Posted on 07/19/2005 4:44:48 PM PDT by freedrudge
Edited on 07/19/2005 4:52:02 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
President Bush has chosen federal appeals court judge John G. Roberts Jr. as his nominee to the Supreme Court, a senior administration official says...
I'd prefer even younger. If this guy is confirmed he could be on the SC smacking down liberal nonsense for 35 years or more.
The MSM will try and keep the Rove story going but it's going to be tough to attack Roberts and him at the same time.
WHEN THAT HAPPENS, if we get yet another conservative confirmed, watch for Stevens and Ruth Buzzi to pack it in. They won't want to be on the losing end of 5-4 decisions every time.
Harvard educated
----
Harvard hates America. Period. It's the spawning ground of globalism.
He has a great record, but I don't trust anyone who went to that anti-American institution.
Oh, that would be sweet. Very, very sweet!
>>>If Savage likes him were in good shape.
LOL...
Savage is nuts.
You're right. He will have to bust out of the saloon doors tonight. Orse his base will have his head.
The first time he crosses the line and attacks him personally the President needs to call him or her out personally as THE obstruction.
Bush will get one to three more picks, IMO. Estrada will likely be one of those.
"If Savage likes him were in good shape."
LOL
"Mark Levin, author of "Men in Black," a new conservative critique of the Supreme Court, sees no conflict and is a fan of Roberts. "In the short period he has been on the court, John Roberts has shown he does not bring a personal agenda to his work. He follows the Constitution, and he is excellent."
Just like all the Dem congressmen who quit after the GOP took over the house in 1994.
Mr. McCONNELL. Is it not the case, I ask my friend from Utah, that both John Roberts and Miguel Estrada worked in the Solicitor's Office?
Mr. HATCH. They both worked there. They both were excellent appellate lawyers. By the way, Estrada worked not only with the Bush administration but with the Clinton administration. And he had high marks.
Mr. McCONNELL. The same two gentlemen we just discussed, who were nominated on the same day back in May of 2001, by President Bush, for the very same court?
Mr. HATCH. Right.
Mr. McCONNELL. Nominated to the same court, the same experience in the Solicitor's Office. And is it not the case, I say to my friend from Utah, that John Roberts was passed out of committee and subsequently confirmed on a voice vote in the Senate?
Mr. HATCH. A unanimous voice vote on the floor, but only after waiting 12 years through three nominations by two different Presidents.
Mr. McCONNELL. He certainly had to wait a while, did he not?
Mr. HATCH. Right.
Mr. McCONNELL. Is it not the case that you had two nominees nominated on the same day, to the same court, having had the same experience in the Solicitor's Office, and one nominee was rejected because internal papers in the Solicitor's Office were requested and not turned over, and no such request for the same kind of office papers were made of now Judge Roberts?
Mr. HATCH. John Roberts, who was one of the finest appellate lawyers in the country, as was Miguel Estrada, was treated completely differently once the Judiciary Committee considered him. And I had to force them to consider him. Yet he passed this body by unanimous consent.
Mr. McCONNELL. So the request was made for certain papers of one nominee and the precise same papers of the other nominee were not requested?
Mr. HATCH. That is exactly right. They treated Miguel Estrada differently from John Roberts.
Mr. McCONNELL. Let me ask my friend from Utah, is there any conceivable basis for such disparate treatment for the same two people, nominated for the very same court on the very same day, going through the very same Judiciary Committee? Can the Senator from Utah think of any rational reason for this kind of disparate treatment?
Mr. HATCH. Not a legitimate reason. The only reason was they believed him to be pro-life. I don't know whether he is to this day because we do not ask those questions.
Mr. McCONNELL. But the stated reason, I would say to my friend from Utah, you just confirmed a moment ago. The stated reason for not confirming Miguel Estrada was that he would not turn over these papers or the administration would not turn over these papers.
Mr. HATCH. The phony reason.
Mr. McCONNELL. That was the stated reason.
Mr. HATCH. The phony reason they hid behind.
But let me make this point. Miguel Estrada, as great an attorney as he is, having argued 15 cases before the Supreme Court, having the highest recommendation of the American Bar Association, their gold standard, they did not want him to come through this process because they knew, or at least they perceived, that he was on the fast track to become the first Hispanic on the Supreme Court and they just cannot tolerate having a conservative Hispanic on the Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, let alone on the Supreme Court.
Mr. McCONNELL. So I say to my friend from Utah, what we have is a situation where a white male nominee, to the very same court, with the very same experience, was treated one way and a Hispanic-American nominee, nominated to the very same court, on the very same day, was treated differently?
Mr. HATCH. That is absolutely right. But even Roberts had to go through a lot of pain to get there--12 years waiting, nominated three times by two different Presidents.
We put him out of the committee after a 12-hour hearing. You hardly have that much for Supreme Court nominees. There were two others on that list. They complained because there were three on one day's hearing. They ignored the fact that TED KENNEDY, when he was chairman, had seven circuit nominees one day, and another four. We had at least 10 other times when we had three.
Then once we put him out of the committee, I had to bring him back in the committee so they could have another crack at him. They could not touch him. He was that good. So he had to go through an inordinate process to get there. But they knew they did not have anything on him.
They know they didn't have anything on Miguel Estrada.
Mr. McCONNELL. It sounds to this Senator, I wonder if the chairman concurs, that there was a sort of rule created and applied to Miguel Estrada----
Mr. HATCH. It was a double standard.
Mr. McCONNELL. That was not applied to John Roberts, two nominees considered for the same court at the same time.
Mr. HATCH. Absolutely right. Roberts was treated like all other nominees during the Reagan years, Bush 1 years, and the Clinton years. He was not asked to give his opinions on future issues that might come before the Circuit Court for the District of Columbia.
Because Miguel Estrada answered the same way basically as all the other people who had passed in prior years, they held that against him. The big phony issue was knowing that the Solicitor General's Office did not give the most privileged, private documents in that department without making that department unworkable.
Mr. McCONNELL. Which is why, I say to my friend, they didn't ask for those papers on John Roberts.
Mr. HATCH. That is right. They did treat Roberts differently, no question about it. They gave him a rough time, too. Miguel Estrada is in a league of his own in the way he was mistreated, but Roberts was mistreated, too. Roberts sits on the Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia after having been unanimously approved here.
Looks like they will revert and now ask for his private papers from his days as a solicitor as they did to Estrada. Ain't gonna work this time folks.
Well, if we can't have Michael Savage, I guess this guy will do.
Mikie has my vote.
Sorry. I should have put a sarcasm note there. I really don't know his stand on 2A. I am searching but I think you will find he is a strict constructionist.
I always thought Bill O'Reilly was live...All this is going on and he decides to have Barney Frank on...
The usual suspects have already started screaming their heads off. Sure sign it may be a very good pick...
If he's ever rented an X-rated video or told an off-color joke, it's going to come up in the hearings.
Possibly, then Roberts get Borked for being a good decent white guy (like Pickering), then Bush nominates Judge Brown, then the RATs say a good decent black female minority is "out of the mainstream". Possbibly a rope-a-dope tactic at work, and with the RATs, there are a lot of dopes to rope.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.