Thursday, September 15, 2005

Time to Take Off the Gloves

Senator Orrin Hatch was the guest on C-SPAN this morning, and took quite a few calls.

One point that he made was that Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer both were confirmed by overwhelming margins (85+ votes). That they were Liberals was beyond question. However, Republicans recognized that they were well-qualified for the job, AND that Bill Clinton (Damn it!) had won the presidency, and was entitled to nominees of his ideological stripe.

Nevertheless, Democrats won't concede this fundamental principle, and give every indication that they are going to vote against Chief Justice-designate John Roberts because he refuses to pledge his support for Democrat litmus-tests on abortion, reverse discrimination, and other parts of the far-Left agenda that can't win at the ballot box, and therefore have to depend upon activist courts for their enactment.

Republicans Senators should really lay down the gauntlet on this one. George Bush won the presidency. Twice. The second time, with a majority of votes cast (something that Clinton never did; remember, when he made his appointments to the Supreme Court, he was a 43% President). If Judge Roberts is confirmed with fewer than 80 votes, Republican Senators should promise that any Democrat nominee who fails to satisfy GOP litmus tests will not receive ANY Republican support.

If Democrats can't support Roberts, then the GOP should promise to apply the same standards as Democrats. Democrat shamelessness should not provoke GOP appeasement.

1 comment:

tschy said...

I agree with your argument, but not the response. The difference (at least in many cases) is called "the high ground." Let them make fools of themselves, but do not stoop to their level. 10 years ago, this would be dangerous - but with the emerging "new media" - they won't be able to get away with it and have the network media look the other direction.