George W. Bush's Betrayal

We now move from the war in Iraq to the war in the Republican Party. When George W. Bush was running for office in 2000 and 2004, both times he assured the party faithful that if given the chance to appoint anyone to the Supreme Court, he would appoint only "strict constructionists" who would interpret our laws according to the Constitution, as opposed to these seditious loonies like Ruth Bader Ginsburg (former head counsel for the ACLU by the way), who has done her utmost to blow the Constitution to smithereens. Looking at President Bush's two recent choices for the Supreme Court, I can't help but think that he has pulled a fast one on the people who voted for him. The Republican Party has always done a great job of pissing me off, because never have I seen a group of people who have done a better job of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The establishment Republicans - especially in the Senate - are a bunch of spineless jellyfish who are way too worried about making sure they play by the political equivalent of Marquis of Queensbury rules, while their Democrat counterparts bite, kick, and stomp on their noggins. The Republicans are always so afraid of putting up a fight. Remember the "filibusters" that the Republicans carried out on behalf of the Circuit court picks last year, or two years ago? What a joke that was. When the Democrats threaten a filibuster, why won't the Republicans make them do a real filibuster where one guy stands up there and talks for 30 hours straight as he reads recipies from a cookbook. Senators used to get away with that stuff, but with C-Span around now, what would the American people think about the Democrats paralyzing the Senate because they don't like the politics of a Supreme Court or Circuit Court nominee, no matter how qualified they are? What has really frustrated me both during my lifetime and reading about the events before my birth are the picks for the Supreme Court that have been made by Republican presidents. What do Earl Warren, Harry Blackmun, John Paul Stevens, Sandra Day O'Connor, Anthony Kennedy, and David Souter all have in common? I'm sad to say, they were all picked by Republican presidents, and they all proved to be either out and out liberal, or center-left. Every once in a while, a gem scoots through, such as William Rehnquist, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas; but for every Clarence Thomas, that made it, there is a Robert Bork who didn't.

When President Bush chose John Roberts, I was (and still am) a little nervous. He has somewhat solid conservative credentials, and he appears to be a very intelligent man, but he is still quite a question mark on any number of issues. I did like when during his hearing, he had some good things to say about not believing in taking international law into account when considering Constitutional questions. I wish someone had told this to Sandra Day O'Connor and Stephen Breyer, who have both advocated seeing how the rest of the world handles an issue and then applying that to the decision in a Supreme Court case. Now we have Harriet Miers being nominated by President Bush to take the spot vacated by Sandra Day O'Connor, who was one of President Reagan's few mistakes. It doesn't bother me that Miers has never been a judge - some of our best Supreme Court judges had no previous judicial experience. What does bother me is that we have no idea what this woman stands for. One thing we do know: In 1987, she gave $1,000 to the Presidential campaign of that nutball Al Gore and his running mate, Lloyd Bentsen. She also has some past positions that I'm not too thrilled about. What really scares me about Harriet Miers is not so much who opposes her, like many conservatives do and will, but who supports her. When you have Democrat opinions running the gamut of supportive enthusiasm, as in the case of House minority leader Harry Reid (D-NV), to the careful optimism of Senator Charles Schumer (D-Stalingrad), then we have a serious problem. Anything those so-called men support, I certainly do not.

So what is the bottom line? I believe that once again, the Republicans, led by President Bush, have blown it. They own the presidency, the House, and the Senate, and they still can't get their agenda through, or what they claim is their agenda. George W. Bush could have put two more justices on the Supreme Court who were of the same vein as Justices Scalia and Thomas. Instead he took the easy way out, and what we have most likely been given are two David Souter clones. Please God, let me be proven wrong, but I have to concede that I will most likely be proven right.

Good Day to You, Sir