More Disorder in the Court?

Just days before last month’s elections, a conservative weekly’s website suggested that a member of the U.S. Supreme Court was gravely ill and that friends had been asked to pray for 86-year-old Justice John Paul Stevens.

Such rumors are normally “too ghoulish to repeat publicly,” wrote Sean Rushton on HumanEvents.com. But with control of the Senate at stake, it is “news that should be considered,” he said, even if it’s unfounded.

That get-out-the-vote effort stuck out even in a campaign full of cynical appeals. Today, nearly a month after Democrats won both houses of Congress, the Stevens scuttlebutt remains uncorroborated-the senior justice has participated fully in recent arguments, as has Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 73, who’s also been the subject of rumors of poor health. But the effort by Rushton, former director of a conservative group devoted to winning approval of White House judicial nominations, underscored the right wing’s investment in the issue of high court nominees. With newly powerful Democrats like New York Sen. Charles Schumer of the Judiciary Committee vowing an end to “the days of hard-right judges,” the nominee game has become far more complicated.

Full article here - a good read!

Who do you suspect Bush will nominate? Knowing that Democrats hold the majority vote brings me not that much comfort, what with the promise of a quick confirmation hearing for Robert Gates as defense secretary. Newly elected Democrats, vowing a more centrist view, could possibly allow through the likes of Pat (Robertson or Buchanan… or both!).
Sheeesh…