Agree. I also think many should stop with the defeatist / negative comments / thoughts - Let's allow GWB to pick his man before all this -
So, we, as citizens, should not even debate the issue? Just keep our mouths shut and keep our thoughts to ourselves?
Reagan did not appoint Souter. Bush one did.
Given that it appears that the floating of Gonzalez (Spanish for "Souter") for the Supreme Court comes directly from the White House, it would be foolish to not be very vocal in announcing our objections. If Bush were to deserve of the trust you speak of, then no one from the administration would be promoting his name, in light of already well-known opposition to Gonzalez.
Psst... My reading shows that Gonzales is not pro-abortion. He is a strict interpretationist, which is why he has ruled against pro-life in the past. The problem isn't Gonzales beliefs, but his integrity. He is too ideologically conservative to legislate from the bench.
The question on the legality of abortion is a legislative matter. Get him on the court, and I think Bush will be proven to be right about Gonzales. All that will matter after Gonzaels on the court is whether or not we can pass a law giving "personage" to unborn children, which would eliminate 1/3 of the argument used to justify the Roe v. Wade decision. And if you knock out the "privacy" clause, because a right to privacy does not give a person a right to harm another person, then Roe v. Wade fails, and any new laws criminalizing late term abortions and mid term abortions will become feasible. If we can give a conservative court the basis to overturn Roe v. Wade, a statutory basis, then I think we can win the battle.
No one is stopping Pres. Bush from "nominating his man". The majority of the people who voted for him primarily did so because of 2 reasons: 1. war on terror and 2. restoring sanity into the federal judicial system. It is clear that the WH is floating balloons about Gonzalez. Twerps like Kristol are simply vehicles to release said balloons. The first balloon float - when O'Connor resigned - was shot down thoroughly. Now with the imminent resignation of the CJ, the Bush team has dusted off the Gonzalez balloon and - via Kristol and others - are taking it out for another test drive. All that is happening here is that people - 95%+ Bush supporters! - are reacting to the test balloon.
This is not prescription drugs or education reform. Restoring "originalists" (as Rush calls them) to the courts is a core issue of the now-majority Republicans in this country. It's like strong self-defense. Any Republican who would run against a strong defense policy would be risking the support of the rank and file of the Republican majority and, if said policy were actually enacted under that Republican's term, would risk severe alienation of future support for the party. Same thing here. The President ran strong and hard - for 2 election cycles - on reforming the runaway federal judiciary. Go back to his campaign speeches. There's no ambiguity about the position he staked out. Appointing justices in the "mold of Scalia and Thomas" was the buzz phrase the generated massive applause at countless campaign rallies. To practice "moderation" or appeasement to keep the "balance in the court", with not 1 but 2 vacancies (likely) - and the opportunity to realign the judicial ship of state - would be nothing short of disastrous. Conservatives have been working and investing their time and money in election cycle after election cycle for this moment. Bush seized on this core desire in order to garner support and get elected not once but twice. Any deviation from HIS strongly worded and clearly stated objectives would be a true abandonment. There is no ambiguity here. He would be abandoning principles that he professed to in order to get the support of the folks who put him in power. I would be confident in proposing that nearly every person who pulled the Bush lever in November did so with the anticipation that there would be a significant opportunity to redirect the federal judiciary including the Supreme Court. Bush, to his credit, appears to have kept his word on appellate justice appointments - don't seem to be any squishy "moderates" in that group. One can argue about whether he has invested political capital in them, but he certainly has put forward nominees in the mold of his campaign rhetoric. I personally have faith that he will not take this historic opportunity to abandon his campaign promises and deviate from his past practices.
What is happening here and throughout the conservative world is that we are simply reminding the President and his team that we are watching and that we expect him to take the full advantage of the opportunity to reverse the ruinous direction of the Supreme Court. I don't sense any disrespect, just trepidation on the part of the faithful that the President might be entertaining different directions. If he indeed does go the route of appeasing the congressional democrats and the MSM and giving us "1 out of 2", I fully expect that the core conservatives will feel abandoned yet again by the Republican leadership. Although Bush is not running again, such an abandonment of a core conservative principle will vitiate the conservative support of the Republican party. Let's hope and pray he doesn't go in the appeasement direction.