All the talk about Republican hypocrisy about pushing ahead with a Supreme Court pick during an Election Year boils down to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) giving a feeble excuse when he denied former President Barack Obama one last Supreme Court pick. In hindsight, McConnell should have leveled with the American people that it’s usual-and-customary for a Senate of an opposing party president to deny attempts to appoint more justices in an Election Year. Truth be told, Republicans during Obama’s eight years didn’t want to approve any of his picks but because he was given deferential treatment just not in an Election Year. But no, four years ago, McConnell gave the feeble excuse that voters and a new president shouldn’t pick the new Supreme Court justice, creating the big brouhaha today. Had McConnell just told the truth in 2016, he’d have less resistance.

Resistance was bound come no matter what McConnell did because Democrats can’t replace a pro-civil-rights and gay-rights judge like Ginzburg. When you consider the front-runner for Trump’s 48-year-old Supreme Court pick Amy Conan Barrett, she was already raked over the coals in 2017 by 87-year-old Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) in her U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals confirmation hearings. Feinstein did a good job conflating Barrett’s ideological stands with her work as a judge, sworn to preserve protect and defend the Constitution of the Untied States. “When you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that dogma lives within you, and that’s of concert when you come to the big issues that large number of people have fought for years in this country,” Feinstein said during Barrett’s hearing. It wasn’t clear what Feinstein referred to when it came to “dogma.”

Some people interpreted Feinstein’s attack on Barrett’s Catholic faith, referring to Church dognma. If that was the case, Feinstein was out of line, questioning Barrett’s faith, because the separation clause keeps one’s faith in America out of the public square. No elected official who swear allegiance to the Constitution has a right to question anyone’s faith, especially referring to it as “dogma.” Certainly Feinstein wouldn’t want elected officials or federal judges questioning her Jewish faith. Yet the phony distinction made in confirmation hearings conflates nominee’s personal, private views from how they’d comport themselves and rule on the bench.. Talking about a nominee’s speeches or college essays has little bearing on how a judge applies Constitutional law. Barrett handled Feinstein’s attacks with grace-under-pressure back in 2017 and went on to her confirmation.

If Feinstein and other liberal Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee want a clone of the late Ruth Bader Gisnburg, it’s not going to happen. Ginsburg was unique character in U.S. history building her career on social activism, especially when it came to civil and gender rights. McConnell sees Barrett a battle-tested, already going through her last baptism-by-fire in the U.S. Senate. Religious conservatives like the fact that Barrett stands up for her faith, not to violate established legal precedents like Roe v. Wade, Obamacare or gun rights. Whatever Barrett’s personal preferences, it’s clear she takes her work as an impartial jurist seriously. John F. Kennedy, during a more skeptical time about Catholics, one told an evangelical group in 1960 that, contrary to what people read in the press, “I am not the Catholic candidate running for president, I’m the Democrat Party’s candidate who happens to be a Catholic,” letting voters know that his religious faith is irrelevant.

Ginsburg’s death was a shock last Friday, even if it was expected because of her courageous battle with pancreatic cancer. Ginsburg could have resigned her Supreme Court seat back when Obama was president, allowing him to fill the court with a like-minded vacancy. But she didn’t and squeezed every drop of life out of her 87 years, especially with her multiple bouts of cancer. Democrats were outraged that Trump would move so quickly to replace the civil and gender rights activist known affectionately as “RBG,” after her 2018 documentary. She became a national icon, enjoying the fame she richly deserved based a career of service helping the underserved in society. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, 80, was so furious at Trump and McConnell’s decision to move ahead with Ginsburg’s replacement, she threatened to impeach Trump and 70-year-old Attorney General Bill Barr.

When Trump’s pick faces the Senate Judiciary Committee in confirmation hearings, it will be run by Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who won’t put up with any unprofessional conduct. Listening to Pelosi threaten impeachment shows how little respect she has for the U.S. Constitution. No elected official really thinks that Trump’s Article 2 power to appoint a Supreme Court nominee is a high-crime-and-misdemeanor. Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) said if Trump moves forward with Ginsburg’s replacement before the election, he’d work to abolish the filibuster and expand the Supreme Court. “We don’t want to be talking about the court and retribution before we even win [control] of the Senate and the presidency,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). All the huffing-and-puffing aside, Democrats know Trump has the votes to get his pick approved.