Merrick Garland, who first rose to prominent as a failed Supreme Court nominee under Barack Obama, is now the top law enforcement official in the land. The new Attorney General was confirmed by the Senate in a 70-30 vote yesterday, ensuring that the DOJ gets a doddering figurehead that will stand by while the careerists and other appointees run amok.

Of course, that vote total means that 20 Republicans voted for Garland, offering yet more proof that the GOP as an institution is absolutely worthless. Garland’s confirmation hearing was a dumpster fire, with shades of Robert Mueller’s senile performance mixed with unacceptable bouts of obfuscation. In other words, this was not a man that any Republican should have been voting to confirm.

As I wrote last month, I’m not even sure Merrick Garland can be counted on to know what day it is at this point. Here are a few of the low-lights.

NEW – Biden AG pick Merrick Garland says #Antifa attacks on federal courthouse may not be domestic terrorism because they happened at night.pic.twitter.com/4Q8o0tHt8Z

— Disclose.tv 🚨 (@disclosetv) February 22, 2021

Garland said he has only read "conflicted reports" about the Steele dossier.

— Chuck Ross (@ChuckRossDC) February 22, 2021

To be clear, there are no “conflicted reports” about the Steele Dossier. It was and is a garbage document, paid for by Hillary Clinton via proxies, and not a single salacious charge within it has been proven true. For Garland to play coy about the dossier shows he’s either a moron or a political hack or both.

Further, when pressed on whether illegal immigration should remain a crime, Garland deflected and refused to answer the question. Later, when asked about what the DOJ stance on forcing girls to play sports with biological males would be under his leadership, Garland could only proclaim the issue “complicated.”

I wrote this in response at the time.

What we are seeing here is the systematic exposure of what most Washington bureaucrats are. They are very often unimpressive partisans, living off the glory of things they did decades ago. National Review’s Andrew McCarthy, who is obviously a good legal mind, defended Garland, noting the quality of DOJ official he was in the 1990s. That’s all well and good, but last I checked, it’s 2021. The political atmosphere is completely different these days, and Garland appears to have totally conformed to the thinking of his left-wing overseers. When you can’t even offer an opinion on the legality of crossing the border illegally, perhaps you shouldn’t be Attorney General? Just a thought.

Given the reality of Garland’s disqualifying qualities and clear lack of mental acuity, not a single Republican should have voted to confirm him. After all, what’s the point of a political party if agreement can’t even be met on an issue as simple as this?

Yet, 20 Republicans did vote for Garland. Here are their names.

List Of The 20 Senate Republicans Who Voted To Confirm Merrick Garland For Attorney General

Blunt
Burr
Capito
Cassidy
Collins
Cornyn
Ernst
GRAHAM
Grassley
Inhofe
Johnson
Lankford
McConnell
Moran
Murkowski
Portman
Romney
Rounds
Thune
Tillis

— The Columbia Bugle 🇺🇸 (@ColumbiaBugle) March 10, 2021

While Democrats play for keeps, Republicans bend the knee, hoping to receive a pat on the head and some good media vibes from CNN. Of course, that’s never going to happen. These moments of bi-partisanship are not rewarded. Instead, they are simply taken advantage up. The next time a Republican is president, hopefully in 2024, Democrats won’t extend the same olive branch, but will go right back to opposing almost ever nominee with vigor. Honestly, I don’t blame them. That’s what they are supposed to do as the opposition party, but the GOP still thinks it’s 1995.

Even putting aside the politics of this, Garland’s viewpoints clearly did not warrant support from anyone who claims to be a Republican. Lindsey Graham, Mitch McConnell, Joni Ernst, and others voted for a man who did not hide the fact that he was going to take the DOJ in the wrong direction, valuing woke-ness more than the rule of law. While Republicans couldn’t stop Garland’s confirmation, they could have sent a message that they won’t be toyed with. Instead, we got this episode in failure theater.

You want to know how you got Trump? This is how you got Trump.