Posted by Dan Ewert : 6/19/2003 08:44:00 AM (Archive Link)
You may have come across this already. It’s a little Flash cartoon on the official website of the Democratic National Committee called Bush-enstein. In it, George Bush plays the mad scientist creating the ultimate extremist Supreme Court Justice. The monster judge then proceeds to destroy the Supreme Court building while declaring, “Civil Liberties Bad!” It’s really quite hilarious but not for the reasons most liberals think it is. It does more to illustrate how the Democrats view prospective Bush nominees and how scared they are of them. They know there’s an ideological fine line in the Court and that any new conservative justice can make quite the difference in future cases. So they’re doing everything they can to try and dull the conservativeness of nominees and make sure said nominee is more to their liking.

They’re even trying to put the onus on Bush. Tom Daschle recently warned Bush to consult with him about any nominees because he “believe[s] that it is not necessary to have a divisive fight over a Supreme Court appointment.” By this, he’s trying to make it seem that any fight would be Bush’s fault. Note that it’s the Democrats who have been filibustering appeals courts nominees. Any divisive fight would be their fault, not Bush’s. The President has a Constitutional right to appoint judges to the federal bench. While the Senate approves the judges, the role is meant to be sure that the nominee isn’t some crony who has serious mental, moral, or qualification issues, it’s not meant to test ideology. It’s the President’s prerogative to appoint who he wants and the Senate Democrats are trying to usurp that prerogative. Sen. Charles Schumer even helpfully provided Bush with a list of possible nominees that he finds acceptable. These actions are also unproductive for them in the long term. Someday, hopefully far in the future, there will be another Democratic president. And when he tries to appoint judges, the Republicans will not have forgotten the Democrats’ current actions.