Specter Speaks Truth About Bork
Specter Speaks Truth About Bork
Since Robert Bork’s nomination for the Supreme Court was defeated in 1987, conservatives have repeatedly complained nominees are being “borked” when they are forced to answer tough questions. The Washington Post captured the anger on the right in a story this morning:
“Robert Bork represented the moment when the left decided they were not going to defer to the president in allowing him to make over the court,” said Sean Rushton, executive director of the Committee for Justice, which was formed to support President Bush’s judicial nominees. “And we’ve been at war ever since.”
But the truth is that the only reason the Bork nomination failed is because he had a radical, out-the-mainstream philosophy. And Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter candidly admitted that fact this morning:
SPECTER: “When we go back to the 1987 — and we hear about that all the time, the Judge Bork proceedings — the interest groups did not defeat Judge Bork — just didn’t happen. It was his judicial philosophy.”
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this is why the right-wing is ready to stick a knife in specter. he’s just too honest sometimes
July 12th, 2005 at 12:38 pmI’ve been on a few of the rightie sites lately just to see what they think. They are salivating like Pavlov’s dog. There is a HUGE disconnect between what they are saying and what can be done. Talk about out-of-mainstream…
Bush’ll nominate nothing but conservatives. I know. But it all will depend upon what kind of conservatives he puts up there. If he goes out on a limb too far, we’ll Bork him just like Reagan.
July 12th, 2005 at 12:54 pmSpecter is right, but I also think (and remember it being said at the time) that Bork was an unsympathetic figure to the public because he just looked too weird and came off as very condescending in the committee questioning. Ironically, the right is more conventional in most all respects, and Bork did look a bit “out of the mainstream.” So–Bork did himself in, but the means isn’t so clearcut.
July 12th, 2005 at 1:04 pmBork was defeated because the Senate tilted democrat (54-46, I think). His vote was 58-42, so 4 republicans broke ranks. If he was nominated in a 55-45 republican tilted Senate, he would have been confirmed. So that would mean he is mainstream today, or at least close to it.
July 12th, 2005 at 1:17 pmIt’s amazing how the braindead media including CNN repeat Republican terminology such as “Borking” without having anybody point out the other side (the truth) that Bork borked himself..
Remember Judge “Thalidomide” Bork? The monster! Why do we have such a short term memory?
July 12th, 2005 at 1:40 pmkindness,
Just exactly how are you going to “bork” the nominee? We have an agreement that says there will be no more filibusters except in extra-ordinary circumstances, which may be hard to prove here since you let in Owens, Brown, etc. There is a Republican majority in the Senate now and that was not the case in 1987.
July 12th, 2005 at 2:00 pmYou are funny. Written into the agreement is a clause which allows anyone to filibuster if the nominee is too extreme.
That is what we are talking about here. The agreement was for coordial, mutually respectful behaviour. It wasn’t a blank check.
We’ll all just have to wait and see who dubya nominates.
ps – Alberto now has 3-2 odds. If Bush nominates hime, he’ll pass over the howls of both the hard right (abortion rights) and the hard left (OKing torture & disreguarding the Geneva Convention).
July 12th, 2005 at 2:47 pmFrom President George Washington, circa 1789:
July 12th, 2005 at 2:56 pm“Just as the President has the right to nominate without assigning reasons, so has the Senate a right to dissent without giving theirs.”
Every time I hear msm or bloggers talk about Bork I want to quibble a bit. I remember when Bork fired Cox. That was one of the few times when non political citizens were hooked in to politics. The smell had not fully cleared when Bork was nominated to scotus. In fact we were still refering to getting fired for doing the job you were hired for as getting borked. He was nominated at a time of rather low citizen engagement in politics. Suddenly, angry people with short but sharp memories of the saturday night massacre were on street corners expressing a dim view of such an appointment. It could happen again.
July 12th, 2005 at 9:08 pmSpecter, like Ted Kennedy before him, slandered Bork. They implied that Bork would allow legal segregation, when in fact Bork said in his apperance before the Senate Judiciary committee that Brown v. Board of Education was properly decided. Specter was at that hearing, so he knows Bork supported Brown. So Specter is either lying or he’s gone daft and should resign.
July 12th, 2005 at 10:26 pmeditor you TROLL, go away!
July 13th, 2005 at 10:40 amI took a look at your website, The Editors. Is it disillusionment or idiocy?
Man, you’re nuts.
July 13th, 2005 at 11:43 amWhen I read that this blog was being put up by former SCOTUS law clerks and so many of them were infected by Ginsberg I knew what I would find here. A pox on all you leftwing idiots. God gave you brains and you desecrated them.
July 22nd, 2005 at 11:00 pmSpecter’s views on the Borking of Bork are about as sensible as his “magic bullet” theory…he is a two-bit opportunist who will stab anyone in the back if it will win him an election..he is the lowest form of intellectual whore
July 15th, 2006 at 1:59 pm