Take a lemon and make some lemonade

Of course Tradesports did badly in predicting the Bush nomination to replace O'Connor. It's smart of the Bush team to pick a relative unknown (Roberts has only been a judge 2 years!). It allows them to keep things ambiguous, which is always useful in maintaining tenuous coalitions. A chorus of approval from the conservatives. A whole bunch of confusion...um, I mean, caution from the liberals.

This is what The Jew thinks we should do about Roberts. I am assuming, of course, that a filibuster is worthless at this point because there's nothing to stop Bush from naming one Roberts clone after another. Eventually we will have to cave, and look like whining ninnies doing it. Instead, for once let the left act as one, take a lemon, and extract some lemonade. I changed the order around and expanded a little, but basically this is the Jew's scheme:

1) Clamour loudly demanding his pro-abortion bona-fides prior to confirmation. Do whatever we can to drag the "moderate" Republicans into it. Is he totally for sucking out embryo brains with a surgical vacuum? Or is he going to take away 'Roe v. Wade'? Which is it? Any ambiguity will allow Roberts to cruise to his nomination having it both ways. Clarity will hurt him, and the administration that nominated him, either way.

2) And when Roberts is confirmed, praise the administration loudly and mellifluously for picking a candidate that will respect a woman's right to choose. Roberts said in 2003: ""Roe v. Wade is the settled law of the land. ... There's nothing in my personal views that would prevent me from fully and faithfully applying that precedent." No matter what he say since then, keep pounding that quote. Roberts will then face a choice -- if he does nothing, an active wedge will rive the fragile bond between the Christian right and the Bushies. But if he does try to overturn RvW, the bulk of the electorate will recall that he was singing a different tune before his confirmation.

Dadahead will probably be appalled by how hard I'm biting this bullet -- basically, I'm accepting Roberts as a done deal. Yes, I do know that he'll be serving until they have to carry him off the bench. But ultimately, the only way we get to choose who sits in the highest court of the land is by taking back the White House, something we're not likely to do if we keep blowing political capital on futilities like a filibuster on Roberts.

(Note how I did not say that all filibusters are futilities -- if they nominated "That Torture Guy" Gonzales or Janice Brown, we'll have a lot to work with on the public relations front as we blocked them. Not so with Rogers.)