Posted on 10/09/2005 3:28:25 PM PDT by Pukin Dog
Yes, probably sometimes great intellects get caught up in fine but extraneous points that the lesser exalted don't even notice. As Hayek put it, sometimes great intellectuals overvalue their intellects.
There was no opportunity to force a vote on the nuclear option, the DEMs caved and stopped filibustering. and haven't filibustered since. There was no way to invoke the nuclear option once the RATS stopped the tactic. The threat of filibuster isn't enough.
You've made some very good points. I only hope Bush gets the chance for another appointment, maybe even 2. (We can hope after all).
Oh, you mean Trent Lott, the Republican Senator who voted for Clinton's Ruth Bader Ginsburg appointment but "has questions" about Buch's Harriet Miers choice.
Good post PD. I recently sent email to Rush Limbaugh after he somewhat complained about GW and some of his policies/decisions:
There is no reason we can't fight now.
The problem is the administration has calculated, wrongly imo, that the price for fighting is too high.
And, no, I don't buy those stating they are afraid of a nominee being defeated. I'm talking about high stake gambles.
I truly believe the losers in the Senate would threaten to withhold funding for the WOT.
My belief is that when a bully threatens you, you stand up to them. Get a little bloody, but you bloody them as well. But on this, we have the upper hand with the majority of their constituents that will kick their butts in the elections.
Take the offense and go to the American people. Call the weasels bluff, but keep the evidence to put them on the hot seat if they try to follow through with the threats behind closed doors.
1) I have no evidence she is an originalist.
There is a small amount of evidence that suggests she may be an originalist. But it certainly isn't conclusive at this point in time. The hearings may help on that.
But you didn't answer the question I asked you.
If the president knows Miers to be an originalist, then wouldn't the best thing for him to do would be to nominate Miers and save the weasel smoke for another fight?
There was an opportunity to force the filibuster. We still have people being filibustered right now. All Frist has to do is bring them to the floor for a vote. he has chosen not to do so.
It's OK ;-)
621 was meant for you, sorry I messed it up somehow.
That's exactly the problem with the people in Washington, especially those in Congress. Instead of representing those that elected them they think of themselves and and feed their own ADD.
Let's move everyone in gov't in Washington to New Orleans (except the military folks) then blow the levees up...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/user-posts?id=18066
My present beef is the 60 vote supermajority for confirming nominations.
The "ruling class" are those who the people have elected to office. The lazy people want to be lead, and are easily mislead.
And Specter knows full well she can't comment on cases that may appear before her. Point is, she has no paper trail that proves she is pro or con. As for Dobson, let them go ahead and bring him in. What does his big-time talk have to do with her? She never said anything.
Neithr you nor I are Olympia Snowe's constituents. She answers to the voters of Maine, who are far more liberal than Texans or Hoosiers.
Not all of us.
You left out "married money"! (I'm from MA.)
This elite non-producing class has certain common prejudices and beliefs. Of all of them sexual "freedom" and the corollary "right" to kill undesired babies is one of the strongest.
There does seem to be an element of "the soul of the hive" about libs/Dems (I forget what that's from, though I think Chesterton used it) -- aren't bees said to act as if they all think almost as one entity?
Abortion really is the linchpin, and I'm not sure I understand completely why. People complain about single-issue voters and litmus tests, but attitudes toward Roe really are a pretty reliable indicator of strict constructionism or originalism vs. the "living document" Constitution. Even the women's magazines (which I stopped reading years ago so I don't know if they still do) did at least for a while champion the "I wouldn't have one myself, but who am I to say for anyone else" cop-out, a variation of the politicians' "personally opposed, but. . . ."
There really is the scent of Satan about it. (You can check my posting history -- this is not a charge I throw about lightly.) I recall a footnote I saw in a Shakespeare text in grad school, I think to The Tempest, that explained that the recurrent anti-witch hysteria of the time was largely attributable to the popular belief that witches could induce miscarriage.
No, because...
1) We have no guarentee of another opening.
2) Once the primaries heat up, he'll be weakened in influence. People will be sparring to cosy up to the possible new president of the United States and unless that person is close to G.W.B., and his positions, they'll syncophantly betray the President forthrightly.
Im wondering what you think of this thread?
Do you have any insights into how they established it?
Brilliant. I know so many examples of that in real life.
I can not even begin to tell you. For them, not knowing the janitor's name is a sign of great importance. Most I know are on the left, but I think that the right flirts with this from time to time as well.
I believe they are often people more infatuated with the gravitas of the question, than the value of the answer.
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