Don't vote for Roberts.
John Roberts was always going to be confirmed as Chief Justice. And I don't consider it something to wail and rent and tear over. My impression of Roberts is that he might actually be that rarest of all beasts: a genuine modern American conservative, like Robert George, instead of the sort of flailing reactionary that is the mainstay of today's American right -- Happy birthday, Weekly Standard! Even if we had the votes, I probably wouldn't have favoured a judicial filibuster.
Of course I might be wrong. Roberts is so inpenetrable, any story is possible. His paper trail can be read a lot of ways. But the point is, we're going to find out. We were always going to find out, whatever kabuki Joe Biden came up with.
That said, why would any Democrat actually vote for him? I understand the tradition of voting for internal Adminstration appointments in all but the most extreme, Gonzales-like, cases (it's one of the things I most admire about Russ Feingold, actually). A president, even the worst president, has to be able to surround himself with people he trusts and can work with if anything at all is going to get done. It's not the Senate's job to choose the cabinet. But we're not talking about the cabinet here. We're talking about a lifetime appointment to the independent judiciary. Roberts is only ever going to be accountable to one set of voters and the votes they cast ought to be as representative as possible -- given that it's the Senate, which isn't representative at all -- of how Americans split over judicial philosophy. No Democratic president -- like the hypothetical ones who lost incredibly close, partisan elections to Bush over the past five years -- would have even considered appointing John Roberts to the Supreme Court. When Americans vote for Democrats, as a huge minority or plurality do every two years, they're not voting for people like Roberts.
Mostly, it's the tired old saws in the bipartisanship-above-all "mod squad" who are probably voting for Roberts against any pretense of a liberal ideology: Max Baucus, Kent Conrad, Tim Johnson, Ben Nelson. What can you do about these guys? But why on earth is Patrick Leahy on board? Maybe he thinks encouragement from ideological opponents will make Roberts more sympathetic to their concerns.
Or maybe Leahy has just given in to the Cult of Bipartisanship. Leahy says that, despite his concerns, "in my judgment, in my experience, but especially in my conscience I find it is better to vote yes than no. Judge Roberts is a man of integrity. I can only take him at his word that he does not have an ideological agenda". This sounds perilously close to Ellen Tauscher and the House New Democrat Coalitions' bullshit about "not wanting to be the party of 'no'." The question here, the one we'll have the answer to soon enough, is whether Roberts is a traditional conservative or a faddish originalist hack determined to further increase the power of the conservative executive at the expense of the Congress. I think Leahy is perfectly justified in expressing optimism that Roberts is closer to the former. But neither possibility deserves actual Democratic support, just different degrees of opposition. What about being the party of moderate, tough-minded liberalism?
Of course I might be wrong. Roberts is so inpenetrable, any story is possible. His paper trail can be read a lot of ways. But the point is, we're going to find out. We were always going to find out, whatever kabuki Joe Biden came up with.
That said, why would any Democrat actually vote for him? I understand the tradition of voting for internal Adminstration appointments in all but the most extreme, Gonzales-like, cases (it's one of the things I most admire about Russ Feingold, actually). A president, even the worst president, has to be able to surround himself with people he trusts and can work with if anything at all is going to get done. It's not the Senate's job to choose the cabinet. But we're not talking about the cabinet here. We're talking about a lifetime appointment to the independent judiciary. Roberts is only ever going to be accountable to one set of voters and the votes they cast ought to be as representative as possible -- given that it's the Senate, which isn't representative at all -- of how Americans split over judicial philosophy. No Democratic president -- like the hypothetical ones who lost incredibly close, partisan elections to Bush over the past five years -- would have even considered appointing John Roberts to the Supreme Court. When Americans vote for Democrats, as a huge minority or plurality do every two years, they're not voting for people like Roberts.
Mostly, it's the tired old saws in the bipartisanship-above-all "mod squad" who are probably voting for Roberts against any pretense of a liberal ideology: Max Baucus, Kent Conrad, Tim Johnson, Ben Nelson. What can you do about these guys? But why on earth is Patrick Leahy on board? Maybe he thinks encouragement from ideological opponents will make Roberts more sympathetic to their concerns.
Or maybe Leahy has just given in to the Cult of Bipartisanship. Leahy says that, despite his concerns, "in my judgment, in my experience, but especially in my conscience I find it is better to vote yes than no. Judge Roberts is a man of integrity. I can only take him at his word that he does not have an ideological agenda". This sounds perilously close to Ellen Tauscher and the House New Democrat Coalitions' bullshit about "not wanting to be the party of 'no'." The question here, the one we'll have the answer to soon enough, is whether Roberts is a traditional conservative or a faddish originalist hack determined to further increase the power of the conservative executive at the expense of the Congress. I think Leahy is perfectly justified in expressing optimism that Roberts is closer to the former. But neither possibility deserves actual Democratic support, just different degrees of opposition. What about being the party of moderate, tough-minded liberalism?
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home