Posted on 01/26/2005 8:12:25 AM PST by Jean S
In less than a month, new Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) has already exasperated social conservatives and frightened members of the business community with controversial staff hires, statements and policy positions.
The start of Specter’s tenure as chairman, following a blow-up last year over public comments he made questioning the confirmation of anti-abortion-rights judicial nominees, may augur a rocky future for Specter, whom many conservatives dislike for being too centrist.
But despite their concerns, leading conservatives say they will suspend final judgment on Specter until he is given a chance to manage the confirmation proceedings of President Bush’s court nominees.
Activists on the right are buzzing about two recent controversial hires by Specter: Hannibal Kemerer, a former assistant general counsel with the NAACP, and Carolyn Short, who is married to Joe Torsella, who ran as a Democrat in Pennsylvania for Congress. Specter hired both to serve as counsels on the committee.
Especially irksome to conservatives is a report filed with the Federal Election Commission showing that Short donated $500 to Sen. Hillary Clinton’s (D-N.Y.) 2000 campaign.
And many conservatives view the NAACP as overtly partisan. Departing from the tradition of past presidents, Bush had refused to meet with the group because of its ties to Democrats.
“Obviously the NAACP has not been in the president’s corner in the past,” said Connie Mackey, vice president of government affairs for the Family Research Council, a conservative group active on judicial issues. “So someone who was an assistant general counsel for them is questionable from the start. It needs to be looked into.”
“This raises grave concerns,” said Kay Daly, the head of the Coalition for a Fair Judiciary, another conservative group that advocates for Bush’s nominees.
Activists on the right are suspicious of the NAACP because of the apparent attempt by a lobbyist with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to influence a 6th Circuit appellate decision on affirmative action by delaying the confirmation of conservative Julia Gibbons to that circuit court.
Short’s work for her husband’s campaign and her contribution to Clinton yesterday drew barbs on a blog hosted by National Review Online, a conservative website.
A Judiciary Committee spokesman defended the hires. The spokesman said that Kemerer was “hired because of his strong litigation experience,” noting that Kemerer is “not doing nominations; he’s in the civil division.”
“The senator thinks it’s a complement to have a diverse staff, and these are people hired on merit in a fair and equitable manner,” the spokesman said.
The hires have also drawn the ire of other Senate Republicans.
“The fact that Republican money is being used to hire hardcore leftists to work on the Judiciary Committee is just a travesty,” a GOP aide said.
Conservatives who view the battle over the makeup of the federal judiciary as their most important priority were also dismayed about Specter’s apparent criticism of Bush’s decision to renominate immediately appellate court nominees whom Democrats had blocked with filibusters.
Specter told The Washington Post last month that he “would have preferred there would have been an interlude before they were resubmitted to provide an opportunity to improve the climate on the Judiciary Committee.”
However, that runs squarely counter to the desires of conservatives who want Senate Republicans, who expanded their majority by four seats, to confront Democrats immediately on the stalled nominees.
Senate Democrats have asked for new hearings on the resubmitted nominees, something conservatives criticize as an unnecessary delaying tactic. For his part, Specter has not taken a position on whether he will hold new hearings for the recycled nominees.
A GOP committee aide defended Specter’s desire not to take up immediately the nominees whom Democrats stopped in the last Congress as an effort to heal raw relationships on the committee.
“Senator Specter looks to accomplish a lot this session and tone down the hostile atmosphere that existed, not only in the committee, and have a well-founded relationship with the White House,” said the aide.
Business allies of the GOP, such as manufacturers and insurers, are worried about aspects of draft legislation on asbestos litigation reform that Specter has proposed. Industry officials are concerned that Specter would allow asbestos claims in certain circumstances to be settled in court, instead of through a proposed trust fund, exposing them to costly lawsuits.
For example, Specter has proposed that if the fund runs short of money claims would be settled in state court, where business allies say awards are often excessive and trial lawyers have greater influence over judges. Craig Berrington, the general counsel of American Insurance Association, testified before the Judiciary Committee earlier this month about his worry that Specter’s draft would not make the trust fund the exclusive remedy to claims.
Privately, Senate Republicans have also expressed their disappointment.
“It’s a terrible bill,” a GOP aide said. “Republicans are not happy.”
Late last fall, when Senate Republicans had contemplated denying Specter the Judiciary Committee gavel because of strong opposition from conservatives, then-spokesman Charles Robbins defended his boss’s record on asbestos reform.
“On asbestos, Senator Specter worked longer and harder than anyone to get the parties involved together, and for those efforts he was recognized by the Chamber of Commerce,” Robbins told The Hill.
I trust him as much as I would a rabid dog.
...The fact that Republican money is being used to hire hardcore leftists to work on the Judiciary Committee is just a travesty...
Real screwup giving the chair to Spector
And here's to all those hacks who said we could trust Specter: ppppphhhbbbbbbttttt!!!
Spector - an enemy to the people.
Specter needs to be urged to change party affiliation immediately. We really don't want him in the GOP.
Specter is a LIDAR.
Liberal In Disguise As a Republican.
The Spectre of this senator is frightening!
Arlie Sphincter (LIBERAL-PA) is a scumbag. I voted for Toomey in the primary. I'm ashamed Sphincter's from my state.
What I said before. It would have been a lot easier to keep him out of the chairmanship than it will be to remove him from the chairmanship. The longer they wait, the harder it will be. Bush will now have to expend considerable political capital to remove him, capital that would have been better used on the judicial appointments themselves.
Moreover, Karl Rove and G. W. Bush are responsible for Specter being there. Without their intervention in Ohio, he never would have won the primary. Nor would the senate leadership have given him this post without Bush's tacit agreement.
Even if Specter does nothing but delay judicial appointments, that will be critical. We have only four years to push them through. Or, if he screws up badly enough, only two years, because Sp;ecter is now in a position to bring down the whole Bush presidency if he chooses. Bush will get the blame, and rightly so, for whatever damage Specter does.
I said at the time they had better have him on a very tight leash. Obviously they don't.
I'll always remember and resent Spector as Ira Einhorn's defense lawyer after Eihhorn murdered Holly Maddux and stuffed her body in a trunk. Einhorn then spent 20+ years living off women and swilling wine and cheese in the French countryside as a protected guest.
I imagine many people like the good doctor, but as far as I'm concerned Frist is a worse version of Lott and i find any talk of Frist running for president extremely laughable.
Under Irish law I think we are allowed to give him a good flogging!
My first band was named "Spectre"! Yeaaa...ROCK-N-ROLL!
Yeah, me too!
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