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03/09/2005: Saving Spector
Much as I complain about most GOP members -- especially those political sell-outs and shills for that empty suit of a "Fearless Leader" we have -- it's always good to have people willing to work their way across the political aisles like Sen. Arlen Spector. He appears to be a rare type of political operative (almost extinct these days) who isn't hidebound by their own Party ideology. Spector took a lot of hostile flack from the conservative right to get his Chairmanship of trhe Senate Judiciary Commitee. I only hope that he stays at it and beats this latest illness as mentioned in this piece in the Washington Post: Spector Unbound."President Bush would be wise to "pick up the phone" and consult with Democrats before choosing a new Supreme Court justice. "The advice clause in the Constitution has been largely ignored." If there is a vacancy on the high court, "the far right is going to come hard at a nominee if it is not a nominee of their choosing. But I think there's a much broader base in America than the far right." Changing the Senate rules to prohibit filibusters of judicial nominees -- the "nuclear option" -- could have deleterious short-term effects and run the long-term risk of eroding the rights of the minority. "If we go to the nuclear option . . . the Senate will be in turmoil and the Judiciary Committee will be hell."
What is surprising about these comments is not so much the substance as the speaker: the new Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Pennsylvania's Arlen Specter. If you thought that his brush with losing the committee chairmanship had chastened the legendarily contrarian Specter, if you thought his recent diagnosis of Hodgkin's disease might have tempered his approach -- well, that wasn't the Specter on display in a visit with The Post editorial board yesterday. Instead, the discussion featured Specter Unbound: the Specter who voted against Robert H. Bork rather than the one who rallied to the defense of Clarence Thomas...."
Karen on 03.09.05 @ 05:38 AM CST
