Patterico's Pontifications

1/16/2006

News Flash: Democrats Play Partisan Politics with Alito Confirmation

Filed under: Judiciary,Scum — Patterico @ 9:45 pm

The Washington Post reports that Senate Democrats are delaying the vote on Alito:

Democrats, anticipating that Alito ultimately will be confirmed, are trying to deny the White House that victory as long as possible, particularly in the days before the State of the Union address President Bush is to deliver Jan. 31. Although Senate rules do not enable them to defer the confirmation vote until after the speech, Democratic senators would like to reduce the victory period immediately before the speech, one of the broadest public stages the president commands each year.

The State of the Union “is the 800-pound gorilla lurking over the debate,” said Jim Manley, spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.). “That’s part of the strategic calculation.”

Manley added that Senate Democrats are not going to be “rushed” into a vote. Whew! It has been a whirlwind, hasn’t it?

Pathetic.

Comments (60)

60 Responses to “News Flash: Democrats Play Partisan Politics with Alito Confirmation”

I don’t buy the “victory period” b.s. In think the real reason is that the Dems are under intense pressure from their moonbats to fb and have to either find a way to win that fight, or find a way to appease the loonies.

Roll by a few of the Hard Left sites and see for yourself. They’re demanding fb (and I, um occasionally encourage ’em for fun), and they’re about as reasonable on the fb topic as they are on all others.

However, delaying Alito’s confirmation till the SOTU might distract the little buggers, in the same way parents distract a screaming toddler who wants something. Maybe that’s what’s up. Makes more sense than the stated reason, anyway.
ras (f9de13) — 1/16/2006 @ 10:02 pm
It looks as though they got Patterico’s goat enough to get him to whine about it.

So who’s more pathetic?
m.croche (8e3bfc) — 1/16/2006 @ 10:22 pm
Delaying the vote keeps Sandra Day O’Connor from her wish–taking care of her Alzaheimer’s-afflicted husband. She agreed to stay until her replacement was in place. It is time to grant her wish and let her go home.
Richard (f95b98) — 1/16/2006 @ 10:23 pm
Democrats play partisan politics? Who knew?
Justice Frankfurter (2dcd84) — 1/16/2006 @ 11:48 pm
I don’t get it. It what way is moving the vote that will confirm Bush’s 2nd appointee to the U.S. Supreme Court *closer* to the State of the Union going to be bad for Bush?

Wouldn’t it make more sense (to the extent it’s possible to make sense of this) to get Alito confirmed and out of headlines while there’s still time to drum up some bad news headlines in the run up to the State of the Union?

I mean, Alito’s confirmation vote may be bad news for the Democrats, but it ain’t bad news for Bush.
Rickbert (5f1bfd) — 1/17/2006 @ 1:03 am
ras wrote:

Roll by a few of the Hard Left sites and see for yourself. They’re demanding fb (and I, um occasionally encourage ‘em for fun), and they’re about as reasonable on the fb topic as they are on all others.

Boy, is that the truth. I’ve seen some libs basically saying f*** the Democrats, because Senatrix Feinstein says a filibuster is not a wise move, the Daily Kos has had a group wedgie over the issue, you name it.
Dana (3e4784) — 1/17/2006 @ 4:38 am
Pitiful George can’t seem to get a break, can he? He can’t even get his own congress back early from vacation either to settle who’s replacing Delay. Poor baby. http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/6345.html
Psyberian (1cf529) — 1/17/2006 @ 4:48 am
“He can’t even get his own congress back early…”

I thought the legislative branch of the government was separate from the executive. George’s congress? Heck I thought it was a separate branch. Silly me.
Luke (b7189a) — 1/17/2006 @ 6:05 am
I wonder just how the voters would react to Bush saying in the State of the Union Speech that the Mean Spirited Democrat partisans in their Obstructionist ploys delayed Judge Alito’s vote and elevation to the Supreme Court not out of any legitimate reasons, but in pure Mean Partisanship thereby Keeping Justince O’Connor from retiring to care for her Alzheimer stricken husband. How petty can they get. What else are the Democrats putting before the needs of the American people to pursue power or Obstruct solutions to problems they haven’t been able to solve?
PCD (49d1db) — 1/17/2006 @ 6:30 am
“Manley added that Senate Democrats are not going to be “rushed” into a vote. Whew! It has been a whirlwind, hasn’t it?”

I didn’t follow the hearings that closely, but I still haven’t figured out just what alito meant when he said in 1985 that national review was formative to him in the sixties. National review was saying some awful racist things back then, and I’d like to make sure those weren’t formative for the nominee.
actus (85218a) — 1/17/2006 @ 7:03 am
Hearings are over, actus.
Angry Clam (fa7fff) — 1/17/2006 @ 7:06 am
“Hearings are over, actus.”

Did they touch on this? Alito could still clarify his record outside of the hearings. He doesn’t have to do it under oath.
actus (85218a) — 1/17/2006 @ 7:09 am
Or he could just ignore it as more of the same pointless idiocy from democrats that CAP was.

Most likely, it’s going to be “I liked ‘God and Man at Yale'” anyway.
Angry Clam (fa7fff) — 1/17/2006 @ 7:22 am
“Or he could just ignore it as more of the same pointless idiocy from democrats that CAP was.”

I’d say its different. He said he was a member of CAP, not that its ideology was formative. You can understand the distinction.
actus (ebc508) — 1/17/2006 @ 8:09 am
I’m referring to the “CAP is racist!” (it wasn’t) and “NR is racist!” (it wasn’t) nonsense.
Angry Clam (fa7fff) — 1/17/2006 @ 8:15 am
“I’m referring to the “CAP is racist!” (it wasn’t) and “NR is racist!” (it wasn’t) nonsense. ”

Here’s a quote from 1957:

“The central question that emerges . . . is whether the White community in the South is entitled to take such measures as are necessary to prevail, politically and culturally, in areas in which it does not prevail numerically? The sobering answer is Yes – the White community is so entitled because, for the time being, it is the advanced race. It is not easy, and it is unpleasant, to adduce statistics evidencing the cultural superiority of White over Negro: but it is a fact that obtrudes, one that cannot be hidden by ever-so-busy egalitarians and anthropologists.”

Nonsense indeed.
actus (ebc508) — 1/17/2006 @ 8:29 am
If that’s your support for the claim that NR was racist, then let’s attribute to left-leaning organizations or publications the attitudes reflected by their members’ or contributors’ most off-the-wall statements. You see where this leads?

This is kind of like your “the Constitution was written by slaveowners so everything in it must be pro-slavery” nonsense.

Is this is what passes for argument on the left? I suppose it energizes the moonbat base, but it doesn’t persuade anyone who hasn’t already drunk the Kool-Aid.
TNugent (6128b4) — 1/17/2006 @ 9:10 am
Oh good. Formative in the ’60s. Quote from 1957.

Please waste some more time finding a comment from the right decade.
Al (2e2489) — 1/17/2006 @ 9:12 am
Alito was 6 years old in 1957, and he wasn’t reading National Review then. (Trust me on this one.)

Besides, using essays written by someone else to smear Alito is the same slimy technique that Ted Kennedy tried to use, and failed.
Justice Frankfurter (2dcd84) — 1/17/2006 @ 9:32 am
If that’s your support for the claim that NR was racist, then let’s attribute to left-leaning organizations or publications the attitudes reflected by their members’ or contributors’ most off-the-wall statements.

They wrote racist things. Their view of civil rights was racist, as well as basically resistive of civil rights. They were on the wrong side. I’d like to know how formative this was to your then-young Alito.

This is kind of like your “the Constitution was written by slaveowners so everything in it must be pro-slavery” nonsense.

Its not pro-slavery. Its just, well, pro the kinds of people who are slaveowners. Who we surely know have many other enlightened opinions that we must follow, rather than contemporary ones, in order to protect our rights.
actus (ebc508) — 1/17/2006 @ 9:36 am
Besides, using essays written by someone else to smear Alito is the same slimy technique that Ted Kennedy tried to use, and failed.

Like I said. I think we can look to the views of those that Alito considers formative, and find that distinct of the views of people that alito chose to join.
actus (ebc508) — 1/17/2006 @ 9:38 am
Democratic Senator Robert Byrd (D-West Virginia) spent his formative years in the Ku Klux Klan.

Duh.
Justice Frankfurter (2dcd84) — 1/17/2006 @ 9:46 am
Democratic Senator Robert Byrd (D-West Virginia) spent his formative years in the Ku Klux Klan.

And we know he has renounced it. That’s what I want to know of Alito.
actus (ebc508) — 1/17/2006 @ 9:47 am
Here’s a chapter from the (roughly) contemporaneous book “Conscience of A Conservative,” which was essentially identical to the NR editorial position. Racist, as actus says, or witchhunt, as reality demands?

Chapter 4: And Civil Rights
An attempt has been made in recent years to disparage the principle of States’ Rights by equating it with defense of the South’s position on racial integration. I have already indicated that the reach of States’ Rights is much broader than that-that it affects Northerners as well as Southerners, and concerns many matters that have nothing to do with the race question. Still, it is quite true that the integration issue is affected by the States’ Rights principle, and that the South’s position on the issue is, today, the most conspicuous expression of the principle. So much so that the country is now in the grips of a spirited and sometimes ugly controversy over an imagined conflict between States’ Rights, on the one hand, and what are called “civil rights” on the other.
I say an imagined conflict because I deny that there can be a conflict between States’ Rights, properly defined-and civil rights, properly defined. If States’ “Rights” are so asserted as to encroach upon individual rights that are protected by valid federal laws, then the exercise of state power is a nullity. Conversely, if individual “rights” are so asserted as to infringe upon valid state power, then the assertion of those “rights” is a nullity. The rights themselves do not clash. The conflict arises from a failure to define the two categories of rights correctly, and to assert them lawfully.
States’ Rights are easy enough to define. The Tenth Amendment does it succinctly: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by it to the States are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
Civil rights should be no harder. In fact, however-thanks to extravagant and shameless misuse by people who ought to know better-it is one of the most badly understood concepts in modern political usage. Civil rights is frequently used synonymously with “human rights”-or with “natural rights.” As often as not, it is simply a name for describing an activity that someone deems politically or socially desirable. A sociologist writes a paper proposing to abolish some inequity, or a politician makes a speech about it-and, behold, a new “civil right” is born! The Supreme Court has displayed the same creative powers.
A civil right is a right that is asserted and is therefore protected by some valid law. It may be asserted by the common law, or by local or federal statutes, or by the Constitution; but unless a right is incorporated in the law, it is not a civil right and is not enforceable by the instruments of the civil law. There may be some rights-“natural,” “human,” or otherwise-that should also be civil rights. But if we desire to give such rights the protection of the law, our recourse is to a legislature or to the amendment procedures of the Constitution. We must not look to politicians, or sociologists-or the courts-to correct the deficiency.
In the field of racial relations, there are some rights that are clearly protected by valid laws and are therefore “civil” rights. One of them is the right to vote. The Fifteenth Amendment provides that no one shall be denied the franchise on account of race, color or previous condition of servitude. Similarly with certain legal privileges enforced by the Fourteenth Amendment. The legislative history of that amendment makes it clear (I quote from the Civil Rights Act of 1866 which the Amendment was designed to legitimize) that people of all races shall be equally entitled “to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, and give evidence, to inherit, to purchase, lease, sell, hold and convey real and personal property and to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of persons and property.” After the passage of that Act and the Amendment, all persons, Negroes included, had a “civil” right to these protections.
It is otherwise, let us note, with education. For the federal Constitution does not require the States to maintain racially mixed schools. Despite the recent holding of the Supreme Court, I am firmly convinced-not only that integrated schools are not required-but that the Constitution does not permit any interference whatsoever by the federal government in the field of education. It may be just or wise or expedient for Negro children to attend the same schools as white children, but they do not have a civil right to do so which is protected by the federal constitution, or which is enforceable by the federal government.
The intentions of the founding fathers in this matter are beyond any doubt: no powers regarding education were given the federal government. Consequently, under the Tenth Amendment, jurisdiction over the entire field was reserved to the States. The remaining question is whether the Fourteenth Amendment-concretely, that amendment’s “equal protection” clause modified the original prohibition against federal intervention.
To my knowledge it has never been seriously argued-the argument certainly was not made by the Supreme Court-that the authors of the Fourteenth Amendment intended to alter the Constitutional scheme with regard to education. Indeed, in the famous school integration decision, Brown v. Board of Education (1954), the Supreme Court justices expressly acknowledged that they were not being guided by the intentions of the amendment’s authors. “In approaching this problem,” Chief Justice Warren said “we cannot turn the clock back to 1868 when the amendment was adopted…We must consider public education in the light of its full development and in its present place in American life throughout the nation.” In effect, the Court said that what matters is not the ideas of the men who wrote the Constitution, but the Court’s ideas. It was only by engrafting its own views onto the established law of the land that the Court was able to reach the decision it did.
The intentions of the Fourteenth Amendment’s authors axe perfectly clear. Consider these facts.
1. During the entire congressional debate on the Fourteenth Amendment it was never once suggested by any proponent of the amendment that it would outlaw segregated schools.
2. At the same time that it approved the Fourteenth Amendment, Congress established schools in Washington and in Georgetown “for the sole use of…colored children.”
3. In all the debates on the amendment by the State Legislatures there was only one legislator, a man in Indiana, who thought the amendment would affect schools
4. The great majority of the States that approved the amendment permitted or required segregated schools at the very time they approved the amendment. There is not room here for exhaustive treatment of this evidence, but the facts are well documented, and they are all we have to know about the Fourteenth Amendment’s bearing on this problem. The amendment was not intended to, and therefore it did not outlaw racially separate schools. It was not intended to, and therefore it did not, authorize any federal intervention in the field of education.
I am therefore not impressed by the claim that the Supreme Court’s decision on school integration is the law of the land. The Constitution, and the laws “made in pursuance thereof,” are the “supreme law of the land.” The Constitution is what its authors intended it to be and said it was-not what the Supreme Court says it is. If we condone the practice of substituting our own intentions for those of the Constitution’s framers, we reject, in effect, the principle of Constitutional Government: we endorse a rule of men, not of laws.
I have great respect for the Supreme Court as an institution, but I cannot believe that I display that respect by submitting abjectly to abuses of power by the Court, and by condoning its unconstitutional trespass into the legislative sphere of government. The Congress and the States, equally with the Supreme Court, are obliged to interpret and comply with the Constitution according to their own lights. I therefore support all efforts by the States, excluding violence of course, to preserve their rightful powers over education.
As for the Congress, I would hope that the national legislature would help clarify the problem by proposing to the States a Constitutional amendment that would reaffirm the States’ exclusive jurisdiction in the field of education. This amendment would, in my judgment, assert what is already provided unmistakably by the Constitution; but it would put the matter beyond any further question.
It so happens that I am in agreement with the objectives of the Supreme Court as stated in the Brown decision. I believe that it is both wise and just for negro children to attend the same schools as whites, and that to deny them this opportunity carries with it strong implications of inferiority. I am not prepared, however, to impose that judgment of mine on the people of Mississippi or South Carolina, or to tell them what methods should be adopted and what pace should be kept in striving toward that goal. That is their business, not mine. I believe that the problem of race relations, like all social and cultural problems, is best handled by the people directly concerned. Social and cultural change, however desirable, should not be effected by the engines of national power. Let us, through persuasion and education, seek to improve institutions we deem defective. But let us, in doing so, respect the orderly processes of the law. Any other course enthrones tyrants and dooms freedom.
Chapter 4: And Civil Rights
An attempt has been made in recent years to disparage the principle of States’ Rights by equating it with defense of the South’s position on racial integration. I have already indicated that the reach of States’ Rights is much broader than that-that it affects Northerners as well as Southerners, and concerns many matters that have nothing to do with the race question. Still, it is quite true that the integration issue is affected by the States’ Rights principle, and that the South’s position on the issue is, today, the most conspicuous expression of the principle. So much so that the country is now in the grips of a spirited and sometimes ugly controversy over an imagined conflict between States’ Rights, on the one hand, and what are called “civil rights” on the other.
I say an imagined conflict because I deny that there can be a conflict between States’ Rights, properly defined-and civil rights, properly defined. If States’ “Rights” are so asserted as to encroach upon individual rights that are protected by valid federal laws, then the exercise of state power is a nullity. Conversely, if individual “rights” are so asserted as to infringe upon valid state power, then the assertion of those “rights” is a nullity. The rights themselves do not clash. The conflict arises from a failure to define the two categories of rights correctly, and to assert them lawfully.
States’ Rights are easy enough to define. The Tenth Amendment does it succinctly: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by it to the States are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
Civil rights should be no harder. In fact, however-thanks to extravagant and shameless misuse by people who ought to know better-it is one of the most badly understood concepts in modern political usage. Civil rights is frequently used synonymously with “human rights”-or with “natural rights.” As often as not, it is simply a name for describing an activity that someone deems politically or socially desirable. A sociologist writes a paper proposing to abolish some inequity, or a politician makes a speech about it-and, behold, a new “civil right” is born! The Supreme Court has displayed the same creative powers.
A civil right is a right that is asserted and is therefore protected by some valid law. It may be asserted by the common law, or by local or federal statutes, or by the Constitution; but unless a right is incorporated in the law, it is not a civil right and is not enforceable by the instruments of the civil law. There may be some rights-“natural,” “human,” or otherwise-that should also be civil rights. But if we desire to give such rights the protection of the law, our recourse is to a legislature or to the amendment procedures of the Constitution. We must not look to politicians, or sociologists-or the courts-to correct the deficiency.
In the field of racial relations, there are some rights that are clearly protected by valid laws and are therefore “civil” rights. One of them is the right to vote. The Fifteenth Amendment provides that no one shall be denied the franchise on account of race, color or previous condition of servitude. Similarly with certain legal privileges enforced by the Fourteenth Amendment. The legislative history of that amendment makes it clear (I quote from the Civil Rights Act of 1866 which the Amendment was designed to legitimize) that people of all races shall be equally entitled “to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, and give evidence, to inherit, to purchase, lease, sell, hold and convey real and personal property and to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of persons and property.” After the passage of that Act and the Amendment, all persons, Negroes included, had a “civil” right to these protections.
It is otherwise, let us note, with education. For the federal Constitution does not require the States to maintain racially mixed schools. Despite the recent holding of the Supreme Court, I am firmly convinced-not only that integrated schools are not required-but that the Constitution does not permit any interference whatsoever by the federal government in the field of education. It may be just or wise or expedient for Negro children to attend the same schools as white children, but they do not have a civil right to do so which is protected by the federal constitution, or which is enforceable by the federal government.
The intentions of the founding fathers in this matter are beyond any doubt: no powers regarding education were given the federal government. Consequently, under the Tenth Amendment, jurisdiction over the entire field was reserved to the States. The remaining question is whether the Fourteenth Amendment-concretely, that amendment’s “equal protection” clause modified the original prohibition against federal intervention.
To my knowledge it has never been seriously argued-the argument certainly was not made by the Supreme Court-that the authors of the Fourteenth Amendment intended to alter the Constitutional scheme with regard to education. Indeed, in the famous school integration decision, Brown v. Board of Education (1954), the Supreme Court justices expressly acknowledged that they were not being guided by the intentions of the amendment’s authors. “In approaching this problem,” Chief Justice Warren said “we cannot turn the clock back to 1868 when the amendment was adopted…We must consider public education in the light of its full development and in its present place in American life throughout the nation.” In effect, the Court said that what matters is not the ideas of the men who wrote the Constitution, but the Court’s ideas. It was only by engrafting its own views onto the established law of the land that the Court was able to reach the decision it did.
The intentions of the Fourteenth Amendment’s authors axe perfectly clear. Consider these facts.
1. During the entire congressional debate on the Fourteenth Amendment it was never once suggested by any proponent of the amendment that it would outlaw segregated schools.
2. At the same time that it approved the Fourteenth Amendment, Congress established schools in Washington and in Georgetown “for the sole use of…colored children.”
3. In all the debates on the amendment by the State Legislatures there was only one legislator, a man in Indiana, who thought the amendment would affect schools
4. The great majority of the States that approved the amendment permitted or required segregated schools at the very time they approved the amendment. There is not room here for exhaustive treatment of this evidence, but the facts are well documented, and they are all we have to know about the Fourteenth Amendment’s bearing on this problem. The amendment was not intended to, and therefore it did not outlaw racially separate schools. It was not intended to, and therefore it did not, authorize any federal intervention in the field of education.
I am therefore not impressed by the claim that the Supreme Court’s decision on school integration is the law of the land. The Constitution, and the laws “made in pursuance thereof,” are the “supreme law of the land.” The Constitution is what its authors intended it to be and said it was-not what the Supreme Court says it is. If we condone the practice of substituting our own intentions for those of the Constitution’s framers, we reject, in effect, the principle of Constitutional Government: we endorse a rule of men, not of laws.
I have great respect for the Supreme Court as an institution, but I cannot believe that I display that respect by submitting abjectly to abuses of power by the Court, and by condoning its unconstitutional trespass into the legislative sphere of government. The Congress and the States, equally with the Supreme Court, are obliged to interpret and comply with the Constitution according to their own lights. I therefore support all efforts by the States, excluding violence of course, to preserve their rightful powers over education.
As for the Congress, I would hope that the national legislature would help clarify the problem by proposing to the States a Constitutional amendment that would reaffirm the States’ exclusive jurisdiction in the field of education. This amendment would, in my judgment, assert what is already provided unmistakably by the Constitution; but it would put the matter beyond any further question.
It so happens that I am in agreement with the objectives of the Supreme Court as stated in the Brown decision. I believe that it is both wise and just for negro children to attend the same schools as whites, and that to deny them this opportunity carries with it strong implications of inferiority. I am not prepared, however, to impose that judgment of mine on the people of Mississippi or South Carolina, or to tell them what methods should be adopted and what pace should be kept in striving toward that goal. That is their business, not mine. I believe that the problem of race relations, like all social and cultural problems, is best handled by the people directly concerned. Social and cultural change, however desirable, should not be effected by the engines of national power. Let us, through persuasion and education, seek to improve institutions we deem defective. But let us, in doing so, respect the orderly processes of the law. Any other course enthrones tyrants and dooms freedom.
Angry Clam (a7c6b1) — 1/17/2006 @ 9:48 am
Damn it, I pasted that twice.
Angry Clam (a7c6b1) — 1/17/2006 @ 9:48 am
The segregationist attorney who argued against lawyer Thurgood Marshall in the Supreme Court case, Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas was John W. Davis. Not only was Davis a Democrat; Davis had previously been the Democratic party’s candidate for President in 1924.
Justice Frankfurter (2dcd84) — 1/17/2006 @ 10:05 am
Oh, please, if we just admit what the rules are, we’ll all be happier:

1- If a Democrat belonged to the Klan, or drove a girl off a bridge, or plagiarized someone else’s work, or inflated his résumé, or used the word “nigger” on television, or trashed his fellow soldiers in Vietnam; if he says that he’s sorry, all is forgiven.

2- If a Republican was once a member in a campus group that discriminated against women, or ran for president as a segregationist half a century ago, or honors someone who was a segregationist way in the past on his 100th birthday, had a DUI without running off a bridge, or missed a National Guard roll call, it doesn’t matter what he says, how much he apologizes, or how long ago it was; he is forever tainted.

These are the left’s rules; I just wish that they were honest enough to admit it.
Dana (3e4784) — 1/17/2006 @ 11:00 am
I demand that the vote be delayed until actus has an audience with Alito and pronounces himself satisfied on every issue that actus “didn’t follow . . . that closely” during the hearings.
eddie haskell (51058c) — 1/17/2006 @ 11:05 am
I suppose by actus’s weird logic, any Democratic member of Congress or any left-leaning judge who read The Nation up until, oh, present time would be suspect since that magazine has famously been sympathetic to Communists, including those of the Stalinist variety.
JVW (54c318) — 1/17/2006 @ 11:05 am
You forget, JVW, that communists are good people (although, depending on the lefty you get, misguided), and that conservatives are worse than Satan.
Angry Clam (fa7fff) — 1/17/2006 @ 11:33 am
actus repeats a central claim of Democrats when confronted by the record of Grand Kleagle (i.e., chief recruiter) Robert Byrd—“he’s renounced it.”

Now, far be it for me to question a sitting US Senator, but I’d be curious to know the specifics of:

1. Robert Byrd’s renunciation of the Klan; and
2. Any apologies he has ever extended over his membership in the Klan.

It’s all well and good to claim that he’s renounced the Klan and such. I’ve no doubt he’s no longer a dues-paying member (unlike, say, Teddy Kennedy, who’s been a dues-paying member of an all-male club for two decades after said club was booted from Hahvud). I’m just asking when and where Robert Byrd did it, and how it’s phrased.
Lurking Observer (ea88e8) — 1/17/2006 @ 11:52 am
Lurking Observer,

Byrd denounced the Klan as being politically inconvenient to politicians these days such that he would advise an ambitious young pol not to join it. To my knowledge, that’s as far as he’s gone.

He still enjoys using the “N” word, tho. Like a good cigar, he knows it’s bad for him, but damn it’s just too bloody enjoyable to give up completely.
ras (f9de13) — 1/17/2006 @ 12:21 pm
ras:

I’m aware of Byrd’s recent “it’s an albatross around your neck.”

I’m just presuming that actus or other good liberals can provide some evidence that Byrd actually renounced the Klan earlier (as in, “the Klan is a hate-filled organization” or some equivalent). Frex, exactly when did he tell the Klan that he was resigning from its ranks?
Lurking Observer (ea88e8) — 1/17/2006 @ 12:28 pm
Frex, exactly when did he tell the Klan that he was resigning from its ranks?

Try Answers.com.

When running for Congress in 1952, he announced, “After about a year, I became disinterested, quit paying my dues, and dropped my membership in the organization. During the nine years that have followed, I have never been interested in the Klan.” During this campaign, “Byrd went on the radio to acknowledge that he belonged to the Klan from ‘mid-1942 to early 1943,’ according to newspaper accounts.

The wall street journal wingnut page puts it at the 1940’s. Though they say he’s still got racist sympathies.
actus (ebc508) — 1/17/2006 @ 12:34 pm
Hmmm.

actus, in the same article, it notes that Byrd claims to have dropped out of the Klan in 1942-1943, yet, the article goes on to note:

1. In 1945, he made his infamous claim that he’d rather see Old Glory trampled underfoot than serve w/ black soldiers.
2. In 1946, a handwritten letter from Byrd was found, urging the Klan to spread
3. In 1958, he was openly defending the Klan.

This does not exactly sound like Mr. Byrd’s claims to have only been a member for a year or so are necessarily credible.

So, again, I’m curious to know what the corroborated facts regarding his resignation from the Klan actually are?

Hence my question. Referring readers to an article that notes that there is controversy about when he left doesn’t really answer the question, does it?
Lurking Observer (ea88e8) — 1/17/2006 @ 12:50 pm
Referring readers to an article that notes that there is controversy about when he left doesn’t really answer the question, does it?

He can leave it and defend it, or leave it and think that someone else should spread it.
actus (ebc508) — 1/17/2006 @ 12:52 pm
On FOX News Sunday, March 4, 2001, Senator Robert Byrd (D.-West Virginia) said:

“There are white n___gers. . . I’ve
seen a lot of white n___gers in my
time.”

If you don’t have racist sympathies, then you don’t use the N-word, right?
Justice Frankfurter (2dcd84) — 1/17/2006 @ 12:54 pm
actus,

Are you really suggesting that this is the action of someone not in the Klan?

Byrd won the primary, but during the general election campaign, Byrd’s GOP opponent uncovered a letter Byrd had handwritten to Green, the KKK Imperial Wizard, recommending a friend as a Kleagle and urging promotion of the Klan throughout the country. The letter was dated 1946 — long after the time Byrd claimed he had lost interest in the Klan. “The Klan is needed today as never before, and I am anxious to see its rebirth here in West Virginia,” Byrd wrote, according to newspaper accounts of that period.

And are you really going to tell me that someone who is not in the Klan is going to be recommending someone else as not just a member, but as a recruiter??

Do all the ducks in your neighborhood wear little sticky tags that say, “I am a duck”?
Lurking Observer (ea88e8) — 1/17/2006 @ 12:58 pm
"Senate Panel's Vote on Alito Delayed Until Next Week"

Via The Washington Post:The top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee reached an agreement yesterday evening to wait until next Tuesday to vote on the nomination of Samuel A. Alito Jr. to the Supreme Court. The agreement alters the …
protein wisdom (c0db44) — 1/17/2006 @ 1:05 pm
actus, who’s “they?” Would that be the unspecified “they” who are always doing bad things to good liberals?

And you have yet to offer any support for your bald assertion presented as argument that the Constitution is “pro the kinds of people who owned slaves”. It’s not. It’s anti-slavery and it always was, except for those few provisions which, before the Civil War, contained the specific compromises beteween states that permitted slavery and those that did not. The conflict between slavery and the Constitution was as apparent as was the conflict between slavery and the Declaration of Independence; both conflicts were recognized by the pro-slavery side (who usually refused to acknowledge the conflict, but made up flimsy rationalizations, instead) as well as those favoring abolition (who clearly pointed out the conflict — writings of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, for example). On the slaveowner side, consider Jefferson’s ridiculous attempts to use imagined racial differences to rationalize his ownership of slaves, in contrast to what he wrote in 1776 (not to mention his relationship with Sallie Hemings), and also consider Hamilton’s contemptuous dismissal of Jefferson’s baseless assertions of the inferiority of blacks.
TNugent (6128b4) — 1/17/2006 @ 1:08 pm
Let’s not forget the Civil Rights Act of 1964, filibustered by “ex” Klansman Byrd.
Xrlq (ffb240) — 1/17/2006 @ 1:15 pm
If you don’t have racist sympathies, then you don’t use the N-word, right?

Lets ask Marshall Mathers.

And you have yet to offer any support for your bald assertion presented as argument that the Constitution is “pro the kinds of people who owned slaves”.

Its not like it was ratified by them.
actus (ebc508) — 1/17/2006 @ 1:22 pm
actus:

Are you really arguing that b/c pro-slavery people ratified the Constitution, therefore the Constitution was pro-slavery?

How in the world do you reconcile that absurd position with the reality that anti-slavery people also voted to ratify the Constitution?

Does the word “compromise” or “log-rolling” have any meaning in your lexicon? Do you have any clue as to how politics works in the real world?

Among the Founding Fathers, there were those who also supported a stronger central government, a weaker central government, high tariffs and low tariffs, greater and lesser religious freedom. Read the Federalist Papers to see some of the debate, as well as any number of histories that discuss the various compromises that went into that document.

Even then, as others have noted, the subsequent Civil War redefined much of the Constitution, such as whether its provisions necessarily applied to the states, the power of the central government versus the power of the states, and the rights of all citizens regardless of color.

Are you suggesting that the existence of the Klan would somehow then equate to the Constitution being suspended, since the Klan existed in order to overturn and subvert various aspects of the post-Civil War Constitution?

And if Robert Byrd could be outside the Klan while supporting it, what is to say that pro-slavery elements pre-Civil War were not outside the penumbra of the Constitution, even as they were ratifying it?
Lurking Observer (ea88e8) — 1/17/2006 @ 1:32 pm
Are you really arguing that b/c pro-slavery people ratified the Constitution, therefore the Constitution was pro-slavery?

It was the sort of constitution that people like slaveholders, or sexists who did not let women vote, would ratify. And it is their interpretation that should guide us, rather than our contemporary ones, because that is the best way to protect our rights.
actus (ebc508) — 1/17/2006 @ 1:41 pm
actus:

It was also the sort of constitution that people like abolitionists (e.g., Hamilton and Franklin) would ratify.

Your sophistry is more than a little tedious, actus, and is unbecoming someone who has in the past at least tried to argue in good faith.

Meanwhile, I await you or anyone else providing a little more light as to just when Robert Byrd left the Klan.
Lurking Observer (ea88e8) — 1/17/2006 @ 1:47 pm
“Becoming disinterested” is hardly “denouncing,” is it? But it sure is politically expedient, if you believe your constituents are still “interested.”
Jamie (4f069f) — 1/17/2006 @ 2:00 pm
Sure actus, in your universe only slaveowners ratified the constitution; no one voting for ratification was an abolitionist. And in the actus universe, we get to disregard the effect of the 10th amendment regarding state laws permitting slavery (keeping the federal government out of state policy on the issue), and also disregard the fact that the original constitution didn’t contain the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments. I suppose we also read Taney’s opinion in Dred Scott as though it were correct, and since the Constitution calls for the protection of property rights and slaves are property, not persons under the Constitution in the actus universe, the Constitution is a document that favors the interests of the kind of people who owned slaves. And we will have substituted an assumption of the conclusion for anything resembling an actual argument.
TNugent (6128b4) — 1/17/2006 @ 2:10 pm
actus has a point. Last week the Senate Dems were able to find hundreds of Alito’s colleagues, even sitting appelate judges, who testified that Alito was a vicious racist, sexist, bigot, homophobe.

Oh, wait a minute. They testified just the opposite. My bad.

Well, I bet he liked Archie Bunker better than Mr. Jefferson!!!
Old Dad (fbd785) — 1/17/2006 @ 2:27 pm
Lurking Observer, I posted my last comment before reading yours. I concur in your disappointment in actus’ out-of-character non-argument.

Actus, so, who are you and what have you done with the real actus?
TNugent (6128b4) — 1/17/2006 @ 2:27 pm
actus stated as fact that Robert Byrd apologized for serving in the KKK. He has not. actus has lied.

Why must you lie, actus? Why can’t you be honest? Is it your ideology that drives you to put forth falsehoods or is it something from your upbringing?

Why are you a liar, actus? Why do you think your speculative moral judgements about another man matter to anyone reading your comments when it’s so very clear that the one who is lacking in morality is yourself?
Cash (0d203b) — 1/17/2006 @ 3:14 pm
Mr Justice Frankfurter wrote:

On FOX News Sunday, March 4, 2001, Senator Robert Byrd (D.-West Virginia) said:

“There are white n___gers. . . I’ve
seen a lot of white n___gers in my
time.”

If you don’t have racist sympathies, then you don’t use the N-word, right?

Actually, if you are a United States Senator and you have a brain, you don’t use the word.
Dana (8d0335) — 1/17/2006 @ 3:57 pm
Even Alito at seven was probably reading Mad and EC Comics. At least I certainly hope so.
Pat Patterson (5b3946) — 1/17/2006 @ 4:01 pm
Actus,

Here’s how Alito responded when confronted about CAP, and I think any reasonable person can believe that he’d respond the same way about NR:

“I would never be a member of an organization that took those positions.” (advocating racial or gender inequality)

The issue is done. The Dem’s had their chance to ask their questions and defend their base. You’re continuing to hang on to a very flimsy reed.

To borrow a saying from Chick Hearn:
“This game’s in the refrigerator: the door is closed, the lights are out, the eggs are cooling, the butter’s getting hard, and the Jello’s jigglin’!”

Time to vote him in!
Brian (b0d240) — 1/17/2006 @ 6:15 pm
Do we even need to discuss the racial discrimination practiced by the UAW and skilled labor unions in the 1960’s and 1970’s (and years prior)?
Imagine someone coming to the court saying that labor was a strong influence in his young life being painted a racist by Kennedy or actus.
MayBee (c5700f) — 1/17/2006 @ 6:24 pm
Maybee writes:

Imagine someone coming to the court saying that labor was a strong influence in his young life being painted a racist by Kennedy or actus.

I’m sure that I’d need some of Mr Kennedy’s Dewer’s to imagine something that fanciful.
Dana (3e4784) — 1/18/2006 @ 3:46 am
I’m sure that I’d need some of Mr Kennedy’s Dewer’s to imagine something that fanciful.

Mary Jo Kopechne was unavailable for comment.
rls (0516f0) — 1/18/2006 @ 8:08 am
From: Ending slavery

by Thomas Sowell

”To me the most staggering thing about the long history of slavery — which encompassed the entire world and every race in it — is that nowhere before the 18th century was there any serious question raised about whether slavery was right or wrong. In the late 18th century, that question arose in Western civilization, but nowhere else.

It seems so obvious today that, as Lincoln said, if slavery is not wrong, then nothing is wrong. But no country anywhere believed that three centuries ago.

A very readable and remarkable new book that has just been published — “Bury the Chains” by Adam Hochschild — traces the history of the world’s first anti-slavery movement, which began with a meeting of 12 “deeply religious” men in London in 1787.

.. The anti-slavery movement was spearheaded by people who would today be called “the religious right” and its organization was created by conservative businessmen. Moreover, what destroyed slavery in the non-Western world was Western imperialism.

Nothing could be more jolting and discordant with the vision of today’s intellectuals than the fact that it was businessmen, devout religious leaders and Western imperialists who together destroyed slavery around the world. And if it doesn’t fit their vision, it is the same to them as if it never happened.

As anti-slavery ideas eventually spread throughout Western civilization, a worldwide struggle pitted the West against Africans, Arabs, Asians and virtually the entire non-Western world, which still saw nothing wrong with slavery. But Western imperialists had gunpowder weapons first and that enabled the West to stamp out slavery in other societies as well as in its own.

The review of “Bury the Chains” in the New York Times tried to suggest that the ban against the international slave trade somehow served British self-interest. But John Stuart Mill, who lived in those times, said that the British “for the last half-century have spent annual sums equal to the revenue of a small kingdom in blockading the Africa coast, for a cause in which we not only had no interest, but which was contrary to our pecuniary interest.”

It was a worldwide epic struggle, full of dramatic and sometimes violent episodes, along with inspiring stories of courage and dedication. But do not expect Hollywood to make a movie about anything so contrary to their vision of the world.”
___

Read the whole thing: http://www.townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/ts20050208.shtml
mary (5020c4) — 1/18/2006 @ 9:00 am
Regarding posts 55 and 56, when I lived in Massachusetts I recall hearing that Kennedy’s scotch of choice was Chivas Regal. Not quite the workingman’s drink, eh, even if it is “only” a blend.
JVW (54c318) — 1/18/2006 @ 12:04 pm
I heard it was Cutty Sark his dad “imported” during the dry days of prohibition. In my misspent youth we took that as an article of faith. Even my Uncle Jack said so, and he had JFK’s picture on the living room wall, over the fireplace. But, enough of this speculation, does anyone have it straight from the horse’s mouth.
Black Jack (d8da01) — 1/18/2006 @ 4:46 pm
I’d heard the Cutty Sark story too.
Angry Clam (fa7fff) — 1/18/2006 @ 5:47 pm

1/16/2006

News Flash: Democrats Play Partisan Politics with Alito Confirmation

60 Responses to “News Flash: Democrats Play Partisan Politics with Alito Confirmation”

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