Posted on 11/12/2004 2:27:51 PM PST by swilhelm73
A conservative member of the Senate Judiciary Committee said he could support Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) as chairman of the committee if Specter issued a public statement saying he would not try to block a Supreme Court nominee who opposes abortion rights.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) said Specter assured him in a conversation Tuesday he would push for swift up-or-down votes on nominees without regard to their positions on abortion. Cornyn indicated he was satisfied by Specter's comments but wanted them expressed in an official statement.
Asked if he thought Specter would get the chairmanship, Cornyn said, "Today, yes, I do."
Cornyn also said Specter is seeking a meeting with Republicans on the judiciary panel next week to resolve doubts prompted by his comments last week suggesting that the Senate was unlikely to confirm nominees who would overturn the 1973 Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion nationwide. Conservatives have flooded the Senate with protests, urging Republicans to reject Specter as chairman.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Don't give up hope yet. There is plenty of time before a decision will be made. I think Spector is digging his own grave everytime he opens his lying mouth. Keep positive! And, keep calling your Senator and Frist.
Or would twitting MacSpectre now drive him to be our Zell DURING this crucial term?
I'd suggest, in a friendly way, that we're losing focus a bit. Is the discussion about whether MacSpectre sucks, as a senator? Well then, I think we're all agreed. He's by far not the worst (Boxer, Kennedy, Kerry, etc.); but he sucks.
But is that the issue? No. That was up to Pennsylvania to decide last week, wasn't it? And in the primary? And they decided — God help them — that they wanted him. That's how the Constitution works.
The issue is specifically whether he should chair this committee, which tradition would call for. If not, it gets complicated. Do we trash tradition? Do we forbid anyone who is ideologically impure from holding any position, as the Donks did with Casey? Do we send the message that other viewpoints can vote, but only the pure will wield influence?
If so, are we about making a gesture and feeling good about how pure we are, knowing that we will lose power in two years and get little done before then?
Or do we really want to put our eyes on the long-term, be THE national party, and make real progress?
Dan
You: "It is time to look to a third party who will have candidiates who are Pro COnstitution and Pro Christian and Pro Life. I am sick of these A$$ES and mean to tell them so. They won't believe us until 2 years from now when we can make believers out of all of them -- both the ELETE of the Left and The ELETE of the Right. They both have an extreme hearing defeciency !!"
I feel your pain, but it's not the time.
Not yet.
Assume that Bush and Frist are both pro-life strict constructionists who want judicial reform, and intend to put pro-life justices on the courts.
Assume that they have calculated the risk of Specter blocking them, and have factored in his obstruction factor, but have also calculated the damage that will be done by him if they DON'T let him take that seat.
If they go ahead and let Specter take the position, it is a calculated risk.
IF Specter screws the President and Frist and does what we fear he will do...and what COULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED by blocking him now...there will be no reason to give the Republicans any support in the next election, and a strong incentive to stay home or vote for third party candidates specifically to punish Republicans for their betrayal of the people who put them in power.
But we're not there yet.
It's a gamble the Republican leadership appears to be taking, and if they are gambling right, that they can get around Specter's obstructionism while still keeping his vote in the caucus, then they'll get their judges and it was a wise move.
So don't bolt yet.
Steady on.
Wait to see what Specter does, and wait to see if the appointees get through his committee and get their seats in the end. If they do, continue to reward the Republicans for having done the right thing.
If they don't, turn on the Republicans and burn the party to the ground.
"The Democrats will pick up a lot of seats in 2006, because the pro-life voters will stay home. And the Democratic nominee will win the Presidency in 2008 too."
I know I will.
I don't believe that's the issue. The GOP will have at least a two-vote advantage on the committee, perhaps three.
The leadership won't be asking Specter to commit his vote on any pro-life candidate. Instead, they don't want him adopting any delaying tactics, bottling up pro-life candidates in committee.
With the expanded margins, Specter's vote in the committee and on the floor can be overcome. It is his procedural cooperation that is at stake.
If Specter will commit to that proposition, I personally have no objection to his being named Chairman (so long as they extract a similar pledge not to bottle up tort reform).
Remember that, while we don't need Specter's vote for judicial nominees in committee or on the floor, we do need his vote (and the votes of the other RINO moderates) on cloture motions.
I will --- Congress is back in session next week and I am really anxious to see how all of the Senators act now that they know the election results.
I'm sure Daschle won't show up. -- But, I don't hesitate to call Wash. if I need to ask a question or make a comment about something that is happening in Senate or House!
Et tu, Cornrim?
Nothing.
Not Proven!
I've called all the Republican senators on the judicial committee. Some of them have been tallying the calls and emails, etc. Orin Hatch's office told me that this is Frists' decision to be made on 11/17/2004.
I think Frist is wimping out...he addressed the Federalist Society one? two? nights ago and said:
"One way or another, the filibuster of judicial nominees must end," Dr. Frist, Republican of Tennessee, said in a speech to the Federalist Society, a conservative lawyers' group. "The Senate must do what is good, what is right, what is reasonable and what is honorable."
--cut---
Dr. Frist told the members of the Federalist Society here that Democrats were abusing the filibuster by extending it to the Senate's role of confirming presidential nominees. "This filibuster is nothing less than a formula for tyranny by the minority," he said, adding that if Democrats use procedural tactics to block more nominees, they "will have effectively seized from the president the power to appoint judges."
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1278087/posts
I'm sure the democRATs are shaking in their boots....NOT!
Evil thrives when good men do nothing.
It is the six years between elections that make them safe, that and the short memory of voters.
Spector can sign an oath to God that he won't block a judge for being pro-life, but he can oppose him for being too old, too young, too short........In other words his oath would be worthless, and any Senator that thinks otherwise is very foolish.
Not to mention it is likely illegal to bind a vote before the issue is known.
Cornyn is my Senator. He has not responded to my letter. Sounds like he has learned to play the game. It's 100 Senators against the uneducated masses who elected them. A cozy little club.
I intend to write him and ask him this: If Specter does block a pro-Life judge, after promising not to, will you lead the fight to remove him from the Judiciary Committee? Will you at least admit to the voters that you are a stooge and not worthy of reelection, and refuse to run in the next election?
"he Republicans are gambling everything on the feckless Arlen Specter.
They are doing it because they really don't connect the dots, or they really don't believe that pro-life voters will abandon them if they don't use their full power to advance the pro-life agenda. "
You nailed that one!
It looks like the Republicans would remember '92.
And again it could believe that they are just that arrogant.
I will remember in '06 what they do in '04.
No, if Specter somehow stalls or prevents one of Bush's nominees from getting a floor vote, the Judiciary Committee will vote him out as chairman in a heartbeat, which they can do.
Yep, pretty much what you said.
I think too many confuse not being enthused about nixing Mac's promotion with defending MacSpectre in any way. I don't. I'll never forgive him for Bork, unless he someday repents of it. And I could go on and on.
And I don't trust his promise or vow any more than anyone else. I think he's a shallow, callow, self-absorbed politician. But given that, I think that if he did try any funny business, he knows he's being watched like a mouse at a cat convention. After all his assurances of fairness and impartiality, I think the pressure's on the old fraud.
It's not the level of comfort I'd like, but this is politics. /c8
Dan
Why do you think that if Spectre broke his word one tme he would not do it again?
Been there - Done that ( Seriously will the people hold them accountable?)
He (Specter) is going to be touble.
Amen!
What about tort reform? Spectoer is also against that and the Trial Attorneys Assn. claim that Spectoer is their best friend on the judiciary panel. Roe v. Wade isn't the only problem here.
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