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In Alito, G.O.P. Reaps Harvest Planted in '82
New York Times ^ | January 30, 2006 | DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK

Posted on 01/30/2006 1:30:00 AM PST by RWR8189

Last February, as rumors swirled about the failing health of Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, a team of conservative grass-roots organizers, public relations specialists and legal strategists met to prepare a battle plan to ensure any vacancies were filled by like-minded jurists.

The team recruited conservative lawyers to study the records of 18 potential nominees — including Judges John G. Roberts Jr. and Samuel A. Alito Jr. — and trained more than three dozen lawyers across the country to respond to news reports on the president's eventual pick.

"We boxed them in," one lawyer present during the strategy meetings said with pride in an interview over the weekend. This lawyer and others present who described the meeting were granted anonymity because the meetings were confidential and because the team had told its allies not to exult publicly until the confirmation vote was cast.

Now, on the eve of what is expected to be the Senate confirmation of Judge Alito to the Supreme Court, coming four months after Chief Justice Roberts was installed, those planners stand on the brink of a watershed for the conservative movement.

In 1982, the year after Mr. Alito first joined the Reagan administration, that movement was little more than the handful of legal scholars who gathered at Yale for the first meeting of the Federalist Society, a newly formed conservative legal group.

Judge Alito's ascent to join Chief Justice Roberts on the court "would have been beyond our best expectations," said Spencer Abraham, one of the society's founders, a former secretary of energy under President Bush and now the chairman of the Committee for Justice, one of many conservative organizations set up to support judicial nominees.

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 109th; 1982; alito; alitovote; brokebackreporters; bush43; federalist; federalistsociety; judgealito; justiceroberts; reagan; reaganlegacy; reaganrevolution; roberts; samalito; samuelalito; scotus; supremecourt
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1 posted on 01/30/2006 1:30:04 AM PST by RWR8189
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To: RWR8189
a team of conservative grass-roots organizers, public relations specialists and legal strategists met to prepare a battle plan to ensure any vacancies were filled by like-minded jurists.

I saw the source for the headline and thought "Ahh, another Vast Rrightwing Conspiracy" story.

Only took till the first paragraph to confirm that suspicion.

2 posted on 01/30/2006 1:34:13 AM PST by Darkwolf377 (http://www.welovetheiraqiinformationminister.com/#quotes)
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To: RWR8189

MSM moonbats on parade...with typical anonymous sourcing for their delusions.


3 posted on 01/30/2006 1:40:09 AM PST by peyton randolph (As long is it does me no harm, I don't care if one worships Elmer Fudd.)
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To: Darkwolf377

A win is a win.


4 posted on 01/30/2006 1:47:53 AM PST by Past Your Eyes (Criticize me if you will, but just don't circumsize me any more. -Kinky Friedman)
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To: Darkwolf377

A group of winners, not whiners.


5 posted on 01/30/2006 1:48:58 AM PST by billhilly (The Democrat symbol is no longer the donkey, it's a strait Jacket.)
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To: Past Your Eyes; billhilly

I should have explained I was illustrating the DUmmies who think every issue is going to lead to Bush's destruction. My fault, sorry.


6 posted on 01/30/2006 1:53:30 AM PST by Darkwolf377 (http://www.welovetheiraqiinformationminister.com/#quotes)
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To: RWR8189

So let me understand this, a group of thinkers, get together to hammer out a vision of what America should be. They then act on that vision and produce the desired results. The only weapons they used was their God given intellect and their persuasion.

Yeah, that's radical....


7 posted on 01/30/2006 1:57:19 AM PST by RadioCirca1970
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To: RWR8189

Those leftist suckers. They get blindsided by decades old vast right wing conspiracies every time! Shows that they just don't know how to plan ahead./s


8 posted on 01/30/2006 1:59:50 AM PST by Nathan Zachary
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To: Darkwolf377

Nothing to be sorry for. Let them bark at the moon all they want. ";^)


9 posted on 01/30/2006 2:03:57 AM PST by Past Your Eyes (Criticize me if you will, but just don't circumsize me any more. -Kinky Friedman)
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To: RadioCirca1970

Yes. Kind of sounds like what the Founders did about 230 years ago.

Isn't that what people who love this country are supposed to do?


10 posted on 01/30/2006 2:14:13 AM PST by joyspring777
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To: RWR8189
>lawyer and others present who described the meeting were granted anonymity because the meetings were confidential and because the team had told its allies not to exult publicly until the confirmation vote was cast.

Back in the day, I would have said, "The New York Times: They have sufficient credibility for me to assume this is true."

Nowadays, I say, "The New York Times has been caught in so many outright fabrications that it is OBVIOUS they are simply making it up."

11 posted on 01/30/2006 2:19:46 AM PST by Lazamataz (I have a Chinese family renting an apartment from me. They are lo mein tenants.)
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To: joyspring777

Yup, but the founders were eeeeeevil....just ask ward churchill.


12 posted on 01/30/2006 2:24:17 AM PST by RadioCirca1970
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To: RadioCirca1970

I am from Colorado...so you are touching an incredible sore spot right now.

That was one thing our lame duck and turncoat Governor (Ref C) got right in opposing and speaking out about.


13 posted on 01/30/2006 2:35:30 AM PST by joyspring777
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To: joyspring777

I heard Churchill was going to endorse HAMAS in the election last week, but decided at the last minute not to; he thought they were too soft on Israel...


14 posted on 01/30/2006 2:39:10 AM PST by RadioCirca1970
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To: RadioCirca1970

The guy gags everyone I have ever talked to about him.

What a wretched human being!

I won't even dignify him by calling him a man.

I came across a web site last week that exposed an author that now lives in extreme southern Florida that has been outed as truly pretending to be an American indian orphan.

Those same indian folks say they could spend their lives outing person after person who has done this.

I believe they should aim their research at Ward Churchill. Blow his lying and cheating carcass out of our University system...and make him have to "work" for a living...instead of lying and plagerizing on the public dole.


15 posted on 01/30/2006 2:45:12 AM PST by joyspring777
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Comment #16 Removed by Moderator

To: Darkwolf377
"Ah, another Vast Right Wing Conspiracy story."

Leahy was the dem who was known for his staunch opposition to Federalist Society members serving in the Judiciary. After Hillary's election, she became the most vocal and has publicly stated that the Federalist Society is the cornerstone of the VRWC conspiracy, that they are intending on "rolling back the New Deal".

Briefly, the dems base this conspiracy on those feddies working for Reagan influencing the Reagan Whitehouse when the investor protection languge that would become NAFTA Chap 11 was composed. After these investor protections have spread thru-out the western hemisphere via all the FTAs, there will exist duel set of conflicting regulatory laws. Once that happens, the dems say, a Supreme Ct dominated by the Federalist Society would find a case in which they would rule that 90% of the regulatory law that the dems created in the 20th century to be un-constitutional.

This is why the dems have been most opposed to Bush's nominees that were/are members of the federalist society or those that the dems perceive to be stealth feddies such as John Roberts, Janice Brown, and also AG Alberto Gonzales.

The problem for the dems is that if they try to use the this conspiracy in opposition to Alito or any other feddie, they look like kooks.

17 posted on 01/30/2006 5:57:51 AM PST by Ben Ficklin
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To: RWR8189

These sources should not be talking now. It will be the source of conspiracy stories in the future. It looks like Alito is in, although we won't be sure until the votes are counted tomorrow. But now that rumors are flying that Stevens may retire this summer, and knowing Ginsburg is not in good health, our president may well have a shot at a third nomination, possibly even a fourth. The way those dems went after Alito insisting to know who he talked to after he was nominated and what they said to him is unsettling. These lawyers need to keep their mouths shut. Let's just see the results of their exceptional work and let their role come out as future histories are written.


18 posted on 01/30/2006 6:00:41 AM PST by twigs
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To: wtp7
Alito's nomination is a highlight of Bush's presidency.

Yep, for all its faults, no conservative can complain about Bush's court nominees. With Alito, Roberts, Thomas, and Scalia, conservatives have a 15 year age advantage over the four liberal justices.

19 posted on 01/30/2006 6:03:40 AM PST by Always Right
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To: RWR8189

I see the New York Times four editorials against Alito did not do any good, now it is time to start making up news stories about him.


20 posted on 01/30/2006 6:05:22 AM PST by Always Right
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