Dems Don't Mind Conservative Judges, Unless . . .
Regular readers have no doubt picked up on the general subject matter of this blog: things religious and cultural first, things political where the religious and cultural bleed into politics second (maybe even third or fourth). Thus, readers rarely see straight-out political commentary, like the Bolton nomination issue and the DeLay investigation. We also haven't commented much on the filibuster flurry, though Eric Scheske, as an attorney with an interest in the Supreme Court that predates his law school years, has followed it.
We are interested, however, in the Democrats' choice of filibuster victims since it is ultimately tied closely to the culture wars. This writer is, too. Link. And he says Democrats aren't resisting conservatives--unless those conservatives are members of the Dem's traditional power base. Interesting piece. Excerpt:
Why are Senate Democrats so afraid of conservative judicial nominees who are African Americans, Hispanics, Catholics, and women? Because these Clarence Thomas nominees threaten to split the Democratic base by aligning conservative Republicans with conservative voices in the minority community and appealing to suburban women. The Democrats need Bush to nominate conservatives to the Supreme Court whom they can caricature and vilify, and it is much harder for them to do that if Bush nominates the judicial equivalent of a Condi Rice rather than a John Ashcroft.
