Bush declares war, again

Man the battle stations!! Sound the alarms!!! George W. Bush has just launched a pre-emptive attack on the American people by tapping a totally unhinged, far-right wingnut for the Supreme Court. (Photo illustration courtesy of Whiskey Bar.)

I think it is appropriate that Bush would choose Halloween as the day to nominate the scariest Supreme Court nominee since Robert Bork. Booooooo!!! Judge Samuel Alito is a treat for the far-righties and a nasty trick for the rest of the country.
But it is a shame too, because as Sen Harry Reid made clear the other day, Bush owes us an explanation about his administration’s complicity in the Valerie Plame CIA leak scandal.
Rather than give us that explanation, however, Bush would rather change the subject and thus he rushes out another Supreme Court nominee within days of throwing Harriet Miers overboard.

Far from being a stealth nominee, Alito (or Scalito, as he is known is some circles) has a long and loopy track record of demented decisions.
There is no doubt that he would vote to overturn Roe vs. Wade and would support any and all restrictions on a woman’s right to choose. I’ve always assumed that as a given with anyone who would be nominated by President Bush. But that is just the beginning of Alito’s extremism on judicial issues.

Most disturbing to me is Alito’s opposition to the popular Family and Medical Leave Act or FMLA which guarantees workers will not lose their jobs if they are forced to miss work to take care of a newborn or an ill family member. This strikes home especially hard with me since my wife is due to give birth to our second child next month and I am planning to take a couple of weeks off. God forbid that I would have to stay home longer than that, but if I did I might not have a job to come back to if Alito had his way. Ironically, it was the late-William Rehnquist who slapped Alito around for that bizarre opinion.

There is no question that Democrats are going to have to fight this nomination - filibusters and all. They will most likely lose the battle, but as long as they put up a good fight they will make significant progress in the war. Just like Bush is tapping Alito to satisfy his wingnut base, Democrats will have to oppose it to hold up their moderate-to-liberal base. There is not much else that can be done at this point other than prepare to take back the reins of government from these dangerously incompentent and corrupt people in 2006 and 2008.