The fact that Alito is so sure to be confirmed gives us a new reason to criticize Bush for nominating Harriet Miers. Back then, it looked as if Bush had chosen an underqualified nominee because she was a woman and had no record of taking positions on issues. But we now know that a white, male conservative with a long paper trail did not run into any serious obstacles. So not only did Bush choose an unqualified nominee for political reasons; those political reasons didn't even apply. We already knew that the Miers nomination was incompetent, but it looks even more incompetent now that the Alito hearings have gone so smoothly.Indeed. We shall see how this new knowledge affects future appointments. Don't you think it will embolden this President and future Presidents?
(John is home from law school -- Cornell -- for winter break, and, don't worry, we do talk. But sometimes I say, "Email me that," for blog purposes.)
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It sounds like the money you're putting into the young man's education is being well spent. :)
Plus, emailing across the table -- with one's own son/mother! -- is the very essence of cybercool.
I'm not wishing Justice John Paul Stevens ill, but he's not a spring chicken, or even a fall chicken any more, he's a mid-winter chicken, though a very healthy specimen of a mid-winter chicken who hasn't shown any signs of not being in full charge of all his faculties (Just to illustrate his age, he graduated University of Chicago ('41) and even Northwestern Law School ('47) (his college career interrupted by distinguished service in WWII) before Chief Justice Roberts ('55), Justice Thomas ('48) or Judge (soon Justice) Alito ('50) were born).
With that caveat out of the way, there is still the possibility that President Bush will get another chance to replace another Justice. And the next Justice replaced won't be a moderate or conservative (as they are the younger, healthier Justices now), but a liberal Justice.
That means, hopefully, a future nomination of Judge Janice Rogers Brown (who probably should have been the nominee this go round, as it's obvious that even a staunch conservative/libertarian, so long as they have the proper intellectual credentials, can survive the nomination process).
Worse things could happen.
And the fight would be epic, but the Democrats don't show an ability to thwart a candidate on purely ideological grounds at this moment, or any time before the '06 election.
Slocum: Excellent point.
Excellent point on John's part. Cynical moves do often backfire, thought probably not as much as they should.
DH and I have been known to IM each other WHILE talking on the phone to each other ... within our own home, no less. "As in, did you notice xxx? Yeah, I'm pinging you with you link ... ".
We're also among those annoying people who will use cell phones (though discreetly, I hope, if that's not to oxymoronic) to navigate back to each other in large stores. (Whatever happened to just setting a time and place to hook back up?)
So your and John's communication seems normal to me.
Sissy's right: The essence of cybercool.
Point already somewhat made by Slocum but by nominating Miers first Bush also arguably gets credit for taking gender concerns into account--'well, I TRIED to nominate a woman, but it didn't take...' Whether those who care about such concerns are mollified but such an argument I don't know, but I suspect some of them might be to a degree, or at least were less able to reflexively oppose Alito solely because of his Y chromosome.
I used to think it was dismissive to say "email me that", but now I see it's just maternal love. awww.
Too bad the whole Harriet Miers thing can't be written off as a Dallas-style "Bobby Ewing's Dream" episode.
I still wonder if the Miers nomination was deliberately set up to fail.
Although it is perfectly Rovian to assume Miers was set up to fail, I doubt this was the case. I still think Bush wanted to appoint himself to the Court, and Miers was the closest thing to himself.
I wonder how much work Stevens actually does on the court. Perhaps his staff does everything....
"I wonder how much work Stevens actually does on the court. Perhaps his staff does everything...."
I think it unlikely; the best touchstone is probably his contributions at oral argument, which so far as I can tell, remain as erudite and intelligent as they were in the 90s. I have no question that Stevens retains the intellectual clout to be on the Court, even though I hope he retires sooner rather than later.
I think it's very unlikely that the Miers nomination was set up to fail and I think Lastango offers a far more plausible alternative. The flat reality is that Bush doesn't want originalist judges, and I think most of the people who use that term for what it actually means, rather than as the lastest GOP buzzword, fully understand that: we didn't support Bush because we think he intends to appoint another Scalia, he's just more likely to appoint one by accident than the other fellow.
Slocum said...
On the other hand, it may be that the Harriet Miers fiasco smoothed the way for Alito in that it placed the focus firmly on experience and expertise and lessened the focus on on identity politics and even ideology.
Well put. It's almost like bringing jello to the table for dessert, disappointing all the dinner party guests, and when expectations are thusly lowered, you dump the jello and whip out a grocery store bought cake. In comparison to the jello, the store cake looks quite good (with everyone forgetting the fact that the true meal was supposed to have included gourmet handcrafted chocolates).
That means, hopefully, a future nomination of Judge Janice Rogers Brown (who probably should have been the nominee this go round, as it's obvious that even a staunch conservative/libertarian, so long as they have the proper intellectual credentials, can survive the nomination process).
I wouldn't hold out much hope for that. If you recall, one of the things Congress was anxious to establish in these Alito hearings (and the Roberts hearings too, I think) was that Alito properly respected Congressional authority to do pretty much whatever it felt like under the Commerce Clause.
One of the reasons Janice Rogers Brown is so beloved by certain elements of the Right is that she has been considerably more outspoken on the subject of overreaching Congressional power than Alito (or really, most other judges) have been, and I think Senators of both parties would be considerably more leery of putting her on the Supreme Court. Ninth Circuit -- okay, she just provides a bit of balance to an already famously-wacky Circuit. But the Supreme Court is a rather different.
Balfegor said...
"If you recall, one of the things Congress was anxious to establish in these Alito hearings (and the Roberts hearings too, I think) was that Alito properly respected Congressional authority to do pretty much whatever it felt like under the Commerce Clause."
While I strongly dissent over the use of the term "properly," I think that's an important point, because to the extent there was dissent among the GOP ranks, it tended to be protecting their turf. DeWine and Grassley wanted promises that Alito would use inappropriate materials in statutory construction such as legislative history, while, hypocritically, demanding reassurance that Alito would not use equally inappropriate materials suich as foreign law. Many Senators on both sides of the aisle wanted promises that Alito would defer to Congressional power. A nominee who walks in there and explains to Congress that, if it wants its intent to govern statutory interpretation, it should jolly well write statutes that are clear, rather than hoping judges will mangle the text to set right Congress' ineptitude, could produce serious dissent in the ranks.
As noted before, neither President Bush nor the GOP really want originalist Justices, because they are the party in power (by contrast, the Democrats don't want originalists because they have been in perpetual denial since 1994, honestly believing that they return to power will come at the next election), and a return to the original understanding would dramatically reduce the scope of the Federal government, and for personal corruption (lest there be any doubt, pork = corruption). The difference is simply that the GOP might accidentially appoint the right kind of Judges.
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