Redstate

Batten down the hatches, boys and grits, it's gonna be a bumpy ride.

Or at least will be soon.

Erick, what will Rehnquist do now?  Will he retire next week as planned or wait until the fall?

"Sources confirm.."

Any fear that the multiple sources on foxnews.com just refers to Erick's post? That's what we like to call "circular reporting".

....is worth busting the filibuster for.

Great!! Janice Rogers Brown!

He had that stupid red siren thing going.

Guess Erick was first!

Former Senator Simpson, being interviewed on FOX News, just said:

"Here we go, this is it: batten down the hatches." And he said he's glad he's not on the Judiciary Comm.

Giddyup.

Holy **. Wow. I can't, it's just... Well.

Had a vision from God himself come to me, I would have had doubts about this happening., what a surprise. And, what does this mean?

Is Garza much more viable now? Here comes the speculation pool. I say it's definitely still Garza now.

Here is the SCOTUSblog roundup of Garza posts for some background.

Don't attack the siren! Who else uses a siren on their website to announce breaking news?

...congrats, Erick, well done!

My source, who would know, says Garza is at the top of the list produced by "the process," POTUS asked that Priscilla Owens be added.  No decision yet.

I could be convinced regarding Gonzales as O'Connor's replacement.

BTW, The diaries at Kos had the news about one hour ago - no offense to Erick.

Can you link to the dKos diary?  I searched for it and couldn't find it.

No need to nominate Gonzales when many more qualified, more conservative choices are available.  Gonzales is not acceptable in place of O'Connor - or any future resignations.  Period.

14-1  Samuel A. Alito

56-1  Janice R. Brown

04-1  Emilio Garza

07-1  J. Michael Luttig

12-1  Michael McConnell

22-1  John G. Roberts

10-1  James Harvie Wilkinson III

. . .this was always coming--it might have been better to kill the judicial filibuster before we had a Supreme Court nomination to deal with, since now we've got to worry about the Shivering Seven and their willingness to call BS on the Democrats when they claim that the nomination of anyone to the right of Castro is an extraordinary circumstance that justifies a filibuster, not to mention the media highlighting the promise by the Spineless Ones not to vote to kill the judicial filibuster this session--with all of this happening with about ten times as much media coverage as the previous blowup.  Best to have taken care of this before.

but www.dailykos.com had it by about a half hour.  Apperantly, they had a email from Clarence Thomas' wife.

O'Conner Retires

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/7/1/94012/70086

I dont remember exactly which one I saw, but I remember looking at Redstate to see if it was also here and it wasnt up yet.

they all thought it was a hoax!

The big problem with getting the Republicans on board to go nuclear is that the Democrats will press that there's no rush on this one.  O'Connor technically didn't quit, she quit effective upon the approval of her successor. Technically she could still hear cases and write opinions (though I doubt she will).

That type of logic will be interesting to the Republican 7.  No rush...still 9 on the Court...

Affirmative action delendo est.

Fake constitutional rights delendo son(?).

My Latin gets weak when it comes to congegating verbs.

Lieberman already broke his promise to stop filibustering ordinary nominees when he voted against cloture on John Bolton, who's got bona fide credentials to be the Ambassador to the U.N.

All of the other 6 democrats who promised to stop filibustering frivolously supported the vote to end the filibuster on Bolton.

Dewine, Graham, Spectre, and Warner are the ones to focus on.  (and I know Spectre wasn't one of the "shivering seven, but I worry about him whenever the vote-counting gets tight).

Gonzalez is not acceptable.

Gonzalez is the type of nominee that McCain would appoint so that liberals will induct him into their hall of shame next to FDR and Karl Marx.

We need J. Michael Luttig.

John Cornyn, Samuel Alito, and Emilio Garza are also acceptable.

Kay Bailey Hutchinson is not acceptable. (not that she was in consideration in the first place).

J. Harvey Wilkenson is acceptable.  Although he is a little older than the other candidates.

Lindsey Graham may be acceptable as well.

The fact that Harry Reid finds him acceptable worries me a little.  But Harry Reid has supported great conservatives like Jay Bybee and Richard Leon in the past.

So Lindsay Graham might actually be a winner.

Luttig is a great candidate because he will most likely be a powerful spokesman for those who have suffered at the hands of brutal criminals.

Luttig seems like one who would support the death penalty even for those who murdered before they turned 18.  Even for those who get their lawyers to give them an IQ test so that they can deliberately fail it.

Luttig is a no-nonsense conservative.

OBTW, Ted Olsen and Kenneth Starr would also be great justices.  If the liberals attack Ted Olsen, they will expose themselves as the cowards they truly are.  Ted Olsen is a great conservative.

Ken Starr may have given up his only chance to be a Supreme Court Justice when he accepted the onus of being the Independent Counsel in the prosecution of Slick Willy.

It is sad that he has to pay for the sins of an evil man, but as a good Christian, I'm sure he knows that his reward in heaven will be greater than all of the glory of the world.

My understanding is that the "deal" was specifically limited to judicial nominees.  However as at least one of the 7 Democrats who were a Party to the "deal" failed to vote for cloture (as opposed to merely not voting against it) on Judge Owens(?) then the "deal" has already been breached.

Remember: it's not up to Reid, Boxer, and Kennedy.  It's in part up to those 'maverick' Democrats in states that went for Bush whether they break the deal or not.

They might just uphold the deal, not filibuster, and disappoint the whole press corps as the hearings end in a whimper.

NO, Lieberman did NOT break the deal.  The Byrd Maneuver and the deal only dealt with judges.

just make up those odds? Where did they come from?

Here some more fun with poltical numbers.

http://www.redstate.org/story/2005/7/1/104116/9571

Projected timeline, based on the last 9 SCOTUS nominations.

Projected Timeline (Based on last 9 nominations)    Announcement    First Senate Action    Final Senate Action

Fast    7/1/2005    8/3/2005    8/20/2005

Average    7/7/2005    8/24/2005    9/24/2005

Slow    9/26/2005    9/15/2005    10/23/2005

So on the slow track the first senate action comes before the announcement?

Cool!

Merci

How'd that happen?

Here it is, updated:

Projected Timeline (Based on last 9 nominations)    Announcement    First Senate Action    Final Senate Action

Fast    7/1/2005    8/3/2005    8/15/2005

Average    7/7/2005    8/30/2005    9/30/2005

Slow    9/26/2005    12/11/2005    1/31/2006

All better...