Radiofree West Hartford - THE DEMOCRAT CONFIRMATION SIDE SHOW by Tim Siggia

THE DEMOCRAT CONFIRMATION SIDE SHOW

By Tim Siggia

January 26, 2006

Once again we have passed a major hurdle in the confirmation process for a Supreme Court nominee: Judge Samuel Alito has passed muster, albeit along party lines, with the Senate Judiciary Committee, and his nomination now goes to the full Senate. This could not happen, of course, without the usual side-show antics by the likes of Patrick Leahy, Chuck Shumer, Joe Biden, and, of course, the self-appointed star of the show, Ted Kennedy, whose blustering and grandstanding in the end brought him rebuke by committee chairman Arlen Specter.

The Democrats' brouhaha has nothing to do with Alito's qualifications. All are in agreement that Alito is unquestionably qualified to be a Supreme Court justice. (And isn't that what confirmation hearings are supposed to be about, anyway?) The Democrats' bone of contention is the candidate's views. Latest to join the bandwagon of Harry Reid, Dianne Feinstein, and, of course, the ever-blathering Kennedy, is Connecticut's senior senator, Christopher Above-All-Else-We-Must-Be-Liberal-No-Matter-What-The-Cost Dodd, who says he will vote against the Alito nomination because Alito's views are, according to him, out of the mainstream, and because he poses a threat to overturn Roe v. Wade.

"Out of the mainstream"? Upon examination, whose views are in fact more representative of mainstream America? Alito's, or those of Senator Sandanista? Informed Americans will readily recall that had Dodd had his way twenty years ago, Danny Ortega and his gang of Sandanista thugs would still be running El Salvador today. If this is Dodd's definition of "mainstream," then the only Americans in it are those in isolated liberal enclaves like the Northeast, which of course includes his own People's Republic of Connecticut. How interesting it must be to note that the vast majority of Americans are posited on the Far Right -- at least according to Dodd. When ACLU lawyer Ruth Bader Ginsburg was confirmed as a Supreme Court justice back in the Clinton years, with many of those confirmation votes coming from Republicans who strongly disagreed with her near-radical views, there was no big outcry from Democrats about her views being "out of the mainstream".

But let's consider the second part of the argument: that Alito's nomination threatens to overturn Roe v. Wade. Ah, now we're getting down to what it's really all about: abortion, which has become the sacred cow of the Democratic Party. So what's the fuss all about, really? Let's say, for the sake of argument, that the Democrats' precious Roe v. Wade did get overturned. Does this mean that abortion would then be outlawed throughout the land (as it should be, but let's be realistic)? No, not really. What it would really mean is that the federal government would then remove itself from the abortion argument, and the matter would then be up to the individual states. In other words, the states themselves would then decide for themselves to either permit abortion or outlaw it. Ironically, it is the most bloodthirsty of those states (like Connecticut, for instance) that raise the loudest howl over the possibility of Roe v. Wade being overturned.

But is this likely to happen? Again, the answer is no. Even with the assured confirmation of Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court, that body will still have a liberal majority: five liberals to four conservatives (and no, Justice Kennedy is no conservative). Again, without the addition of yet another conservative to the high court, Roe v. Wade would still continue to be upheld. And don't forget, we don't know for sure which way Alito will go on this. Like any good jurist, he will not give a forecast before the matter actually comes up in court, when he will then weigh both sides of the issue before casting a vote.

Abortion, of course, is only the tip of the proverbial iceberg. What really scares both Democrats and their liberal Republican allies is the idea that conservatives might gain control of the judiciary. There is the real threat to all liberals. Thus far, liberals, who know they cannot win in the elective process, have yet managed to use the courts to force their agenda upon a country whose majority rejects it at the polls. Without a black-robed oligarchy to accomplish this, liberals loses all their clout. They then go the way of anarchists, fascists, and every other fringe element with ideas of what America ought to be that run contrary to the will of the people.

Roe v. Wade should be overturned, but don't look for that to happen anytime soon. The ideological balance of the Supreme Court should shift, but don't get your hopes up. It isn't going to. And Samuel Alito should be confirmed as a Supreme Court justice.

That will happen.