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April 18, 2007 3:08 PM
Because we didn't fight.
In his earlier post on the Supreme Court decision, Justin Krebs was pretty polite. Instead of warning against the dangers of being silent, I'll chalk this one up to refusing to fight.
Supreme Court Justice Alito cast the deciding vote in today's Supreme Court case upholding Bush's ban on late term abortions. Alito now has a lifetime appointment on the Supreme Court because these Senators who professed to oppose Alito didn't fight:
Senator Daniel Akaka (D-HI)
Senator Max Baucus (D-MT)
Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-NM)
Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA)
Senator Thomas Carper (D-DE)
Senator Lincoln Chafee (R-RI)
Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND)
Senator Daniel Inouye (D-HI)
Senator Herb Kohl (D-WI)
Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA)
Senator Joe Lieberman (D-CT)
Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-AR)
Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL)
Senator Mark Pryor (D-AR)
Senator John Rockefeller (D-WV)
Senator Ken Salazar (D-CO)We had a chance to block Alito. Back in January of 2006, pro-choice forces in the Senate were filibustering the nomination of this far rightwing judicial activist. However, 16 Senators, who would later vote NO on Alito's appointment, voted yes to cut off debate, end the filibuster and move the vote to the floor.
By voting YES for cloture, these Senators assured Alito's lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court. Their later NO vote was made meaningless by their earlier support of cloture.
Some of these Senators continue to enjoy support from pro-choice groups even after they voted to end the filibuster of Alito, thus assuring his appointment to the Supreme Court.
If you're wondering how this Supreme Court decision could have happened, you might want to pose that question to the senators on the list above.
The Congressional switchboard is: 202-224-3121. Don't forget, the call is free if you are a Working Assets Wireless or Long Distance customer.
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Discussion
Thank you for calling them out.
I'm furious about this.
Go here and read this story -- and then come back here and tell me you're "pro-life" and support this decision. Go on, I dare you.
There's no way our government should be interfering with the private medical decisions of a woman and her doctor -- that's the hallmark of a fascist state, not a democracy.
And there's something oddly hypocritical about an Administration that calls the use of a few frozen blastocysts for medical research "the destruction of human life" (even when they were going to be discarded anyway) -- yet had no problems launching an illegal war of aggression that has (so far) killed thousands of Americans and tens if not hundreds of thousands of Iraqis.
America, what have we become?
Very interesting, but on this case, Alito was assumed to be a lost case by most court watchers. Surprisingly, Roberts was the one we were hoping to get. All the more reason to be fed up with the D's lack of assertiveness in the face of Bush's court packing.
in my book, not fighting is not fighting. do the odds have to be 50-50 or 45-55 before our side will break a sweat?
I think bbond misunderstood my point which was that the Ds (and pro-choice Rs) rolled over on the confirmation processes of *both* Alito and Roberts.
Alito wasn't the swing vote in this particular decision. He was assumed to be ungetable. Roberts (who pontificated about precident in his confirmation hearing) voted to overturn precident not a decade old. And, that sets a dangerous precident. (pun intended)
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