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Japan | Hakamada found religion, but then felt under attack by ‘the devil’

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Editor's note: This is the last in a four-part series on letters that Iwao Hakamada wrote while on death row. About a decade after cursing God, Iwao Hakamada was baptized Catholic at the Tokyo Detention House on Dec. 24, 1984. “Since I have been given the Christian name Paul, I am keenly feeling that I should be aware of the greatness of Paul.” (June 1985)

Biden says ‘voters should pick the president, and the president should pick the justice.’

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Joe Biden
Joseph R. Biden Jr. said on Friday night that the Supreme Court vacancy created by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death should not be filled until after the presidential election.

“There is no doubt — let me be clear — that the voters should pick the president, and the president should pick the justice for the Senate to consider,” he told reporters after landing at New Castle Airport in Delaware following a campaign trip to Minnesota.

Mr. Biden, the former vice president, pointed to how Senate Republicans refused to consider the nomination of Judge Merrick B. Garland in the final year of President Barack Obama’s second term.

“This was the position the Republican Senate took in 2016 when there were almost 10 months to go before the election,” Mr. Biden said. “That’s the position the United States Senate must take today.”

The statement by Mr. Biden, who spent 36 years in the Senate and served as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, immediately put him at odds with Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, who said a nominee by President Trump “will receive a vote” in the Senate.

Senator Kamala Harris of California, Mr. Biden’s running mate, also issued a statement: “Even as we focus on the life that she led and process tonight’s grief, her legacy and the future of the court to which she dedicated so much can’t disappear from our effort to honor her,” she said of Justice Ginsburg. “In some of her final moments with her family, she shared her fervent wish to ‘not be replaced until a new president is installed.’ We will honor that wish.”

Mr. Biden has previously promised to nominate a Black woman to the Supreme Court. Ms. Harris, in an Instagram Live conversation on Friday, said that doing so would be a priority for a Biden-Harris administration.

On Friday night, Mr. Trump did not address his plans for the Supreme Court in brief remarks to reporters before boarding Air Force One to return to Washington, after a rally in Minnesota.

“She led an amazing life,” he said. “What else can you say? She was an amazing woman. Whether you agreed or not, she was an amazing woman who led an amazing life.”

In his comments to reporters, Mr. Biden also spoke of Justice Ginsburg’s life and career, noting that he had presided over her confirmation hearings in 1993. He said she was “not only a giant in the legal profession, but a beloved figure.”

“She practiced the highest American ideals as a justice, equality and justice under the law, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg stood for all of us,” he said.

Source: nytimes.com, Thomas Kaplan, September 19, 2020


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"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde
Location: Washington, DC, USA
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