Why the Democrats are wrong and other meanderings

Name:
Location: Metro Phoenix, Arizona, United States

I'm too lazy to type anything about me. Read my blog and I'm sure you'll eventually learn a few things.

Wednesday, November 23, 2005

Rockefeller and the Arguments of Dumb Dems

A couple Sundays ago, Sen. Rockefeller (D-WV) was on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace (son of Mike Wallace), and this was a portion of the interview:

SEN. ROCKEFELLER: Chris, there's always the same conversation. You know it was
not the Congress that sent 135,000 or 150,000 troops.

WALLACE: But you
voted, sir, and aren't you responsible for your vote?

SEN. ROCKEFELLER:
No.

WALLACE: You're not?

SEN. ROCKEFELLER: No. I'm responsible
for my vote, but I'd appreciate it if you'd get serious about this subject, with
all due respect. ...
(more of the transcript available here)

Frankly, senator, I'd appreciate it if you were serious about the subject. Trying to weasel out of your vote and blame the President for the pre-war intelligence is not serious. Pretending that similar pronouncements to the President's about the threat Iraq posed did not come from Clinton, Gore, Kerry, YOURSELF, and pretty much every other democrat in the Senate, along with most of those in the House, is not serious. Pretending that it was Bush exaggerating the intelligence when British, German, French, Russian, and other foreign intelligence agencies came to the same conclusion is not serious.

See, this is part of the reason I hate Democrats. They're always seeking to blame others for their own problems. They voted for it, now they want to weasel out of it. There's a complete lack of personal responsiblity. This manifests itself across several other policy positions, too, and, of course, lack of personal responsiblity tends to be the motto of one of the most Democratic groups in the nation, defense lawyers. You even see their commercials on tv -- you got caught doing something, call us and we'll try to get you off scott-free. Very irritating.

Friday, November 18, 2005

Quite Funny

This has apparently been making the rounds via e-mail:

The British are feeling the pinch in relation to recent bombings and have raised their security level from "Miffed" to "Peeved." Soon though, security levels may be raised yet again to "Irritated" or even "A Bit Cross." Londoners have not been "A Bit Cross" since the blitz in 1940 when tea supplies all but ran out. Terrorists have been re-categorised from "Tiresome" to a "Bloody Nuisance." The last time the British issued a "Bloody Nuisance" warning level was during the great fire of 1666.

Also, the French government announced yesterday that it has raised its terror alert level from "Run" to "Hide". The only two higher levels in France are "Surrender" and "Collaborate." The rise was precipitated by a recent fire that destroyed France's white flag factory, effectively paralysing the country's military capability.

It's not only the English and French that are on a heightened level of alert. Italy has increased the alert level from "shout loudly and excitedly" to "elaborate military posturing". Two more levels remain, "ineffective combat operations" and "change sides".

The Germans also increased their alert state from "disdainful arrogance" to "dress in uniform and sing marching songs". They also have two higher levels: "invade a neighbour" and "lose".

Belgians, on the other hand, are all on holiday as usual and the only threat they worry about is NATO pulling out of Brussels.

Monday, November 07, 2005

Amusing Look at Arguments over Judicial Nominees

How to demonize a judge in twelve steps.

Essentially, it shows you all the ways a nominee -- especially one to the Supreme Court who has served on a Circuit Court of Appeals -- will have his record distorted.

Saturday, November 05, 2005

Alito Hearings

I'm disappointed, though not surprised, in the dates set for the Alito hearings. I'm aware that the holidays are coming up, which complicate scheduling, but Ginsburg was confirmed in fifty days in 1993, and a similar scheduling could get Alito confirmed by mid-December. People point to Alito's fifteen years' worth of opinions as a reason for delay, but Ginsburg had been on the bench for thirteen years. Moreover, Alito was not some unexpected nominee; various groups have already been researching his record on the bench.

Most importantly, however, is that the announced schedule means that he will miss oral arguments for the January session. It doesn't make sense to have O'Connor sit through those, because the Court will not hand down opinions on them for some time following the arguments. Should the Court's members give one of those cases a preliminary 5-4 vote, with O'Connor in the majority, they would likely need to re-hear the case after Alito joined the Court.

The cases at issue are:
  • Bank of China, N.Y. Branch v. NBM L.L.C.
  • Hudson v. Michigan
  • Hartman v. Moore
  • Wisconsin Right to Life v. Federal Election Commission
  • Texaco, Inc. v. Dagher and Shell Oil Co. v. Dagher (the two cases are being combined into one oral argument session, due to them being essentially the same case (you'll notice that each is a big oil company v. Dagher))
  • Jones v. Flowers
  • Arbaugh v. Y&H Corp.
  • House v. Bell
  • United States v. Grubbs
  • Merrill Lynch v. Dabit

Currently, I don't know much about the particulars of any of these cases; some I have a vague idea about and some I have no clue. I intend to check further into the matter.

However, I think the goal in delaying the hearings may be more in allowing time for the Court to hand down more opinions in which O'Connor takes part before Alito replaces her. A justice must be a member of the Court at the time the opinion is issued for their vote to count, regardless of whether they were a member for oral arguments or the period during which opinions for the case were drafted. Alito is believed to be more "conservative" while O'Connor is considered a "moderate" on the Court (there are problems with those descriptions, which I'll address another time if I haven't already). Thus Alito is predicted to somewhat change the direction of the Court. Kennedy will become the "swing" justice (despite all this talk about O'Connor being the swing justice, that position belonged more to Kennedy during the last term (though that was partially due to the coincidences of which cases were brought before the Court during that particular term)). As such, Democrats (primarily) wish for O'Connor to remain as long as possible.