Posted on 12/26/2004 3:08:49 PM PST by Aetius
.........To the extent that the vote was a mandate for any social issue, it was a repudiation of gay marriage, not a vindication of restrictions on the right to choose.
Indeed, voters oppose courts' imposing gay marriage for the same reason that they oppose a reversal of Roe vs. Wade – they do not support it when judges try to impose their own views on the social consensus. Just as most voters want marriage to remain strictly heterosexual, so most want abortion to continue to be legal, albeit with restrictions. While parental notification and consent, restrictions on late abortions and limitations on Medicaid funding all meet with popular approval, the voters will treat very unkindly any effort to reverse the essential findings of Roe.
If President Bush nominates a Supreme Court justice who is a conservative in the mode of Sandra Day O'Connor or Anthony Kennedy, he will meet with a broad public level of support. But if he tries to add another knee-jerk reactionary to the court – and jams the nomination through by changing the rules to block a Democratic filibuster – he will shatter the national moderate consensus that impelled his re-election.
The nation will not tolerate seeing an electoral victory impelled by terrorism hijacked to put another William Rehnquist, Antonin Scalia or Clarence Thomas on the court. If Bush tries it, he will not be able to govern effectively for the balance of his term.
(Excerpt) Read more at wnd.com ...
Second of all, to equate overturning Roe with the type of judicial imposition of values as happens when Courts impose gay marriage/civil unions is absurd. The imposition of values was the Roe decision, when they invented a new Constitutional right because they wanted too. It is true that the public opposes overturning Roe, but the political consequences should it happen could be handled with an effective and focused media campaign. All the GOP would have to do is make it perfectly clear that the overturn of Roe would simply return the matter to the states, where the people (who again, presumably support Roe) would have a direct say in the abortion laws they live under. Once the so-called moderates living in the Ohio suburbs understand this, then I doubt seriously if they would join a Dem quest for revenge. I mean, does anyone think that a Pennsylvania suburbanite would change their vote from GOP to Dem because the abortion laws in Texas just got a lot stricter? I think many in the pubic erroneously believe that overturning Roe would itself criminalize abortion; the GOP must remedy this falsehood that the Dem/Left benefits from. Furthermore, the GOP must make it clear that Roe is in fact such an extreme decision that it makes virtually impossible the most reasonable restriction on abortion -- like bans on late-term abortions -- which enjoy overwhelming public support.
Finally, the idea that you could pick a judge conservative enough to reject misusing his/her power to impose gay marriage or civil unions (and the 'or civil unions' is key since most states would reject that euphemistic substitute for marriage as well) but liberal enough to vote in favor of Roe is questionable. Yes, there are people who hold virtually every combination of positions you can imagine, but generally speaking a conservative is conservative on most issues while a liberal is liberal on most issues. So unless a nominee is aked directly what they would do on these issues, I think its unlikely you could get such a justice. The most likely result of picking a pro-Roe justice is to also get a pro-gay marriage justice.
Morris is no doubt well aware of this, but he is himself more socially liberal and he probably supports the eventual judicial imposition of gay marriage.
I've never had a lot of respect for Morris's intellect, but this demonstration of his cluelessness astonishes even me.
Morris is a leftist, for the most part. If we get what he advocates, it will be disaster.
I don't believe that most people in this country want to make abortion freely available.
I certainly think we should stop government funding of a procedure most of us thing is evil.
Morris is still a trained clinton chimp. He believes we believe he's sincere. Maybe he should take a poll...
Indeed, voters oppose courts' imposing gay marriage for the same reason that they oppose a reversal of Roe vs. Wade – they do not support it when judges try to impose their own views on the social consensus.
How does one arrive at (B) after postulating (A) in the above quote? Astonishing.
Most of those polled on Roe do not even know what it stands for because of the deliberate misinformation on this issue by the mainstream media.How about an honest poll on what Roe v.Wade actually stamds for?
Hell, O'Connor ought to be impeached and removed from office for deciding that the laws of OTHER COUNTRIES ought to be what she used for a measuring stick instead of our own Constitution!
Nobody ever tracks this guy's win-loss record on predictions. For months he was saying Bush would lose.
Dick Morris has it wrong, as usual. The man has in recent years proven he is indeed a patriot, but he's just flat wrong on so many things. For instance, overturning Roe v. Wade doesn't make abortion illegal - it would just put the matter back in the hands of state legislatures.
The winners are entitled to appoint judges that are compatible with their views. Who would ever think that the losers inherit that entitlement?
You have my unqualified vote for that.
Poll shmoll. Let's just get abortion repealed as a federal law. It is not in the Constitution as a right, never was.
It should be left to the states under the 10th Ammendment.
Certainly, our tax money should not be used to pay for killing American children.
sarcasm The casualty rate is too high in America, we need to pull out! sarcasm off
I think Morris got a toe stuck up his nose
LOL. He is a bit of a freak. He really is quite bright when his ideology and lack of faith don't get in the way.
This guy is allows his own ideological liberalism on cultural issues confuse his analysis. If Bush were to turn on his grassroots, by nominating another lib Republican to the court, given its disgust with the court already, he would do great damage to his presidency, his legacy, and the party. He won't do it.
Morris is an extremely devout centrist, it seems. He seems to run his campaigns getting everyone to cling to the middle of the road.
First of all most americans don't understand the Cloture business anyway, and when they do, I doubt they oppose the idea of taking the minorities power to obstruct the majority. I just don't see the general outrage over it that he does, particularly since it's been done before.
didnt the democratic party just elect a pro life chairman?
I don't remember Dick Morris kicking up a fuss about ideology and making dark predictions about the Republic when Bubba nominated those two awful Leftist ideologues, Breyer and Ginsburg, to the Court.
Maybe I missed it?
Since the Democrats and the Judicial Tyrants are against any reasonable restrictions in either case we should remove them from power.
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