademark knack: Instead of seeing dead ends, young Sonia saw possibilities. ... She's also an avid Yankees fan, a mean guacamole maker and a fierce biker."

Sotomayor sits at the left-wing extreme of the Supreme Court, but at her confirmation hearings, the networks were in denial. Jan Crawford Greenburg at ABC said, "Sotomayor ... calmly, persistently, repeatedly ... described herself differently, sounding almost conservative."

But any research seems to bring us back to the eternally shameless Totenberg. She said of Sotomayor, "In fact, on a lot of criminal law issues, you could say that she's more conservative than some members of the Supreme Court, including Justice Scalia."

When Kagan was nominated in 2010, Totenberg took to NPR and — we're not making this up — put on the theme song of the "Superman" TV show from the '50s to compare Kagan, the former Harvard Law School dean, to Superman: "Kagan, who can raise money by the millions! Kagan, who can end the faculty wars over hiring! Kagan, who won the hearts of students ... !"

They are about to show the world what first-class hypocrites they really are.

Double Standards …

Shouting Acosta … For those of you who have been reading this newsletter for a while, it would come as no surprise that I often find fault with CNN’s Jim Acosta. When many on the Right lined up to attack Acosta for “breaking protocol” in Singapore by shouting questions at Kim Jong Un and President Trump, I didn’t think there was anything wrong with it. That’s his job, and reporters have screamed questions at photo ops since I was in diapers.

What I do find fault with is the media’s double standard. Stephen Miller, aka @redsteeze on Twitter, has an excellent Twitter thread where he goes through how mainstream media sources lambasted the Daily Caller’s Neil Munro for daring to shout a question at President Obama in a similar situation. You see, the old guard media is upset that folks like Munro and CRTV’s Jon Miller even get a seat at the table.

CNN, where Acosta works, ran the headline: “Obama Interrupted: Disrespectful or latest in ‘era of incivility’?” Situational outrage at its finest.

Real-Life Zoe Barnes? … I’ve been following the leak case of former Senate Intelligence Committee staffer James A. Wolfe and his reported paramour, Ali Watkins of the New York Times. While those on the Left and in the media were quick to call the seizure of Watkins’ personal communications government overreach, it looks like the Times is now investigating the history and sourcing of Watkins’ work. There are serious ethical questions about how Watkins got her “scoops” and whether they were coming from someone she had a relationship with.

Educrat (ED-yoo-krat) noun, usually pejorative. A government school official or administrator whose primary function is to spend tax dollars telling other parents what to do with their children.

Beltway education bureaucrats abhor families who choose to keep their kids out of public schools -- unless it's to grandstand over gun control.

Behold Arne Duncan, longtime pal of Barack Obama and former U.S. Department of Education secretary, who called last weekend for parents nationwide to withdraw students from classes "until gun laws [are] changed to keep them safe."

Emotions are still raw after a teen shot 10 classmates and teachers to death in Texas last week. But Duncan has no excuse for his cynical, made-for-cable-TV exploitation of the Santa Fe High School massacre. Existing state laws banning minors under 18 from purchasing or possessing guns didn't stop the shooter. Neither did laws against possessing sawed-off shotguns or pipe bombs.

And contrary to hysterical early reports, the accused 17-year-old gunman did not use "assault rifles." So a "commonsense" ban on "assault weapons" would not have saved lives, either.

But effective solutions to maximize students' safety and well-being seemingly aren't Duncan's goals. His mission is airtime. Publicity. Entertainment. Provocation for provocation's sake. Show time -- for the children, of course.

School boycotts are a "radical idea," he admitted to MSNBC. "It's controversial. It's intentionally provocative." Praising teacher walkouts and student protests, Duncan told The Atlantic he supported parent-initiated school shutdowns for gun control because "we are not protecting our kids... And the fact that we're not doing that -- we're not willing to think radically enough to do it -- I can't stomach that."

Ah, the royal, unstomachable "we."

Here's another thing I find hard to swallow: Education overlord Arne Duncan now championing the radical idea of parents exercising their autonomy to do what's best for their children.