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We’re barely a month removed from a nut showing up to Kavanaugh’s home with a gun and a plan to murder him.

Yet this halfwit can’t understand why he wasn’t up for confronting a crowd of “peaceful protesters” gathered outside Morton’s.

Don’t ask me what the “hypocritical” part of that is either.

The partisan double standard is so blatant that it’s hardly worth pointing out. If a Democratic official had recently dodged an assassination attempt and then opted not to face a gathering of hostile demonstrators outside a private event, we’d all understand why. The topic on “The View” that day, in fact, would be the Republican “climate of hate” that had indirectly encouraged that assassination attempt in the first place.

In fact, Hostin shoehorned in a “climate of hate” point at Alyssa Farah Griffin’s expense elsewhere in the conversation:

She doesn’t quite accuse the Freedom Caucus of deserving the 2017 mass-murder plot against them that nearly killed Steve Scalise. But I take her to mean that if not for pernicious civic influences like the Freedom Caucus, maybe we wouldn’t have the sort of bitter partisan rancor that inspires intimidation of public officials.

Which, okay. But we do have it, and Kavanaugh conducted himself accordingly. So how was him ducking out the back door of Morton’s “ridiculous” instead of “tragically prudent under the circumstances”?

What got the panel talking about all this were Pete Buttigieg’s comments to Fox News yesterday, which Democrats greeted with cheers. Buttigieg is a cool-headed speaker, preternaturally articulate even by the standards of major politicians, but his argument boiled down to (1) public officials have a right not to be intimidated but no right not to be protested and (2) if Kavanaugh felt intimidated, he more or less deserves it for overturning Roe.

My question is this: Is there not inherently an element of intimidation when confronting a public official in a private setting? Officials expect to be protested at work; government agencies have security on the premises to protect them in those circumstances. But at dinner, and especially at home, there’s no assurance that a crowd can be controlled if it turns rowdy. It’s not a coincidence, I’m sure, that some lefty activists are eager to confront the justices out “in the wild” instead of by camping out in front of the Court. You won’t frighten Kavanaugh by carrying signs outside his place of employment. You might frighten him by surprising him outside his favorite restaurant.

Add a recent foiled assassination plot to the mix and Kavanaugh would have been a fool to present himself in person before the protesters.

Don’t forget either that most (but not all) elected officials who die while in office will be replaced by a member of the same party. That’s not true of SCOTUS justices during moments when the other party controls the White House. There’s a political incentive for a deranged partisan to harm one under those circumstances.

The good news for Kavanaugh is that public attention on abortion will soon shift from SCOTUS to the state courts. After all, just because there’s no unwritten right to abortion in the U.S. Constitution doesn’t mean there’s no unwritten right in your local state constitution. NBC’s Benjy Sarlin sees the fight ahead developing on multiple fronts — judicial elections, litigation, constitutional amendments, maybe even court-packing.

In Wisconsin, for example, judges are chosen in statewide elections. That makes them a likely quicker path to impacting policy than winning all three branches of government, where legislative maps favor Republicans…

The most obvious path is to simply enshrine abortion rights or abortion restrictions into the state constitution.

That’s what anti-abortion activists are trying to do in Kansas, where voters will decide on a proposed amendment on August 2 that would clarify the constitution does not protect abortion. Michigan voters may get to vote on an amendment to protect abortion access in November, which would remove the possibility of a 1931 ban taking effect. In Alaska, voters have the option to call a constitutional convention that might eventually overturn prior state rulings that favor abortion rights…

Republican-led governments in Arizona and Georgia added seats to their court in recent years. States where independent commissions take the lead in choosing judges could also be a target. Iowa legislators passed a law that gave the governor more control over nominations after the court found a right to abortion in 2018. The remade court overturned the decision last month, paving the way for new restrictions.

It’ll be a big, fascinating, gloriously democratic mess. As activist interest shifts to those state fights, maybe Kavanaugh will even be able to leave through the front doors of restaurants again.

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