STOP HITLERCHIMP

When Justice White retired, Clinton felt no need to "maintain the current balance" and decided to swing for the fences. He got a grand slam named Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who despite a record of liberal activism best described as "loony", was confirmed 96-3.

I don't think it will be Gonzales. I think Bush got the message that his base doesn't want him, and he doesn't feel like dredging up all that "torture memo" BS again.

But hopefully the Senate GOP won't cave into this defeatist mentalitiy. They have the majortiy for a reason, and they better use it. I'd like to see Owens or Rogers-Brown get the nomination. They keep it a female spot, which the MSM will play up whethger we lie it or not, they are both throroughly conservative, and they were just confirmed with that fun "compromise." Let's see the dems filibuster them now.

If not them, then Garza. The MSM will make a big deal of the first Hispanic justice, and he is a true conservative. Again, let the dems filibuster a Hispanic. I doubt they will.

The good thing about O'Conner going first is that this is the contentious one. I don't mean that replacing Rehnquist will be easy, but that if he had gone first, the dems would have let a conservative through t replace a conservative justice, then used that "show of goodwill" as an excuse to filibuster whoever Bush nominates to replace "moderate" O'Conner. That won't happen now.

But our side needs to buck up and stay strong. We can get two or three true conservatives on the bench.

We should use the term 'constructionist' instead of conservative.

I think Justice Brown would be a fine choice, she just got confirmed, so don't see any problem. Obviously she wouldn't be seen as an extremist based on the agreement.

She is an excellent originalist justice.

Wasn't Janice Rogers Brown already confirmed by 56 senators?

If she's good enough for the 9th circuit, why not the Supreme Court?

Shove that up John McCain's ass.

I am not excited about Gonzales but the difference I see from him and the other so called conservatives nominated by Nixon, Ford and Reagan is that Bush personally knows this man and thus knows his character and his thinking process. He is just not a candidate vetted by the President's aides as a possible choice known only by his paper trail history.

The fact that Bush knows and likes this guy makes me less enthusiastic about Gonzales, not more.

I would love to see Posner or Kozinski nominated; they're two of the smartest and hardest-working court of appeal judges out there, and their opinions are a pleasure to read. Unfortunately, neither is probably enough of a doctrinaire conservative to appeal to the GOP base.

I cannot recall her name offhand, but I read that there is a solid, under the radar female conservative on the 5th Circuit.

I'm a lot more bullish on the prospects here, partly because in retrospect we got the most conservative judges that the left screamed the loudest about confirmed uner the "deal." Also, the public never really pays attention to judges UNTIL it is a supreme court nominee. Now even the average Joe and Jane will notice.

To me it's a no-brainer. Miguel Estrada. First off, he's a conservative's dream of a candidate. Second, his record is impeccable. I'd love to see liberals try to oppose him again, and defend the memos where they describe him as "especially dangerous because... he is Latino". Their opposition to him was absolutely indefensible, and they got away with it only because people weren't paying attention. That won't be a problem now.

Qwinn

Gonzalez has backed affirmative action, is unenthusiastic about states' rights, and generally seems to favor a "living Constitution" approach to rendering decisions. Like Jonah Goldberg said the other day, I like my Constitution stone cold dead. The White House is probably well aware that Gonzalez is fairly unpopular with Bush's base and no more popular with the Democrats, so I'd be surprised and disappointed if he were the nominee.

Okay, given the way things are going, not all that surprised. But there are plenty of other possibilities out there. Personally, my money's on Garza.

I cannot recall her name offhand, but I read that there is a solid, under the radar female conservative on the 5th Circuit.

You're thinking of Edith Brown Clement. Click here and scroll down. She sounds like a dial tone.

Wow, more defeatism from Ace. Why am I surprised?

If Bush nominates Gonzales, the 2006 election is lost. Perhaps 2008 too.

Maybe he's that stupid. I doubt it. If he wants to conserve political capital, he'll nominate Senator Cornyn (which is the current rumor de jour at Redstate).

Incidentally, probably not worse than O'Connor? Gonzales is very pro-racial preferences, which until her recent ignominy O'Connor was actually pretty good on.

The fact that Bush knows and likes this guy makes me less enthusiastic about Gonzales, not more.

Right back at ya.

And what happened to the 5th Circuit's other Edith? She's still younger than Clement, and conservative as all get out -- more solidly so than Garza, this week's rumored frontrunner.

Ace, the nominee will be a surprisingly strong conservative, and he or she will get the nomination despite the pronouncements of the MSM that it'll die.

Bush doesn't lose votes. He has trouble getting to those votes (read: Social Security, Bolton), but when the chips are down, Bush will get whichever nominee he wants passed.

Will it be bloody? Of course. But even Bush has to understand that a Supreme Court choice is one of the handful of decisions a President makes that count far beyond him.

And Bush 43 is ever mindful of Bush 41's screwup with David Souter. We're going to pay for that one for a long time.

Nope, I'm not at all worried about this one. In fact, I think the GOP is eager for a fight here.

It's that SECOND nomination that worries me, because this one will involve a lot of bridges getting torched, and the Dems will be even less pleased at losing the second time around.

I haven't felt this confident in years, Ace.

Cheers,
Dave at Garfield Ridge

Dave: I'm confident in the politics, but not in Bush. A ho-hum guy like Garza as the least-worst option? Ungh. Where are the ballsy names, most obviously Brown?

This white^H^H^H^H^Hhispanic whale Bush is chasing here isn't pretty, and it's taking him further and further from his campaign promise to appoint more Scalias and Thomases.

RENOMINATE BORK!

Of course. But even Bush has to understand that a Supreme Court choice is one of the handful of decisions a President makes that count far beyond him.

Indeed. Of course, Excitable Andy thinks it's more important to "reach out" symbolically to the left by picking a moderate. Because that'll accrue some short-term goodwill, you see, which is far more important than the 20 or 30 years of damage another moderate can do on the Supreme Court.

Fuck them and their goodwill.

They ought to be concerned about earning some of my goodwill. At the moment, they have just about zero.

Oh Glorious Co-Orbital Body, Fuck the Excitable One.
I've been thinking that the Republicans were using the lower court nominees to judge the strength of the dems. Now that they've taken their measure, they can go full bore for the conservative justice. I felt like they were holding back on the lower courts, which was really frustrating.

If the Republicans were smarter I'd figure they've been doing a Rope-A-Dope. Unfortunately Rove ain't running the Senate. But one can hope.

Put me in the Miguel Estrada camp. Oh how sweet that would be! Brown wouldn't be bad either. Either way, no appeasment!

Democratic good will is a joke. Notice how avoiding the "nuclear option" smoothed the way for Bolton? No matter who Bush picks, they're going to be portrayed as the most evil potential justice since Taney, so he might as well go with a serious conservative. But I don't think he's going to be completely in-your-face about it, because this is just the opening act for the fight over Chief Justice, which is going to follow almost immediately.

Even if Bush would truly get hurt by pursuing the 'nuclear option,' should he pursue it, he has a whole term for that ill will to dissipate. And his actions would hardly be wholly transferrable to his successor, because Cheney isn't going to run. If the Democrats filibuster O'Connor's successor, the only right decision is to nuke 'em. If Bush plays his hand right, and goodness knows it won't be hard to do it (appeal to the American people! Throw the 'extreme circumstances' in the democrats faces!). Who cares if people don't like him for this anyway-- the very makeup of the court is what will allow us to keep any reforms we manage to make. Everything is lost if we simply allow the left to rule by judicial fiat.

Naturally, Bush won't understand any of this and he'll cave in. I hate being defeatist.

I agree with Brewfan. No quarter

I'd prefer Miguel Estrada, Janice Rogers-Brown, or Robert Bork, in that order. Just remember that the president needs this one more than the Rehnquist replacement. With that he'll have to fight like a tiger just to stay in the same place. Re: Souter. Most people don't remember this, but the leftists opposed Souter, using the same terms they opposed the current crop, calling him a "rightwing extremist"

Damn Sununu.

I haven't felt this confident in years, Ace.

I feel confident too. Very confident. Supremely confident, even -- that we're going to take it in the ass.

He's going to nominate Gonzales. He doesn't have the fucking stones to throw Luttig or Alito in there, and even if he did, as Ace explains, there aren't enough Republicans in the Senate with the stones to confirm them.

Janice Rogers-Brown would be a good choice but Bush has said he wants to put the first Hispanic on the Court. That leaves only three options, basically: Estrada, Garza, and Gonzales. I can't believe he's going to go back to Estrada after the clusterfuck over his appellate court nomination, so it's really a choice between the other two. I don't know much about Garza, but I'd say cross your fingers and hope for him.

If Rehnquist is planning on retiring too and Bush knows that, then he might nominate Rogers-Brown now and save the Hispanic nominee for the CJ slot. Rogers-Brown would be a slick move, as it replaces a woman with a woman and it makes it harder for the Dems to filibuster considering that they just confirmed her for the D.C. Circuit.

Zell Miller for SCOTUS

replace a DINO with a RINO

Are you folks smoking crack? ;) What on God's green earth makes you think Bush will nominate a conservative? Bush is a moderate. He is likely to nominate a moderate. He's also likely to nominate a Senator because SDO has a legislative background which was essential in being a swing vote, and it would be virtually impossible to ask the Senate to deny one of their own the seat. I think it might be a Lieberman or an Orrin Hatch, though Hatch is older.

What on God's green earth makes you think Bush will nominate a conservative?

Cornyn would actually be a good nominee, but political skills are more useful as Chief, where a certain amount of hackery and politicking is necessary.

Hatch, Lieberman -- zero chance.

Now what if Frist decides to grow a pair in the next week, and pushes the big red button?
See he's got his eyes on the White House. What better way to get in good with the base than to be the architech of their greatest triumph?
If Frist did that, he could let Hillary! ass-rape him at high noon on the 4th of July on the pitchers mound in Ynakee stadium and nobody'd care.

Fuckin' blog with no godddamned spell check!

Because he said he would. What Bush says, Bush does. So far. Posted by someone at

Bullshit. Bush promised to veto McCain-Feingold and look at how much he stood up to that monstrosity.

We're looking at blog police now thanks to that moment of cowardice.

Bush doesn't play hardball. Period. he's to busy trying to be the nice guy rather than doing what needs to be done on the domestic front, and the pussies in the senate don't help matters much either.

We'll be lucky if we get someone as conservative as O'Connor rather than another Souter wannabe.

Now the rumor is that Cornyn was there to get the process started on Owen.

What the hell? Owen's a moderate. She does seem to have the advantage of being from Texas, though.

Are you nuts? He won the popular vote and has a 5 vote majority in the Senate. Clinton didn't have any of those things and he got Ruth Bader Ginsburg, ACLU hack, appointed. It's not like Bush is going to run for office again. What does he need political capital for?

More for the worriers: here.

If you read that link, you'd be reminded: it's going to be a long fight, occupying much of the summer and (with spot #2) a good chunk of the fall.

Let's not blow our wad in a defeatist fit before things even kick off.

Yeah...maybe an affirmative action liberal might say there is now a mandatory female Espicopalian seat, a female Jew seat, a black male seat, a male Jew seat, a gay white male seat that must always be replaced in kind, and a white male is the only seat that must go to a Hispanic .....but I doubt Dubya will follow that....and replace O'Connor with an "obligated" female or nominate a rabid Religious Right figure like Moore after the Terri Schiavo Fiasco he got sucked into.

My guess is Roberts.

Strong conservative with a reputation as the top appellate lawyer in the nation. And, announced with the declaration that he will replace Reinquist as Chief Justice when Reinquist retires.

There will not be a "marginally qualified" Janice Rogers Brown, a theocratic Bible-thumper like Moore, or an extremist "to the right of Attila the Hun" Texan like Edith Clement.

Bush's 2nd pick when Reinquist loosens his death grip on his seat, odds are, will be a Texas white boy or will be an Hispanic or an Asian. Garza is too old, Estrada quit, Gonzales is part of Bush's Texas mafia and a little too "Souter-like" for my taste.

In the meantime, good riddance to O'Connor,

Seriously, stop complaining (or going off on wierd racist rants) and tell your Senator: no Gonzales.

Unless you're in New York, of course, in which case you should probably just call the White House or something.

"Unless you're in New York, of course, in which case you should probably just call the White House or something."
Too true. Eh. I can't believe I live in this state.

Iblis - Now what if Frist decides to grow a pair in the next week, and pushes the big red button?
See he's got his eyes on the White House. What better way to get in good with the base than to be the architech of their greatest triumph?

Frist has not recovered from his ill-advised "video diagnosis" in the "Save Terri" ReligiousRight Panderfest.

Frist pissed away his creds as a straight-shooting doctor, and if he reversed and said - "whoops, innapropriate Love of Turnip Time!!", he would piss off his Right to Life Core.

Frist made his bed, let him sleep in it.

Howard,

I like to believe he signed McCain-Feingold because he thought it would get tossed by the SCOTUS. And, it should have gotten tossed by the SCOTUS. Oh well.

If he's smart, he'll nominate a reliably conservative woman. The most rabid lefties are going to blanch at the prospect of an outright borking of a female candidate, with bogus stories of sexual harassment (remember the confirmation fight for Thomas?) and similar forms of character assasination.

Janice Rogers-Brown all the way.

If he's smart, he'll nominate a reliably conservative woman.

Janice Rogers-Brown all the way.

Brown was a bulwark on the California Supreme Ct.
She was solid conservative voice as the whole state went into the liberal crapper.
She's bulletproof idealogically and the Dems would be in a horrid spot if they try to Bork her.
Shes perfect- so she has no shot.

The MSM will make a big deal of the first Hispanic justice,

What? Benjamin Cardozo wasn't swarthy enough for you?

Y'know, it drives me up the wall when actual ground-breaking men and women are ignored because they lived in a time before identity politics became ubiquitous.

Not that I like a lot of Benny C's opinions, mind you, but he was balls-to-the-wall clever.

"What? Benjamin Cardozo wasn't swarthy enough for you?" Cardozo was descended from Sephardic Jews who came to America in the mid-1700s, via the Netherlands and England. I'll leave the judging of ethnic purity to those who care about such things; however, it seems to me that Cardozo's background is not what most people have in mind when they use the word Hispanic.

Maybe the dems will find someone to claim Janice left a pubic hair on some young male intern's coke can.

Either way, the dems will fight tooth and nail on this one. The courts are the liberal's last stand. If Bush gets 3 supremes the liberals will be shut out of power completely.

I'm going to sit back and watch, 'cause this is gonna be very interesting.

By the way, is it possible the Gonzales is a bizzaro - Souter? A stealth conservative? Can that magnificent bastard Rove be that clever?

I hope Bush realizes he's in a no lose situation:

1. Appoint a strong conservative, who gets confirmed: Win

2. Appoint a strong conservative, Dems lock it up. This makes the Dems look even worse to MSA (Main Stream America). MSA elects a Senate which can pass a cloture vote. We stroll into the 1st Monday in October with a "split" court, which can do "nothing". Is that a bad thing with this activist court? Win

I don't want to see a conservative nominated or appointed. Neither do I want to see some leftist dipstick on the bench. What I want is a liberal. Confused? Well don't be. I'm not using the term liberal in the contemporary sense (which is the result of decades of misappropriation by the left), but in the classical sense. I want a secular 19th century liberal on the bench. Someone who will work to limit the power of government and protect and expand the rights and freedoms of individuals. I'd also like this person to be someone who is able to look beyond the false dichotomy of "liberal" vs "conservative" instead of joining the circus created by the conflict between the two.