Posted on 11/03/2003 7:02:03 AM PST by Tumbleweed_Connection
Just three sentences into a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the federal appeals court nomination of Janice Rogers Brown, Chairman Orrin Hatch already was whining that an earlier nominee, Miguel Estrada, "was treated shamefully by this committee." Well, Hatch - a Utah Republican and a longtime Judiciary Committee veteran - ought to know about shameful treatment. He's the senator who waggled a copy of "The Exorcist" in front of TV cameras back in 1991 and implied that Anita Hill had hallucinated - or worse, plagiarized - the sex-laden comments she recalled Clarence Thomas making to her. I guess his actions then paled in comparison to those of Democratic senators who more recently pressed Estrada - an experienced litigator - on his judicial philosophy, doggedly trying to pry out answers that he adamantly refused to give. At another point during Brown's Oct. 22 hearing, Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., complained that "Justice Brown has been convicted without a hearing." Ah, yes, that would be the same Sen. Specter who declared that Hill had perjured herself before the committee - when he knew full well that he was the one engaged in trickery. But I suppose all was fair in the war that Clarence Thomas' Supreme Court nomination hearings became. And now Democrats are considered impudent obstructionists for dissecting the records of a handful of George W. Bush's judicial nominees. Please. The process of choosing federal judges has not been helped by the polarization of influential interest groups. One extreme of the spectrum wants only judges who'll pledge allegiance to Roe vs. Wade and uphold affirmative action against all attacks. The other extreme wants only judges committed to eviscerating Roe early and often and to putting organized prayer back into every public classroom. Bush flirts with the second constituency and flouts the first. And senators of both parties, instead of reasoning together, increasingly operate by what might be called the Brass (as opposed to Golden) Rule: Do it to them before they do it to you - and then do it to them again after they do it to you. Republicans etherized more than 60 of President Clinton's judicial nominees, never giving them the courtesy of a Judiciary Committee hearing, much less an unfriendly one. Republicans didn't take the political risk of filibustering front and center on C-SPAN. The Democrats, by contrast, have noisily caricatured a smattering of Bush nominees and then have held them interminably hostage. But that attention-getting technique obscures the fact that the Senate has approved 167 Bush judges, most without significant opposition. The fiction that radical Democratic federal judges are eviscerating American values is as phony an urban myth as the 40-acres-and-a-mule tax credit. The federal courts are dominated by Republican appointees; nine of the 13 circuit courts of appeals have Republican majorities, and two have equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats. It's no secret that, by nominating Brown to the D.C. Circuit, which hears numerous cases involving federal regulations, the administration is positioning her for possible elevation to the Supreme Court. A justice on the California Supreme Court, the daughter of sharecroppers, Brown sounds like a forceful, articulate judge given to provocative turns of phrase. Critics take some of her biting dissents and fiery speeches as evidence that she is hostile to government, questions settled court precedents and would be inclined to elevate property rights above civil liberties. Supporters say opponents ought to be satisfied that she has favored plaintiffs, criminal defendants, gun regulation and environmental laws in some of her decisions. It was fair, not abusive, for senators to ask what Brown meant when she wrote about legal precedent, "If our hands are tied, it behooves us to gnaw through the ropes." What she meant when she said, "The result of government is a debased, debauched culture which finds moral depravity entertaining and virtue contemptible." What she meant when she wrote, "Turning a democracy into a kleptocracy does not enhance the stature of thieves. It only diminishes the legitimacy of government." When she says she's "just trying to get it right," does that mean based on where the law and facts take her or where her worldview believes they should go? Brown called her approach "classical conservatism," not ideological activism. And, she said, "I absolutely understand the difference in roles in being a speaker and being a judge." The advise-and-consent role means that senators must judge for themselves whether Brown should be confirmed. Late in the hearing, Sen. John Cornyn of Texas opined, "Every judicial nominee deserves a vote on the basis of reasonable criteria and the merits." If only senators from both parties would follow that rule consistently - not just when it's convenient.
Ok....let's remember history, shall we? These comments were SOO bad, that she FOLLOWED him from job to job for 10 YEARS, in order to further her own career.
This "writer" is delusional.
If you needed yet another reason do disdain the left, the fact that they are still talking about Anita Hill after fifteen years should be all you need to know.
Let us remember, Anita Hill was not up for any post. She was not being vetted by any Congressional Committee. There was no requirement for Advice and Consent on Anita Hill. She was a key witness in the "high-tech lynching" of Clarance Thomas. As such, her veracity was a fact to be determined. If close questioning is required to determine the veracity of a witness who makes an unsupported claim, well so be it.
The 'Rats will never forgive the Pubbies for they refusing to fold on Clarance Thomas. They had folded so many times before, why not this time?
By holding the line on Thomas, the Pubbies put an end to the notion that they will always cut and run, as they had on Bork.
Similarly today, we have an opportunity in another area to demostrate to the Islamabombers that we will not cut and run in the face of casualties, as we had in Mogadishu. If we want to be respected in the future, we must face the fire now. It has always been such.
And now Democrats are considered impudent obstructionists for dissecting the records of a handful of George W. Bush's judicial nominees.
Gee, which ones slipped though?
Too bad they didn't etherize Darth Vader Ginsburg....
you just pissed off several freepers, including me.
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