FILIBUSTERS AND THE COURTS

Buchanan on why filibusters of judicial nominations must be stopped: "For decades, radical secularists like William Douglas, Earl Warren, William Brennan, Thurgood Marshall and Harry Blackmun have abused their power as Supreme Court justices to impose their values and views on a society that opposed or even detested those values and views. We have seen voluntary prayer, Bible-reading and the Ten Commandments purged from public schools; the pornography industry, once a sordid criminal enterprise, given First Amendment protection; and children forcibly bused across town on judicial orders because of the color of their skin. We have seen abortion, once a crime in 50 states, declared a constitutional right, followed by the discovery that the Constitution protects homosexual sodomy, though Jefferson equated it with rape. We are no longer a democratic republic. The Supreme Court picks what cases it will hear, what laws it will permit to stand, what rights it shall invent. We overthrew a rule of kings. Now we are oppressed by a rule of judges".

Why the circuit courts are important: "Democrats have made much of the fact that the Senate confirmed 204 federal judges during President Bush's first term, while 'only' 10 judicial nominations were filibustered. However, it is not coincidental that 100 percent of the filibustered nominations were for the powerful circuit courts of appeal. ...[W]hat can only be described as a concerted judicial-filibuster campaign during the 108th Congress was truly unprecedented. Indeed, throughout the entire history of the U.S. Senate, neither the minority-party members in that chamber nor senators of the party that did not occupy the White House had ever before engaged in such a coordinated, protracted filibustering campaign to frequently deny up-or-down votes for one judicial nominee after another... Democrats have cleverly -- and shrewdly -- perpetrated their unprecedented judicial obstructionism exclusively against nominees to circuit courts of appeal. Relatively speaking, these courts have become vastly more powerful in recent decades. With the Supreme Court issuing fewer and fewer decisions, the circuit courts have become the final arbiters more often than in the past. Unless reversed by the Supreme Court, a decision by an appellate court remains the final determination on both legal and constitutional grounds throughout its jurisdiction."

Black conservative Craig DeLuz is outraged at the hatred of judicial nominee Janice Rogers Brown being displayed by Democrats. A small excerpt: "Janice Rogers Brown has become a lightning rod for liberals because she is Black. But as a conservative, she does not subscribe to typical liberal racist ways of thinking. Liberals think that Blacks cannot be successful without the government's help. They don't believe that Blacks can go out and get jobs, so the government must take care of them. They don't believe that Blacks can be successful in school, so they wish to lower the standards for graduation so that Black students will feel better about themselves. They believe that Blacks are victims of a racist system, so they should not be held responsible for their actions; as if we are incapable of controlling ourselves. This is what liberal racists think of us. And sadly, they have been successful in getting most Blacks to buy into this view of themselves. It's nothing more than psychological slavery. But Janice Rogers Brown challenges that image. A successful Black woman with Brown's humble beginnings and yet also possesses conservative world view, is contrary to the dependent characterization liberals wish to paint of us"

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ELSEWHERE

There is an amusing piece of psychological research emanating from UCLA at the moment. It is such bad research that I encourage readers to answer the questionnaire and spook it. For a start, by administering the questions over the internet, they show the usual sublime indifference to proper sampling that is characteristic of psychologists but, perhaps more importantly, the survey is very transparent and its Leftist intentions stand out. Take this excerpt from their preamble: "many would argue that at their core, Americans are self-interested and care foremost about their own well being. Of course, the opposing view is that Americans are generally quite caring and concerned for the well being of others". Which of those views would you say is the one the authors hold? I think it is pretty clear that the former is the answer they want to hear. And researchers do tend to get the answers they want. In the trade it is called "The Rosenthal effect". The survey also asks for political affiliation so one bet that the really nasty guys will turn out to be Republicans! For a brief look at the utter lack of scholarly standards in political psychology, see here

V.D. Hanson on academic "tenure": "Renewable five-year agreements - outlining in detail teaching and scholarly expectations - would still protect free speech, without creating lifelong sinecures for those who fail their contractual obligations. The cost of university tuition continues to creep higher than the rate of inflation. The percentage of cheaper classes taught by adjunct instructors is increasing as well. Yet the competence of recently graduated students is ever more in question. What is not scrutinized in this disturbing calculus is a mandarin class that says it is radically egalitarian, but in fact insists on an unusual privilege that most other Americans do not enjoy. In recompense, the university has not delivered a better-educated student, or a more intellectually diverse and independent-thinking faculty. Instead it has accomplished precisely the opposite".

The role of blogs in supporting Prof. Klocek is getting noticed. Note this AP story: "A longtime DePaul University instructor who argued with pro-Palestinian students at a campus activities fair last fall no longer works for the school. That much is not in dispute. But why Thomas Klocek lost his job while other professors under fire for their statements, including the University of Colorado's Ward Churchill, kept theirs has created a buzz among conservative-leaning Internet blogs about free speech rights at campuses across the country".

Allende: A typical Leftist of his day: "Salvador Allende, the socialist president of Chile who was killed during a CIA-backed coup in 1973, was an anti-Semite who held fascist ideas in his youth, says a new book which has split Chile. The book, Salvador Allende: Antisemitism and Euthanasia, will shock those around the world who revere the late president as a socialist martyr..... The disclosures come from Allende's 1933 doctoral dissertation which had been kept secret. In it he asserts that Jews have a disposition to crime, and calls for compulsory sterilisation of the mentally ill and alcoholics. Victor Farias, the book's Chilean-born author, said Allende quotes approvingly a "cure" for homosexuality, which was then a crime: "It could be corrected with surgery - small holes would be made in the stomach, into which small pieces of testicle would be inserted. This would make the person heterosexual.""

Last Saturday, The Australian (Australia's national newspaper) editorialized about the attack on Chrenkoff and "Opinion Journal" by "Media Watch", a programme of Australia's Left-leaning public Broadcaster (The ABC). I have reposted the editorial here as it may not stay up long. I must say that the inability of the ABC to find "Opinion Journal" via wsj.com (something I myself used to do often before I bookmarked "Opinion Journal") shows what dopes the ABC journalists are. "Media Watch" will be on air again tonight so I hope somebody tells me if they reply to the editorial. I never watch the supercilious garbage myself.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. And on Social Security see Dick McDonald

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That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftist movers and shakers is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftist ideologues are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions and can con "the masses" into giving them power.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

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