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The democrats should hurry up and confirm Justice Roberts so they can continue going after rove!
Just in time for Justice Rhenquist to retire!
Posted on 07/21/2005 7:01:47 PM PDT by Jean S
Damn, damn, damn.
For all these years, Democrats have been preparing to make war on President Bush’s Supreme Court nominee, and now that they have the chance they’d give anything to put it off so that they can continue making war on Bush’s top political adviser.
Talk about bad timing.
Not long after the president nominated John Roberts for the court Tuesday night, Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean released a statement that began:
“Faced with a growing scandal surrounding the involvement of Deputy White House chief of staff Karl Rove and Vice President Cheney’s chief of staff Lewis Libby in the leaking of the identity of a covert CIA operative, President Bush announced his nomination of John Roberts. ...”
Now those are the words of a frustrated man. Just when Democrats had gained momentum in the Plamegate affair, Bush came up with a beautifully stage-managed rollout of his court nominee.
In the brief ceremony, Bush performed well and, more important, Roberts seemed eminently reasonable and nonthreatening. Are Democrats going to call this guy the devil?
Even worse for Dean and his party, all three broadcast networks, as well as the cable outfits, chose to televise the president’s unusual prime-time announcement ceremony. Instead of having a Rose Garden gathering in the afternoon and a two-minute report on the evening news, Bush got huge coverage.
Everyone got a look at Roberts, and after a few words both he and the president quickly moved offstage. No questions asked.
In one skilful stroke, Bush got maximum exposure for his new nominee and, at the same time, managed to avoid the problems that beset Bill Clinton back in 1993 when he nominated Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
You may remember that Clinton introduced Ginsburg in a White House ceremony and that Ginsburg gave a speech that paid tribute to the women’s movement, the civil-rights movement and Hillary Rodham Clinton, among others.
At the end of it, President Clinton, who appeared to have been moved by Ginsburg’s remarks, opened things up for questions and Brit Hume, then with ABC News, asked about the chaotic process — Hume said it had “a certain zigzag quality” — that led to Ginsburg’s nomination.
Clinton’s face reddened with anger. “How you could ask a question like that after the statement she just made is beyond me,” Clinton said. He then stalked away.
That was perhaps the model of how not to unveil a Supreme Court nominee. Bush did better.
Now Democrats are scrambling to wage a two-front war.
It won’t be easy. For example, just hours before the Roberts nomination, MoveOn.org, the Internet organizing group that has become a major force in Washington, had just released a new anti-Rove ad demanding that the White House “STOP THE COVER-UP. FIRE KARL ROVE.”
Later, MoveOn was forced to move Rove down its homepage as it posted a new headline: “OPPOSE JOHN ROBERTS.”
And despite all the time it had to prepare attacks on all potential Bush nominees, the best MoveOn could come up with about Roberts was that he is allegedly “right wing” and — even worse in the world of MoveOn — “corporate.”
“In nominating John Roberts, the president has chosen a right wing corporate lawyer and ideologue for the nation’s highest court instead of a judge who would protect the rights of the American people,” MoveOn wrote.
Ouch.
Much of MoveOn’s rhetoric is based on the idea of opposing “corporate” media, or “corporate” criminals, or “corporate” lawyers, on the grounds that they are “corporate.” That goes over well with the MoveOn house-party crowd. But will it work in a nationwide campaign against a Supreme Court nominee?
We’ll see.
The more experienced hands in the nomination-killing business are being a little more subtle.
Ralph Neas of People for the American Way pronounced himself “extremely disappointed” by the choice of Roberts.
Why? It’s not exactly clear.
“John Roberts’s record raises serious concerns and questions about where he stands on crucial legal and constitutional issues,” Neas said, adding that “it will be critical for senators and the American people to get answers to those questions.”
Neas ally Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) also didn’t waste time on specifics. Taking a break from his anti-Rove campaign — Schumer appeared last week with Ambassador Joseph Wilson to demand that Rove’s security clearance be revoked — Schumer made the point that he reserves the right to try to kill the Roberts nomination for any reason at all, or for no reason at all.
“The burden is on a nominee to the Supreme Court to prove that he is worthy, not on the Senate to prove he is unworthy,” Schumer said.
So now Democrats begin their two-front war. In the coming weeks, they’ll be attacking Rove and Roberts, Roberts and Rove. Of course it all might come to nothing, from their point of view — Rove gets off and Roberts gets confirmed.
But you gotta try.
York is a White House correspondent for National Review. His column appears in The Hill each week.
E-mail: byork@thehill.com
They must be so confused! LOL!
YESSSS!!!
Go ahead and question the timing!
Rove's plan all along, of course.
The democrats should hurry up and confirm Justice Roberts so they can continue going after rove!
Just in time for Justice Rhenquist to retire!
For God's Sake! Byron York, be careful of your vernacular. Saying Schumer reserves the right to kill the nomination .....gave me such a jolt...... (until I read the words nomination afterwards....)
We have a potential split in interest here - delaying or defeating Roberts accomplishes for the Democrats what removing Rove does for the media - it maintains a level of fear that is their last, best grasp on a power that otherwise they feel slipping through their fingers. Given the choice they'd much rather defeat Roberts. Given their choice, the media would much rather remove Rove. And each side has a stake in the other, and so both will insist on both and as a result gain neither.
Strategery.
Why at all care, what Dean,Rodem,Clinton,Schumer, the great navel war hero of Chappaquiddick , or any one else, from the ranting, raving, hysterical, extremest, kook- fringe, of the American left has to say? America picked our guy in a clean up or down vote.We set the agenda.
We marvel at how well President Bush outfoxes them at every turn, and that's all well and good, but the fact that the President of the United States has to do battle daily with a pack of harpies is sad, sad, sad.
Just imagine what might have been accomplished over the past few years if the Dems had been even halfway civil.
Losers.
I find this terribly hard to believe. They have a very difficult time walking and chewing gum at the same time.
I am sure the spinmeisters will be out with their NO rationale.
I find this terribly hard to believe. They have a very difficult time walking and chewing gum at the same time.
I am sure the spinmeisters will be out with their NO rationale.
bttt
Oh man is this a good point. She has to be getting sick of being in jail too. She might last or might not but she definitely could ruin the whole thing for the MSM. Did you notice the story about her not doing well and losing weight? I'm sure the attempt to make her a martyr is part of the plan. It's such a 'shame' that the MSM has to divide its attention between Karl Rove and Judge Roberts; my heart bleeds.
I like your idea.
The Libs like to speak of nuance but in reality are very single minded. Blitz them.
While the SC nominee wasn't submitted to take a non scandal off the pages, it serves a purpose. Let's add a Bolton recess to the mix. Let them handle three at once. While we're at it, let's bring up ocial Security again. It might be fun to watch how many balls they can juggle at the same time. Oh, and the Patriot Act just passed the House. That would be featured in the Senate as well.
and the best part: whichever gentleman they assault with their gasseous emissions, the Dems will LOSE.
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