Joining the growing chorus of wingnuts objecting to the nomination of John Roberts to the Supreme Court because he doesn't think gays are evil and should be imprisoned is Don Feder, moonbat extraordinaire. He writes:
When the nomination was announced, the White House breathlessly informed us that when Roberts was tapped for the DC Circuit Court, 152 members of the DC Bar - prominent Democrats as well as Republicans - sang his praises to the Senate Judiciary Committee. Never trust a man who's universally loved. Real conservatives are despised by the left.Before last week's revelations, it was still possible to give Roberts the benefit of the doubt. Not any more.
In an August 4th article, the Los Angeles Times disclosed that as a partner with the high-octane DC law firm of Hogan & Hartson, in the mid-1990s, Roberts helped a homosexual group engineer one of the most disastrous Supreme Court decisions of the past two decades...
Their conversation might have gone something like this:
Smith: "John, I'd like you to help us get civil-rights status for homosexuals. We want to negate the will of Colorado voters, further eroding representative government in this country. We hope to establish the precedent that a state's voters are to have no say over whether localities can create special rights based solely on performing certain sex acts."
Roberts: "Delighted to help. I have no serious concern about marshalling the troops for this particular assault on Judeo-Christian values."
Ah, those old "Judeo-Christian values" again. Better yet, "family values"...because gays don't have families, you know. Only Christians have families and only their values matter, liberty be damned. Folks, when Howard Phillips and Don Feder don't like you, you can't be too bad a guy. If they did like him, I'd be scared because it would likely mean that they find him sufficently theocratic.
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Wow, I didn't realize Judeo-Christian values included pre-judging people and interfering with their right to petition the government for redress of grievances. As I understand it, this latter concept was key in the Romer decision. Not to mention the Colorado Amendment (which proponents advocated using at least some of Paul Cameron's disreputable "research" findings) overturned local laws that were passed by representative city governments, reflecting the will of the people of those localities.
I think people like Feder are bitter with Bush for pushing the constitutional amendment a year ago and then suddenly dropping it as though the issue was never brought up as soon as elections were over.
Matthew,
I think you hit the nail on head.
An NPR puff piece tonight played clips of Robert claiming that he sometimes changes his mind in the middle of a case because of compelling evidence, and that making a decision isn't as easy, as he once thought. Amazing. His love affair with the religious right is just about at "I think we should be seeing other people."
The only thing that I'm surprised about is that Don Feder is still around. He used to be a wacky columnist for the Boston Herald but I haven't seen his column there for a number of years. The Boston Herald is a tabloid that has been going through financial difficulties for decades, and I had presumed that they had gotten rid of him.
"Never trust a man who's universally loved. Real conservatives are despised by the left."
So, don't filibuster--heap praises on any judicial nominee that looks bad!
Raj: Feder used to be syndicated to the Chicago Sun-Times, as well; it's nice (well, not really nice) to know that he's still authoring the same sort of rants that had me pegging him as a batshit-crazy loon as early as the 80's. It's a pity that he's taken his one-man comedy act exclusively to the web, though.
Gay tolerant and abortion unfriendly.
He's also, I gather from some limited reading of his opinions on the 4th circuit, that he'll be a national security nightmare (Golly, the President wants to declare the Pentagon exempt from all laws for National Security? Sure boss!) and a corporate stooge.
I don't think that there's a conflict between being non-ideological and being a corporate stooge. Roberts is, apparently, an old-fashioned corporate conservative. He's not a neo-con and he not religious right. I think he'll be a disaster for individual rights, but he'll uphold Roe v. Wade and Lawrence. He'll continue in the Lopez trend of carving out areas where the Federal Government has traditionally acted but can no longer. Look for Federal regulation of environmental policy to go next.
Frankly, Jack Balkin has it right -- the Republicans don't want Roe v. Wade to go away. They just want to continue chipping away around the edges until the right to abortion is regulated into extinction by the states. Roe v. Wade is the best recruiting tool the GOP has ever found. They'll never give it up.
Ironically, I don't think anyone will be happy with him in the long run. In five years we'll hear "No more Roberts's".
ruidh at August 13, 2005 09:52 PM
You may well be correct, and I believe it is a mistake to dismiss Roberts out of hand. If his management skills are up to snuff he may actually be the next chief justice. There are no obvious candidates among the current sitting justices.
Remember, though, that Earl Warren was a fairly conservative atty gen and governor of California. After Roberts gets onto the SupCt--which he will--he might very well suprise all of us. The Warren court led over a revolution in US law. Actually, it wasn't a revolution, it was more of an evolution.
I'd have a very different opinion if Roy Moore--of Roy's Rock fame--was the nominee.