Tuesday, July 14, 2009

The Big Sleep

I’m with Fred Thompson when it comes to Senate confirmation hearings (whether for the Supreme Court or anything else): “…what a nominee says during his or her hearing, while certainly not irrelevant, is one of the least important considerations upon which they should base their vote. [A] [n]ominee’s judicial and professional record, along with their public statements and reputation for integrity, are much more reliable indicators as to the kind of judge they will be.”

Hear, hear! The process now involves an enormous waste of time during which the senators make long opening statements that epitomize the pompous grandstanding that H.L. Mencken once attributed to delegates at political conventions, where the participants “compare themselves favorably to the rising of the sun and the aurora borealis.” The mere fact that the Senate Judiciary Committee is chaired by a scoundrel like Pat Leahy has an ipecac-like effect on me, and the equally nauseating Chucky Schumer always gives the impression of being a penny ante hustler who started out selling stolen watches before graduating to the “big time.” And then there’s Lindsay Graham, whose physiognomy never fails to put me in mind of the cartoon character, Droopy the hound-dog.

With respect to politicians of every stripe, in the context of a healthy society, less is definitely more.

Update: Follow-up on Graham; he may look and sound like Droopy, sometimes, but AllahPundit gives him high marks for his cross-examination of Sotomayor.

7 comments:

mojo said...

A judge is a law student who marks his own examination papers.
-- H. L. Mencken

JeffS said...

Judges, politicians, meh.....I think we ought to use an old, scientifically tested method of seeing if a person is suitable for any public office.

smitty1e said...

As far as I'm concerned, the Ricci case alone is reason to have serious doubts.
But I don't think that the confirmation hearing is more than theater. Unless your name is Bork.

Bob Belvedere said...

Paco: Wondefully put.

The vast majority of Senators possess the dullest minds and are capable of no original thinking. Of course, the Leftists on the Senate Judiciary Committee are engaged in a Big Deception and most of the Republicans, if you gave them one, would fail a CT-scan and be classified as vegetables. It doesn't help that the judge herself is lying through her teeth and is nothing but a committed dullard herself.

Quote from and linked to at:
http://www.thecampofthesaints.com/2009.07.12_arch.html#1247617743024

JeffS said...

Unless your name is Bork.

Alas, smitty1e, you hit the nail on the head.

Anonymous said...

What happened to the idea (or was it an agreement) that the Democrats and Republicans would come up with a list of acceptable candidates for Supreme Court justice, Court of Appeals, etc., and pick from that list? Wasn't McCain a bit advocate of that?

I'd like to see judicial intellectual heavyweights selected rather than nincompoops whose only attribute is that they're from a certain group of people.

wronwright

Veronica Vargas said...

A judge is a law student who marks his own examination papers. -- H. L. Mencken