Ted Kennedy puts down the martini glass and pens a piece for the WaPo:
The president should reject the pressure of the extreme factions of his party that want litmus tests for his nominee. This process shouldn’t just be about whether the next justice would help roll back women’s rights by overturning Roe v. Wade , the law of the land. It should be about something much more basic: protecting our core constitutional values for generations to come, the freedoms that we’ve fought for, bled for and died for. Because of Sandra Day O’Connor, the disabled are guaranteed access to our public courts. Teachers can’t be fired for opposing discrimination against girls in our public schools. Patients can get a second opinion when an HMO tries to deny them care. Our water is cleaner and citizens can stop polluters who dump toxins into our waterways.
I haven’t always agreed with O’Connor. I didn’t agree earlier this year that we should continue to execute juveniles. And I certainly didn’t agree with her in Bush v. Gore .
But she was fair and tried to interpret the law. Unfortunately, many of those whom President Bush has nominated to the lower courts in the past four years have wanted to remake the law to suit their own ideologies. I hope the president will consult with the Senate and select a consensus nominee as dedicated to the Constitution as Sandra Day O’Connor.
More on Kennedy here, including some choice quotes showing his ‘evolving’ postion on how nominees should be scrutinized, but that is besides the point. What is the point is that because this nominee will replace a swing vote, it is going to be ugly. Uglier even than Bork or Thomas (which is about as ugly as it gets). And, something Kennedy fails to recognize is that while the Republicans did change the rulesin the most recent Senates, the Democrats themselves have played their role in creating this antagonistic atmosphere.
You are going to have a tough time convincing me that Clarence Thomas and William Rehnquist are any more conservative than Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Stephen Breyer are liberal, yet look at the acrimony that was kicked up for their confirmations. Look at the numbers- they tell the story:
Ruth Bader Ginsber, 97-3
Stephen Breyer, 87-9
William Rehnquist, 65-33
Clarence Thomas, 52-48
I watched the Thomas hearings, and I saw the smear job the Democrats tried. I was home on leave after the Gulf War, and I watched the hearings, incredulously. I listen to the attacks to this day, which always center less on Thomas’s rulings and more on the man himself. “Uncle Tom.” “House Negro.”
I don’t want a wild, fire-breathing, crazed right-winger anymore than anyone else, but if we get one, the Democrat’s own behavior is partially responsible. I would like someone who thnks like Scalia but without the blind spot towards religious issues and matters regarding criminals. Unless I have been really misreading things, it hasn’t really been the right wing of the Court that has shat all over personal privacy as of late. But it was the treatment of Republican nominees that led to the creation of activist groups whose sole purpose for existence was to make sure conservative judges got confirmed.
And I am not going to even bothering to look up which way Kennedy voted on all four of those votes. I think I have a pretty good idea.
*** Update ***
Everyone seems to claim I am ‘dead wrong’ about how liberal Breyer and Ginsberg are- from where I sit, they look pretty liberal. They vote on the liberal side of damn near every issue I have paid attention to, and are considered to be the stalwarts of the ‘liberal wing’ of the Court. My own political positions could color my perception of them, and I am aware of that, but they seem pretty liberally to me.
And who the hell is David Breyer and why do I keep calling Justice Breyer by the name of David?
And also, I saw the Thomas hearings- if you thought it was all well and good and how things should go, bully for you. Looked pretty nasty and underhanded to me, and it still does.
BTW- I never said Democrats were the cause of all of this acrimony- I said they were willing particpants, and they have had their hand in getting us where we currently are. This was a progression, a slow, nasty one, and one that should stop. It is all well and good that Hatch and Clinton consulted, and that Hatch suggested Breyer and Ginsburg. As I have stated over and over again, that was then, this is now. Progression means things get worse- just like strep throat starts as a bad throat infection but can lead to Kidney failure. It wasn’tme who said that we should just dump all niceties and openly suggest we should have ideological attacks during confirmation hearings- that was Chuck Schumer.
For every stupid, obnoxious thing a Republican or a conservative activist has said, I can throw back something from the People for the American Way or Ted Kennedy or Pat Leahy that is just as bad.
The problem isn’t how we got here- I tend to think both sides have had a hand, and I do believe the extremists on boith sides of the aisle have been driving the debate. Right about now, we need a kidney transplant.
p.lukasiak
And, something Kennedy fails to recognize is that while the Republicans did change the rulesin the most recent Senates, the Democrats themselves have played their role in creating this antagonistic atmosphere.
nonsense. in the past, the Senate rules prevented extremist judges (like Pryor and Brown) from getting on the bench, and if there was sufficient opposition to a nominee, the President found someone else. The GOP changed the rules, and Bush has adopted a policy of confrontation — pushing extremist judges that under the old rules would never have gotten out of committee.
Thomas was opposed because he was an inexperienced by utterly extremist political hack who benefitted from Affirmative Action, then turned his back on the civil rights movement to advance his own career. Thomas was the ultimate “token”, someone who is black whose sole qualification was his race.
The opposition to Rhenquist was based on his support of the doctrine of “separate but equal”, and his active participation in the intimidation of black voters in Arizona early in his career.
Hunter McDaniel
Just a minor quibble, but you mistakenly referred to Justice Stephen Breyer as “David Breyer” in the text. Otherwise I think you have it just about right.
In many ways, we are reaping the whirlwind from our grandfathers’ failure to address racial segregation through the political process. The Supreme Court finally stepped in to correct this manifest injustice, but in doing so set a precedent for judical resolution of divisive social issues. With each decade they have lowered the bar for issues they will tackle. The result has been to make the courts a ‘super-legislature’. With the stakes so high, the escalation of tactics in confirmation battles was inevitable. Democracy and respect for law have suffered as the result.
Ironically, overturning Roe v.Wade would be the best for the law AND for the Democrats, politically.
p.lukasiak
Look at the numbers- they tell the story:
the numbers don’t tell the story. The story is that both Ginsberg and Breyer were recommended to Clinton by Orrin Hatch as the kind of nominees that the GOP would find acceptable — Clinton wanted to nominate Bruce Babbitt, and Hatch indicated that there would be an ugly confirmation battle if that happened — and recommended the two people that Clinton put on the court instead.
The real number that you should be looking at it that of Scalia, who received 98 votes for his confirmation. Nor did Kennedy or Souter face significant opposition. Democrats oppose seating people who should not be on the Supreme Court, and trying to imply that “the numbers [you presented] tell the story” is the height of intellectual dishonesty that, coming from you, I found quite surprising.
demimondian
Smear job? On Justice Thomas? John, were we watching the same hearings?
I don’t think that Anita Hill’s allegations were necessarily relevant to Justice Thomas’s qualifications to sit on the Court, but they were well-founded — even David Brooks finally acknowleged that fact. A smear job requires false allegations, and they weren’t.
Ben
John,
With all due respect, that is bullshit. That is one of the primary excuses for everything done by the fundies and Bush these days… the Dems were worse when they were in power. The JF’s have claimed that the Repubs were the party of values… well, show it. Revenge certainly doesn’t qualify. The Repubs should think about the country for a change and do what’s right whether than just claim the Dems past actions as a justification/rationalization for their own bullshit.
SomeCallMeTim
I don’t think you can compare the votes on Ginsberg and Breyer to the votes on Rehnquist and Thomas to get a sense of the differing level of partisanship in the two sets of confirmations. If Hatch’s autobiography is being quoted properly on the web, then he claims that he suggested Ginsberg and Breyer to Clinton when Clinton was looking at someone else. So Ginsberg and Breyer had been pre-approved by the Republicans before they were nominated. Of course their nominations were widely supported.
Moreover, Thomas’s nomination is aberration because (a) information came to light very late in the day (not the Republicans fault), and (b) he was trapped by changing understandings of women’s roles in the workplace. I have, for example, little doubt that many of the Democratic men bitching about Thomas did the same or worse to women in their workplace. (I’m obviously assuming the truth of Hill’s claims for this point.) I also have little doubt that many Republican women who complain that Thomas was “railroaded” or “lynched” would be appalled and angry if their boss constantly referenced his massive penis and great porn collection. Maybe I’m wrong about the last; let me know if I am, because we’ve certainly got our share of creepy guys on our side who would get a lot of hope out of knowing that there are women out there who think their behavior is appropriate. Maybe we could even set up a website to help them meet.
Justice Scalia
You are going to have a tough time convincing me that Clarence Thomas and William Rehnquist are any more conservative than Ruth Bader Ginsberg and David Breyer are liberal, yet look at the acrimony that was kicked up for their confirmations.
It’s Stephen Breyer. And more importantly, you are dead wrong here. Breyer and Ginsburg are generally considered moderate liberals. They are nothing compared to real liberals that sat on the Supreme Court such as William Brennan and Thurgood Marshall. Recall that both Breyer and Ginsburg routinely vote to affirm death sentences (Brennan and Marshall believed the death penalty was unconstitutional per se and dissented in every order resulting in letting a death sentence stand), and Breyer in particular has authored some opinions/dissents that are very tough on criminals (i.e. the sentencing guidelines cases). On the other hand, Rehnquist and Thomas are generally considered to be about as conservative as they come.
John, you should retract that statement as it is dead wrong, and frankly, anyone with familiarity with the Supreme Court would find it laughable.
etc.
Part of Bork’s problem was his role as hatchet man during Nixon’s Saturday Night Massacre.
Robert A. George
John, both parties have contributed to the acrimonious judicial atmosphere. Democrats certainly invented “Borking,” of course. The Thomas nomination, as several have pointed out is something of an anomaly. First, the GOP played the “sharecropper-card” that reappeared in the Janice Rogers Brown nomination fight. As mentioned here, Democrats try to pretend that one of the reasons they are not opposing a black nominee is because the nominee is black while the GOP tries to pretend that being black wasn’t a key reason the nominee was proposed in the first place. As George Will wrote at the time, Thomas was hardly the most qualified person GHW Bush could have nominated. The Anita Hill stuff, coming in at the end, was a high-tech “character assassination” if not a lynching.
In any event, the final Thomas vote should hardly be seen as demonstrative either way of any past or future confirmation battles. For that matter, the past is rarely prologue on any SC confirmation vote. For example, does anyone seriously think that Scalia, despite his previous unanimous tally, would pass through 98-0 if Bush elevated him to Chief Justice?
ppgaz
Whenever the subhect of Clarence Thomas comes up, I always recommend a step or two away from the iconic view of him, or his detractors, and recommend that one simply watch and listen to the small amount of footage that’s available, footage of Thomas the Supreme Court Justice, talking to the heathen.
Draw your own conclusions. Mine is, and remains, that he is a strange, unhappy and disturbing man who should not be allowed around children. If I had to describe him in one word, it would be “scary”, and I use the term without any regard to or reference to his political or legal views. The man is just a Stephen King character, in the flesh. He makes Robert Bork look like Barney the Dinosaur.
My version of Halloween? President Bill Frist (reincarnation of Joe E. Brown without the humor) appoints Clarence Thomas as Chief Justice.
Joe E Brown
Kimmitt
Maybe that has something to do with President Clinton’s decision to consult the minority Party on the issue.
Gary Farber
“You are going to have a tough time convincing me that Clarence Thomas and William Rehnquist are any more conservative than Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Stephen Breyer are liberal….”
This is undoubtedly why wacky liberal Orrin Hatch recommended each to Clinton as nominees.
This is just like the way liberals used mind-control rays on Reagan to force him to nominate Anthony M. Kennedy and Sandra Day O’Connor (who voted 87% of the time with far-out liberal William Rehnquist), I guess. Of all the SCOTUS Justices, only two were nominated by a Democrat, and both were recommended by the extremely conservative Republican chair of the Senate Judiciary, but SCOTUS somehow is just a wacky liberal court.
And this is also why although the majority of U.S. Federal Judges were named by Republican Presidents, the courts are just packed with liberals, those same guys chosen by Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush, and Bush.
No magical transformations involved! Just liberal mind-control rays!
I blame LBJ; it must be his fault all we’ve gotten are clones Brennan and William O. Douglas. (And their focus on individual liberty! Shocking!)
Al Maviva
Go ahead, libs – keep pulling for more liberal, statist judges out of one side of your mouth, while decrying the paternalist, intrusive federal government out of the other.
The two things are linked. Take a look at the Raich and Kelo decisions.
ppgaz
Al, where are you going to get me a non-statist judge who doesn’t have to first come through the mental detector of the Dobsonite Security, Inc. checkpoint and the Bathosphere of Pseudo-Conservatism? Who’s your model, Bork from Ork?
I’m just asking.
mac Buckets
Noteworthy is Hatch’s statement, “I knew [Ginsberg and Breyer] both and believed that, while liberal, they were highly honest and capable jurists and their confirmation would not embarrass the President.”
Can you imagine any conservative Justice getting the same “well, he’s conservative, but since he’s honest and capable, we’ll all vote for him” treatment from the Democrats?
Not in a million, billion years.
Sojourner
205 have already been confirmed.
ppgaz
Well, let’s conveniently overlook the fact that the cracked wing of the GOP has declared war on half of America. I mean, that’s old news, right?
If we’re decrying extremism (which used to mean “extreme views” but now just seems to mean “extremely outspoken”, which is quite a different thing) ….. then what is the moderate voice of today saying is the right and proper thing to do?
What is the position of the extreme moderate, these days? Or the moderate moderate? The wishy-washy moderate? All the “extreme” voices have rushed to microphones.
I’m curious to know what passes for moderation these days. Speak up, moderates. Show us the way.
KC
At this point, I honestly don’t care anymore about who the president nominates. I know that he/she will probably be loyalists of the Dobson-Perkins bent and that he/she will probably be fine with rolling back some Warren Court etc. precedents. He/she will probably concur in expanding the powers of the executive branch, restrict some taken for typical civil liberties and rights, and limit the effects of the freedom of information act and other laws that may hinder or intrude upon the workings of government officials. In all, as a result of this nomination, I just figure that we’ll be living in a much more restrictive country, at least as far as civil liberties and rights are concerned.
So, what should the Dems do? I say nothing. Have the normal hearings, voice the normal dissents, but let the President have his nominee. Americans will decide later whether they agree with the direction this country takes.
John Cole
I would be perfectly content with someone like O’Connor.
But she is a conservative…
Gary- Could you read the post, all of it, before you go off on snark tangents.
ppgaz
I’m not sure that “me too” is my best look, but in this case, I definitely have to say, “me too.”
The thing I like about O’Connor, aside from the fact that she is from Arizona, that is, is that she is a reasoner. She reasons things out, and that’s something I can live with, even when her conclusions are not the ones I would have drawn.
John Cole
I know a number of people and have a read a number of lawyers who think O’Connor’s decisions are nothing but a jumbled mess of nonsense. I am not a lawyer, so I will simply react spasmodically to the outcomes I don’t like and praise the decisions I do like, and throw consistency and legal arguments out the window.
I want 9 judicial activists who think just like me. So do you. But what I resent is that I think some on the left wing and, by all appearances, many on the social right think they are entitled to that.
But most of all, I would be just happy with a judge who was hellbent on preserving the rights of the individual and limiting, at every reasonable opportunity, the power of the state.
Kimmitt
Well, yes, if the President were to consult with Senate Minority Leader Reid. Certainly Senator Reid has already made a few suggestions of folks who fall into that category.
ppgaz
Translation: They disagreed with her?
Don’t worry, there’s still Thomas, one of the (cough) great (cough) legal (cough) minds (cough) in (cough) history. After Archie Bunker, I mean.
On O’Connor, I can’t claim objectivity. My dad was a judge and was on a first name basis with her here in Phoenix. He and she were cut from the same cloth. They both appreciated good people including those who toiled on the other side of the political fence.
Kathy K
“But most of all, I would be just happy with a judge who was hellbent on preserving the rights of the individual and limiting, at every reasonable opportunity, the power of the state.”
Problem is that both parties would oppose one of those…
jdm
> But what I resent is that I think some on the left
> wing and, by all appearances, many on the social
> right think they are entitled to that.
Both think they are entitled to it because until the 80s when Republicans(-who-don’t-act-like-Democrats) started winning, the Democrats installed pretty much anyone they wanted. To the point of thinking they were entitled to this practice – you know, like packing the court.
The Republicans thought that once they got enough “power”, like a majority of votes in the Senate and the Presidency, they too would then be entitled to install anyone they wanted.
Most of the judicial appointment fireworks of the last six years have involved the Democrats helping the Republicans to understand that they are mistaken about who is entitled to install anyone in the judiciary. The Republicans are reacting to these lessons poorly and noisily.
Sojourner
I love the way jdm conveniently ignores the role Hatch played in the Clinton nominations. I also love the way jdm ignores unilateral changes Repubs made to the rules of the judiciary committee. Blue slips and Rule IV made it very easy for the minority party to rejct nominees. As soon as Hatch took over as committee chair, he immediately got rid of both, even though he, himself, had used them under Clinton.
Be very careful with the flamethrowing, jdm, because the reality is the power grab by your boys is unmatched by any other party for at least the last 40 years. It was Ted Kennedy who introduced Rule IV when the Dems were in the majority. It was hypocrite Hatch who killed it.
Look closely and the Repubs sure don’t look good.
Gary Farber
“Both think they are entitled to it because until the 80s when Republicans(-who-don’t-act-like-Democrats) started winning, the Democrats installed pretty much anyone they wanted.”
Sure, and it was mind-control of Dwight D. Eisenhower, Richard M. Nixon, and Gerald Ford that accomplished that.
I read your whole post, John.
p.lukasiak
Everyone seems to claim I am ‘dead wrong’ about how liberal Breyer and Ginsberg are- from where I sit, they look pretty liberal. They vote on the liberal side of damn near every issue I have paid attention to, and are considered to be the stalwarts of the ‘liberal wing’ of the Court.
They are on the “moderate wing” of a court that has no “liberal wing” at this point. Gone are the great liberal justices like Marshall and Brennan. When the “other side” is comprised of far right wingers like Rhenquist, and complete wingnuts like Thomas and Scalia, its easy to look “liberal” in contrast.
BTW- I never said Democrats were the cause of all of this acrimony- I said they were willing particpants, and they have had their hand in getting us where we currently are. This was a progression, a slow, nasty one, and one that should stop.
There are two ways to “stop” it
1) Restore the old rules of the Senate immediately, and stop threatening the nuclear option
and/or
2) Bush could follow Clinton’s lead, and start consulting with Democrats rather than confronting them with wingnut nominations for the courts.
And also, I saw the Thomas hearings- if you thought it was all well and good and how things should go, bully for you. Looked pretty nasty and underhanded to me, and it still does.
what do you expect when the nomination itself is nasty and underhanded? Thomas was nominated solely because he was black, to replace the first black justice on the court, Thurgood Marshall — who was considered one of the great legal minds of the 20th Century. Thomas was a token, pure and simple, and if there is anything nastier and more underhanded in judicial nominations that pure, unadulterated tokenism, you’ll have to explain it to us.
Hokie
Thomas was a token, pure and simple, and if there is anything nastier and more underhanded in judicial nominations that pure, unadulterated tokenism, you’ll have to explain it to us.
Nominating someone who puts ideology before all, including considering precedent, in other words, someone who wants to make SCOTUS decisions arbitrary at the whims of an ideological majority and wants to throw law back to before Henry II?
Course, I would say Thomas does that, as well…as do pretty much all of the judicial darlings of the religous right, and certainly some of the left, but mostly it seems to come from the right. This might be because Republicans have nominated most of our federal judges, and SCOTUS itself, in terms of the political makeup of the Court, is skewed towards the right, having two ultra-conservatives (Thomas, Scalia), one very conservative (Rehnquist), one (before two) moderate conservatives (Kennedy), three moderates (Stevens, Souter, Breyer), and one moderate liberal (Ginsburg).
I say Ginsburg is a moderate liberal because in terms of liberalness, you simply cannpot put her on the same page as Brennan, Warren, Blackmun, Marshall, Fortas, and Goldberg, and they themselves cannot be considered to be the same degree as Douglas, who’s probably the last ultra-liberal the Court has had.
Al Maviva
PPGAZ – Janice Rogers Brown; Michael McConnell; Miguel Estrada (you guys blew it on that one); Alex Kozinski. Or appoint Mitch McConnell, ferchrissakes. I think you’d find that most libertarian leaning nominees would get through the Republican side of the senate just fine – the problem isn’t on the right when it comes to libertarians, it’s on the left where the Dems oppose anybody who would challenge the paternalistic regulatory state – and until you understand that skepticism about federal economic regulatory overreach is linked to skepticism about federalizing all aspects of life (including abortion and euthenasia, medical marijuana, highway speed limits and ID cards) then you aren’t going to get judges that meet your highly individualistic libertarian litmus test. It’s difficult to find somebody who thinks medical marijuana should be left to the states, but another medical treatment (abortion) should be left to the federal courts. It’s very difficult to arrive at a principled position, so all you are left with are results oriented judges. There are principled libertarians and libertarian leaning conservatives out there, but they are utterly unacceptable to the Dems. That’s what Janice Rogers Brown had trouble with – her skepticism over federal government power was utterly unacceptable to the Dems, never mind that she would get it right 50% of the time in their estimation.
Soujourner – the rate of confirmation of appellate judges is around 66% – the lowest rate of confirmation ever. Don’t tell me about how many federal magistrates and bankruptcy court judges have gotten through the process. Many of those are not subject to full senate hearings. Apples and oranges.
And Lukasiak, have you ever even once read a Thomas opinion?
Randolph Fritz
“Everyone seems to claim I am ‘dead wrong’ about how liberal Breyer and Ginsberg are- from where I sit, they look pretty liberal”
I always snicker at the idea of far-left Democrats; when did the Dems acquire a Trotskyite wing?
Your idea of the center is skewed; “liberal” is very moderate left. If the far right is, say, neo-nazis, the Koch brothers, and James Dobson, the far left would be Stalinists, Maoists, and Trotskyites. Thing is, there aren’t many Stalinists left in US politics, but we do have neo-nazis and James Dobson. I was reviewing the politics of the John Birch Society the other day, and I realized I was looking at, almost entirely, the politics of John R. Bolton. The far right is almost in power; the far left is nowhere to be seen.
Maviva, I have read a Thomas opinion; my reaction was that it read like a not too good blog comment. The man is not competent, so far as I am concerned, to sit on the Supreme Court.
ppgaz
Al, I’ll have to take your work for it, regarding your suggestions. Alas, the poor citizen gets the public version of the results of vetting from both sides of the aisle, and doesn’t really get the straight poop. The citizen … that’s you and me. So we have to — ahem — trust the process.
Well, when I look at the process from out here through the wrong end of the crummy binonculars they give us, I see a bunch of DC insiders who would kill each others’ grandmothers if they thought it would give them an edge. So let’s just say, I am not having a warm and fuzzy feeling. I don’t trust them.
I’d like to sleep well at night knowing that my government is at least trying to get it right, but I don’t. I toss and turn and wish for a return to the days of Barry Goldwater as the idea of a conservative. Instead, I get Benny Hinn.
Sojourner
Janice Rogers Brown? You’ve got to be kidding. I’m sure the American public would love no zoning restrictions (doesn’t everyone want a strip joint in their neighborhoods), no environmental protection (put your gas mask on, dear), and no SS/Medicare/Medicaid.
How ironic that she is so against the government when she’s fed off of it her entire career.
Brown isn’t even within eyeball view of mainstream.
Sojourner
Considering there is absolutely no input from the Dems about nominees, it’s pretty darn high. I know Bush’s bully boys scream bloody murder when they don’t always get their way but 2/3 is pretty darn high considering the loons that Busy nominates.
matt
I don’t believe any Dems have commented that it is okay to murder Federal judges like Cornyn and DeLay have.
And if I recall the Thomas hearings, a legitimate acusation regarding sexual harrassment was made against him, and it was his accusser who was called “a little bit nutty and a little bit slutty.” The Thomas hearings were ugly, but the ugliness was on BOTH sides (and I am sure in retrospect that Allen Simpson regrets being a part of that).
Compuglobalhypermeganet
I call “bullshit” on that one. No one said it was OK to murder anyone, kook. Cornyn wondered aloud whether court decisions lead to violence against judges, and Delay asked for the Justices “to answer for their behavior.”
Only a lunatic would translate either of those statements into a threat or an “okay” of murder.
ppgaz
I guess Gordon Liddy, who called for the killing of federal agents, was a Dem, then?
As for DeLay, the proper thing for him to do as a powerful member of Congress is to stand up for the judiciary, not try to leverage ignorance and resentment into political gain at the expense of the judiciary. DeLay is scum; defend him at your own risk. And as a supposed sentient citizen, he ought to have sense enough to realize that part of his base is made up of people who think the earth was created in seven days, and that the government started the fire in Waco, and that the government bombed its own building in Oklahoma City, and that Hillary Clinton murdered Vince Foster. There are a lot of crazy, stupid people out there, and winking at them is irresponsible. Tom DeLay could have stood up and said, “Respect the courts and their decisions. We’re a country of laws.” That’s what a real mensch, a real leader, would have done. But he’s beholden to the idiots, and doesn’t dare say the right thing because they’d toss him in a heartbeat.
Let’s not piss on each others’ legs and say it’s raining, okay Compu-anagram?
Compuglobalhypermeganet
Could you be a bit more off-topic next post? Thanks.
So since he is “scum,” we should all lie about him saying “murder is OK?” That’s some code of ethics you’ve got there, pp.
>
Your interpretation and mindreading aside, I think he was coming from more of a “God’ll get you for that” place than a “Zealots should murder you” place, but all interpretations are irrelevant. The fact remains that neither he nor Cornyn said anything like what the poster attributed. End of story.
ppgaz
No, you are quite wrong. It is all about interpretations, and nothing else is relevant. Politics is all about interpretation.
As for a code of ethics, you can start by ceasing the stuffing of words into other peoples’ mouths, and then we’ll talk about whether anybody misinterpreted yours.
Yes, it’s end of story. The short story of your understanding, in the slightest, of what is going on here.
Darrell
Just to be clear, ppgaz is seriously standing by the statement that DeLay and Cornyn have both “commented that it is okay to murder Federal judges”. Doubt me? Read his post above. Kook, heal thyself
Compuglobalhypermeganet
Only we aren’t talking about politics. Try staying on-topic. We are talking about words that came out of people’s mouths on the public record. No politics needed, just the ability to read. We aren’t having an election — we’re talking about truth and fiction. I realize that this makes it harder for people to weasel out of the questions at hand with bizarre interpretations and attempts at channelling DeLay, but there it is.
The poster to whom I responded said, “I don’t believe any Dems have commented that it is okay to murder Federal judges like Cornyn and DeLay have.”
Do YOU think that Cornyn OR DeLay said it was okay to murder judges? I say no. Your turn.
Please, spare me the condescension. It isn’t apt, and it doesn’t suit you.
Compuglobalhypermeganet
Careful, Darrell. You just don’t have the depth of understanding of politics that pp does. I’m sure he’ll be the first to tell you.
ppgaz
You two are really a pair to draw to. I never made any assertion that Delay and Cornyn said anything. That’s a beef you have with someone else.
If you can’t get something that simple right, why should I listen to your babblings on the subject at all?
What I said was that Delay failed to say what is right, and he winked at what is wrong. That’s his game, and apparently, it is also your game.
Your rightwing talk-radio “he said, she said” banter is not only boring, it’s counterproductive. The real issues get sidetracked, which I have to conclude is what you want, since you do nothing to right it. The real issue is that DeLay has not stood up for the judiciary in the manner not only befitting, but incumbent upon, a man in his position. Nor has the president done so. Their winky game of talking near-trash, and standing by while surrogates talk trash, and pretending to be above the fray, and pretending to be what they are not, is tedious and it’s dishonest. The truth is that they pander to voting blocs who have no respect for the judiciary, and in fact, want to tear it down. They only come out and sorta kinda say something almost honorable when called on their shit.
I’m not going to go back and review whether somebody asserted that DeLay did or did not say something, that’s an argument you have with somebody else. But of course, that doesn’t matter to you. What matters to you is making more noise. So, make make more noise. Knock yourselves out.
Rick
You forgot to add: “Potatoheads!”
Cordially…
ppgaz
Those who sing spuds know who they are.
Spuds
Compuglobalhypermeganet
You said, “DeLay is scum; defend him at your own risk,” and then somehow divined that he was “winking” at “crazy, stupid people,” who would presumably take his words and, in his name, commit violent acts against judges. So you are either playing coy now or your original post was extremely off-topic.
The hilarious thing about your “Here’s what Delay should’ve said” tangent is that no one here has even defended what Delay said! I merely said he didn’t say it was okay to murder, which is absolutely correct.
As boring as your out-of-leftfield “rightwing talk-radio” rant? I sincerely doubt that.
There is no “he said, she said” here. Both men’s words are in the public record, and you know and I know that the original poster was dead wrong, which is why I called bullshit in the first place.
That case would be a lot easier to make if you hadn’t admitted that you were originally posting off-topic, citing G. Gordon Liddy’s party affiliation, crazy Christians, and pissing on each other’s legs…but WE’RE the ones just posting to make noise? Ah, the smug comfort of blatant projection…
ppgaz
Uh, okay, Compu-alphabet. Whatever.
Compuglobalhypermeganet
Whatever, indeed.
Birkel
It’s like an orgasmic lefty spawn every time you mention the SCOTUS. Kinda funny to watch, really.
Sojourner
wtf