Posted on 08/01/2005 10:45:33 PM PDT by Constitutionalist Conservative
Word among some attendees at this past weekend's American Constitution Society for Law and Policy meeting in Washington, D.C. was that Sen. Arlen Specter, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, had done the leftist organization and its many lawyers and wanna-be legal scholars a huge favor.
"First, Specter refused to give [Supreme Court nominee Judge John] Roberts a full endorsement," says a member of the ACS, which was started several years ago as a liberal competitor to the more well-known and established Federalist Society. "Then he presses the Administration for documents on Roberts for us. He's been a more than fair chairman in a fight we aren't expecting to win."
There was also talk over the weekend of Roberts-related information being passed to liberal legal interest groups from "insiders" on the Judiciary committee. "We knew about the White House wrangling with Specter over the start date of confirmation hearings long before it got out publicly last week," says the lawyer.
Over the weekend it was learned that the White House had been pushing for the confirmation process to start earlier than September 6, the date hearings on Roberts will now begin.
Republican Judiciary staff don't buy the notion that Democrats are getting anything from inside the committee. But they and other Republicans on the Hill remain concerned about the presence of Hannibal G. Williams II Kemerer, who last winter was hired by Specter to join the committee's GOP staff to work on judicial nominations.
When word leaked of the hiring, Kemerer was quickly reassigned, but he remains on the committee staff. Before joining Judiciary, he served as the NAACP's assistant general counsel. Kemerer's presence on the committee is important because it appears that Democrats intend to play the race card in the Roberts nomination fight. Already, NAACP Legal Defense Fund director and legal counsel Elaine Jones has begun strategizing with Hill Democrats. Jones, who has worked with Kemerer, was the lawyer who tried to change the outcome of a federal affirmative action case in Michigan, by having Democrats in the Senate delay a federal judicial nomination that might have changed the outcome of the case that was playing out in the 6th Circuit.
Democratic staffers on Judiciary have spent the past two weeks combing over any and all Roberts writings, and have hit on the civil rights issue, in part because there is so little to point to. "It's hard to refute a negative," says a Democratic Judiciary staffer, "and we have the guys like Kennedy and Leahy who can pull those kinds of charges off."
Republicans staffers on the Judiciary Committee, however, insist that while Democrats may want to play games with Roberts' nomination, it won't be because of Kemerer, who they say has nothing to do with the Roberts nomination, and who has had no access to any documents or inside information about the nomination or the nomination process.
BOHICA. And don't say you weren't warned, people.
Well, well, well...what have we here...
One can always depend upon Specter, to become a specter.
A mere nine months ago.
(Editor's note: What follow is a statement issued by Sen. Arlen Specter on Thursday, Nov. 18 [2004]. Specter's potential chairmanship of the Senate Judiciary committee is strongly opposed by conservatives, and he has spent the past week seeking the support of his Republican colleagues.)
I have not and would not use a litmus test to deny confirmation to pro-life nominees.I have voted to confirm Chief Justice Rehnquist after he voted against Roe v. Wade. Similarly, I have voted to confirm pro-life nominees Justice Scalia, Justice O'Connor, Justice Kennedy. And I led the successful fight to confirm Justice Thomas, which almost cost me my Senate seat in 1992.
I have assured the president that I would give his nominees quick committee hearings and early committee votes so floor action could be promptly scheduled.
I have voted for all of President Bush's judicial nominees in committee and on the floor. And I have no reason to believe that I'll be unable to support any individual President Bush finds worthy of nomination.
I believe I can help the president get his nominees approved, just as I did on confirmation of two controversial Pennsylvania circuit court nominees, when other similarly situated circuit nominees were being filibustered.
I have already registered my opposition to the Democrats' filibusters with 17 floor statements and will use my best efforts to stop any future filibusters.
It is my hope and expectation that we can avoid future filibusters and judicial gridlock with a 55-to-45 Republican majority and election results demonstrating voter dissatisfaction with Democratic filibusters.
If a rule change is necessary to avoid filibusters, there are relevant recent precedents to secure rule changes with 51 votes.
I intend to consult with my colleagues on the committee's legislative agenda, including tort reform, and will have balanced hearings with all viewpoints represented.
I have long objected to the tactic used in bottling up civil rights legislation in the Judiciary Committee when it should have gone to the floor for an up-or-down vote. Accordingly, I would not support committee action to bottle up legislation or a constitutional amendment, even one which I personally opposed, reserving my own position for the floor.
Bush has only himself to blame for this arrogant, insufferable pschitt.
Of course the ones that claimed he's a "solid conservative" and would back the President during times such as these will continue along with their heads up their posteriors, as always.
Good ole Magic Bullet Arlen. This dispicable puke has been lying for power all his life. Frist is an idiot for putting this traitorous scum in as head of Judiciary.
Why does Specter do these things?
What's his reward for this even from the left?
I'm hoping it is a bit of Bush strategery that Janice Rogers Brown will be Rehnquist's nominated replacement, and that the timing will coincide with the 2006 elections. The spectacle of pasty white liberal men doing everything in their power to diss and destroy a strong, confident, articulate, and highly qualified black woman is one I want played up front and center in the weeks and days leading up to the election.
Satan offered him an air-conditioned suite in hell.
'Course, he's a liar...
Hmmmm What does Hillary have on Spectre.. "chicken hawk?" what?.. Spectre don't act like a republican.. Theres something odd about that guy..
Don't they know it is only polite to dance with the guy that brought you?
The Pubs have a big fall coming..next fall.
That's right, they WON'T win and everybody knows it.
And that's all that this is about - - Arlen's keeping the scumbags calm, and why not? It's a safe and politically savvy thing to do. Specter WILL be there to support and defend Roberts, just like he stood tall for Thomas when he exposed Anita Hill and that scumbag woman judge from California as liars in front of a national television audience.
Sad to say... TRUE..
Well put.
If not for the still inexplicable backing of the President and Santorum, Specter would be lunching with his fellow leftists after chemotherapy as the ordinary nobody he should rightfully be and we'd have a conservative serving the nation in his place.
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