{"id":11621,"date":"2007-07-28T12:00:56","date_gmt":"2007-07-28T16:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/11621.html"},"modified":"2007-07-28T12:00:56","modified_gmt":"2007-07-28T16:00:56","slug":"its-not-a-coup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/its-not-a-coup\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s not a ‘coup’"},"content":{"rendered":"

A couple of days ago, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, raised a few eyebrows when he announced<\/a> his intention to review confirmation-hearing testimony from Supreme Court Justices John Roberts and Samuel Alito.<\/p>\n

Specter said he wants to “determine if their reversal of several long-standing opinions conflicts with promises they made to senators to win confirmation.” The implication wasn’t subtle — the Republican senator was suggesting that the justices were less than candid so they could dupe senators into supporting their confirmation.<\/p>\n

In a similar vein, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), also a Judiciary Committee member, said yesterday that he wants lawmakers to be far less accommodating<\/a>, should Bush have another chance to nominate a high court justice.<\/p>\n

“We should reverse the presumption of confirmation,” Schumer told the American Constitution Society convention in Washington. “The Supreme Court is dangerously out of balance. We cannot afford to see Justice Stevens replaced by another Roberts, or Justice Ginsburg by another Alito.” […]<\/p>\n

Senators were too quick to accept the nominees’ word that they would respect legal precedents, and “too easily impressed with the charm of Roberts and the erudition of Alito,” Schumer said.<\/p>\n

“There is no doubt that we were hoodwinked,” said Schumer, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee and heads the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

One can certainly debate whether Schumer and other Democratic senators were aggressive enough with Roberts and Alito, but given recent history, Schumer’s approach hardly seems radical. He wants to reverse the burden of proof on an untrustworthy White House — instead of starting with an assumption that the nominee deserves to be confirmed, Schumer is recommending a more intense skepticism.<\/p>\n

To hear some of our friends on the other side of the political spectrum tell it, the New York senator has put the Constitution in a shredder.
\n
\nPower Line’s John Hinderaker, for example, had an item<\/a> with this headline: “Is This A Coup? If Not, What Is It?” His post argued:<\/p>\n

The Democrats’ unconstitutional usurpation of power continues: Chuck Schumer, possibly the wackiest of all Capitol Hill Democrats, announces a change in the Constitution.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Alas, he did not appear to be kidding.<\/p>\n

So, if a member of Senate Judiciary Committee is not inclined to support hypothetical Supreme Court nominees from a deceitful White House, it’s a “coup”?<\/p>\n

And where, pray tell, is the “change in the Constitution”? The law gives the Senate advise-and-consent powers. Schumer is recommending that lawmakers use their consent authority sparingly, should a vacancy arise. He’s not “changing” anything — if lawmakers block a nominee they disapprove of, it’s within their authority to do so.<\/p>\n

For that matter, given what we’ve seen from this presidency, is it really wise for any of Bush’s inexplicable allies to whine about “unconstitutional usurpations of power”? I think not.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A couple of days ago, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, raised a few eyebrows when he announced his intention to review confirmation-hearing testimony from Supreme Court Justices John Roberts and Samuel Alito. Specter said he wants to “determine if their reversal of several long-standing opinions conflicts with promises […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11621","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11621","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11621"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11621\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11621"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11621"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11621"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}