Even some with firmly established liberal credentials are taking note of how pointless the way the Democrats are handling the Alito confirmation hearings.
E. J. Dionne writes:
A listless intellectual fog had fallen over the Senate hearing room on Tuesday, the first full day of questioning for Judge Samuel Alito before the Judiciary Committee. As one Democratic senator strode out to the hallway during an afternoon break, he leaned my way and said: “We have to hit him harder.”
The senator was expressing frustration over a process that doesn’t work. It turns out that, especially when their party controls the process, Supreme Court nominees can avoid answering any question they don’t want to answer. Senators make the process worse with meandering soliloquies. But when the questioning gets pointed, the opposition is immediately accused of scurrilous smears. The result: an exchange of tens of thousands of words signifying, in so many cases, nothing — as long as the nominee has the discipline to say nothing, over and over and over.
That doesn’t stop Dionne from criticizing Alito or saying what he thinks the Dems should do to try to stop his confirmation, but he acknowledges how empty the exercise has been.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the political divide, the Wall Street Journal notes that "Borking as lost its bite":
The grand hulk of Ted Kennedy ranted that he wanted to subpoena the papers of former National Review publisher William Rusher to get to the bottom of Samuel Alito’s membership in the Concerned Alumni of Princeton. At this moment, one sensed that perhaps at last the ghost of Robert Bork had finally been laid to rest [JIMMY NOTES: Bork is quite alive, so this is an odd metaphor as phrased]. Borking was once a Democratic smear tactic. This week–amid intellectually exhausted and politically befuddled Democrats–it became a laugh track.
Alito Turns Aside Democrats’ Criticism
Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito turned aside Democratic attacks on his judicial record and credib
All true.
I tuned in and REALLY TRIED to watch a couple of times, but the proceedings were so mind-numbing that I couldn’t stay with it.
For all their bluster, the senate Dems may as well have been reading aloud from a dictionary. They are the party who cried “wolf” for decades, and have only themselves to blame that their words are now empty of meaning.
I remember when the whole game started. There was a time when the appointment of a new Supreme Court justice hardly made a ripple in the national consciousness.
Then along came Reagan and Bork. Had the Dems been turned back at that point, they would have no problem today, but they were cursed with early success.
So they did it again.
And again… and again.
Every conservative nominee was painted as a;
Sexist, racist, homophobe, war monger, fascist, child-hater, environmental rapist… a DANGER TO THE COUNTRY, and even the whole world.
Every time.
It got to be so predictable that nominees began to understand that the best way to survive the process was to say as little as possible, in the most innocuous way possible. So now, the whole process, which was meant to provide some reassurance and clarity, has become an exercise in empty lecturing on the one hand, and obfuscation on the other.
A “listless intellectual fog”, is right.
Maybe it’s just me, but E.J. Dionne has always reminded me of Richard LeParmentier. He’s the guy that played Admiral Motti in Star Wars (ep.IV) that Darth Vader was force-choking for making some snotty comments. Good times, good times.
Teddy Kennedy has been his own laugh track since you know when, and in any case, since 1984 at the latest.
Their words were just as meaningless then, but they were in power. If they had managed to retain a majority of the Senate, the Alito hearing would have gone very differently.
PS – you need to update your Southern Appeal link.
That didn’t work: it’s http://southernappeal.org now.
Other observations: Dionne does have a point about Alito’s evasiveness. I found that to be somewhat frustrating myself. Of course, Robert’s essentially did the same thing, but with a touch more charm and rhetorical continuity. More than a few times when facing pointed dem questioning (which I thought was for the most part respectful and useful) it sounded as though he was answering a question that hadn’t been posed. However, when asked why he was being evasive, I thought his reasons were sound and consistent, contra Dionne’s assessment.
I also agree that if a Senator votes to confirm and push the court further to the right, his constituents should know what they’re getting. Of course, I agree for completely different reasons.
“Dionne does have a point about Alito’s evasiveness. I found that to be somewhat frustrating myself”.
My point was that the nominees have been TRAINED (by the process) to be evasive. If the atmosphere were less bitterly oppositional, the nominees might feel free to open up, a little.
As it is, every syllable is being vetted for possible exploitation.
It reminds me of the national party conventions. There used to be some reason behind them. Now, it’s more like, “Can we skip the speeches and get right to the balloons and confetti, PLEASE?”.
Tim, you really hit the nail on the head. Everyone acknowledges that anyone who says something like “Yes, I think the reasoning in Roe v. Wade was flawed, and that the issue of the legality abortion is one which should properly be decided by the people,” even if followed up by “And, by the way, I think abortion should be totally legal and unrestricted, and I would vote for that,” would be the subject of all out *war* to keep him off the Court. Despite the fact that such a legal opinion is perfectly justified and reasonable, and could be backed up by impeccable scholarship and reasoning, Bork taught everyone that the liberal Holy of Holies must not be violated. It’s ridiculous. The “advise and consent” clause is there to make sure the President does not plunk in his unemployed brother Jethro, not to judge candidates based on their political acceptability.
Ah yes, back in the heady days when we had three branches of government and a system of checks and balances. Of course it’s all very different under the current system of judicial autocracy.
As one Democratic senator strode out to the hallway during an afternoon break, he leaned my way and said: “We have to hit him harder.” Another data point in understanding why the Democratic political party and mainstream media are really two branches of the same Democratic Establishment. Could one imagine a Republican senator saying something like that to Dionne? Or a Democrat senator saying something like that to, say, Limbaugh or Hannity?
ELC, great point.
The Dems are just making themselves look stupid. Again.
+J.M.J+
Hey, if it was good enough for Ruth Bader Ginsberg, it’s good enough for Alito! Liberals invented Borking, yes, but they also (ironically) invented the antidote: evasiveness during questioning. Conservatives just took a page from their playbook, that’s all.
In Jesu et Maria,
SDG, We still have 3 branches of government: the Executive, the Legislative, and THE Legislative.
Jay Leno had the best joke … when Joe Biden took 23 minutes of his 30-minute allotment to ask a question, Judge Alito should have asked Biden to repeat the question. That would have brought down the house!
I watched most of the hearings. As a appellate lawyer myself, I thought that Judge Alito was as forthcoming as he could afford to be — and actually even more forthcoming than Justice Roberts. Not simply because of the fact that Democratic questioners were constantly trying to back him into a corner and get him to say something that they would consider to be a bombshell — like he thinks Roe v Wade was bad precedent (which it was) but because as a Justice he is required to weigh the Constitution, statutes, and (to some degree) prior precedent and most particularly the particular facts of each case. And, the facts in each case can vary tremendously. This is illustrated by the large volume of cases decided by the Supreme Court over the years despite the fact that the Supreme Court generally only accepts cases that present new issues of law (either through the application of a new law, or through a fact situation that has never been addressed before). And, Judge Alito answered most questions with an analysis of the applicable case law, statutes and sections of the Constitution that he would consider in addressing the facts of each case. You really can’t ask for more than that.
I was very impressed with Judge Alito. I think he will make a great Supreme Court Justice. I hope that he will be a vote to overturn Roe v Wade when the right challenge comes before the court, but also that in all the cases that the court considers in the future (re: abortion or other issues) he will be the prudent and fair judge that he seemed to be on the Third Circuit.
As for the Democrats, it was a sorry display for the most part. I used to be a Democrat myself – not so long ago – but the abortion issue changed me. So in watching and listening to the Democrats on the committee I was watching senators I used to respect and that too was eye-opening. Mr. Kennedy’s behavior was outrageous – by comparison the rest of them looked practically polite. But, the thing that dismayed me the most was the race-baiting — suggestions that Judge Alito was racist (without coming right out and saying so) that were designed to appeal to the Democrats African-American constituencies. It also annoys me no end to have people like Sen. Feinstien suggest that equal rights for women are all about abortion and that anyone who opposes abortion is anti-woman – when the truth is that the woman who is given the option of taking what appears to be an easy exit through abortion at a time of crisis in her life is the second victim of abortion.
Sorry for the long comment — hope I didn’t get too far off of the subject.
Trish,
Edifying comments. I didn’t watch, but now I don’t have to.
Did you get to read Dionne’s comments on the 55 Catholic Democrats “Statement of Principles”?
Curt Jester posted about the response of the USCCB, and I and several others posted about the Dems statement here.
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