ConfirmThem

But doesn't section III pretty much just restate what Silberman said in his opinion about the right not being absolute. I know that Scalia and Silberman are good friends so I don't know if Roberts; intervention was needed for him to affirm the lower court.

Also, reading Stevens' dissent it's amazing how it contrasts with Boumediene and the liberal decisions on abortion and other hot button issues.

Stevens closes by saying that the majority would have us believe that over 200 years ago the framers chose to limit the tools available to deal with gun control.

Funny, Stevens and his liberal colleagues never seemed to care what the framers thought when it came to abortion or the evolving standards involved in the death penalty or sodomy or privacy or giving habeas to terrorists. Do they really think that over 200 years ago the framers decided to "limit the tools" when it came to abortion, gay sex, foreign terrorists, capital punishment, and a whole host of other issues?

He also complains that it will lead to lower court judges becoming too busy dealing with establishing the contours of the right and becoming more active in vital policy decisions.

Funny, but he and his liberal buddies didn't seem to mind lower court judges becoming more active in dealing with the military policy of a nation at war.

Then he says that even if the arguments are fairly even, respect for precedent and the law cautions against a decision that will lead to a dramatic upheval. Like say, granting habeas rights to foreign terrorists for the 1st time in US history?

Stevens dissent is laughable.

Not that it's the biggest issue in the world, but does anyone know what happened with the 4 New York District Court nominees in today's Judiciary Committee Business Meeting?

Looks like Lawrence of Indiana got his vote.

http://www.senate.gov/pagelayout/legislative/a_three_sections_with_tease...

I assume that Snow of Arizona will follow.

All better than nothing, I guess.

Snow was confirmed by voice vote right after Lawrence was confirmed 97-0.

All four New York distict court nominees were voted out of committee by voice vote.

Thanks for the additional info.

Why are there so few people responding to this SC decision?? If the decision had gone the other way, there would have been scores of people here complaining and criticizing Kennedy, lamenting the decision, etc.

Anger and disappointment are much greater emotions and causes for action than security and thankfulness. This is why I fear Obama will win in 2008. Conservatives, after so many years of being in the majority, are grateful for the direction things are going, and hence are becoming complacent. Liberals on the other hand are energized – giving money to their candidates, fighting for their causes, etc. If Conservatives don’t unite and get energized, we will be the ones who are angry and disappointed in 2012. And by then, it will be too late to do anything about it, because Stevens, Ginsburg and Souter would already have been replaced with young liberal justices.

While you're generally correct about how poor majority decisions raise more responses, I think most people viewed this as a win based on the oral arguments. The only question was whether Breyer would join the majority (which he didn't do).

You should be pleased that McCain jumped right on this decision, in contrast to the Kerry-like response of Obama.

Gun ruling reverberates in presidential campaign By LIZ SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer
20 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - John McCain welcomed a Supreme Court decision invalidating a District of Columbia handgun ban. Barack Obama sought to straddle the subject by saying he favors an individual's right to bear firearms as well as a government's right to regulate them.

The hotly contentious issue surfaced in the presidential campaign Thursday after the Supreme Court ruled that Americans have a constitutional right to own guns and struck down the city's thirty-two-year-old ban.

McCain, the Republican presidential nominee-in-waiting, heralded the justices' action as "a landmark victory for Second Amendment freedom."

Voicing a stance that could help him woo conservatives and libertarians, McCain said, "This ruling does not mark the end of our struggle against those who seek to limit the rights of law-abiding citizens. We must always remain vigilant in defense of our freedoms."

GOP aims at Obama after gun ruling
By DAVID PAUL KUHN | 6/26/08 12:50 PM EST Text Size:

Sen. Orrin Hatch, accompanied by Democratic Sen. Jon Tester, attorney Stephen Halbrook and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, applauded the Court's ruling.
Photo: AP

In a landmark decision that returns the gun control debate to the forefront of the presidential race, the Supreme Court on Thursday overturned the District of Columbia's restrictive ban on handguns and declared for the first time an individual right to possess a gun.

The D.C. gun ban had prohibited residents from keeping handguns inside their homes and required legal guns like hunting rifles to be registered and kept unloaded in a locked area.

The Republican National Committee and John McCain's campaign seized on the ruling and used it to frame Democrat Barack Obama as a radical liberal on the issue of gun rights, in the first step toward a media and advertising push in more rural battleground states that “highlights that Barack Obama is the most anti gun candidate in American presidential history,” according to RNC spokesman Danny Diaz.

“This issue is a big fat wedge in target states,” said Matt McDonald, a senior adviser to McCain, citing Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and West Virginia. “Obviously it is an issue where he is at odds with working-class voters.”

In the long term, McDonald said the McCain campaign planned to highlight Obama’s past stances on gun issues to “fit into the narrative that we are looking at for Barack Obama: one, that is he coreless and, two, he's unwilling to stand up for issues that risk his political future."

The Obama campaign distanced itself Thursday from a statement made last year to the Chicago Tribune that "Obama believes the D.C. handgun law is constitutional." Spokesman Bill Burton said that the statement "was not worded as well as it could have been" and that Obama believes that generally the Constitution "doesn't prevent local and state governments from enacting their own gun laws."

http://www.committeeforjustice.org/blog/2008/06/keisler-praised-by-ig-ob...

"The real test for whether the shame center in Leahy’s brain is still functioning is whether Leahy continues to block Keisler now that the former Assistant Attorney General has been praised by the DOJ Inspector General’s report for standing up to the very politicization of the Department that Leahy has spent the last year denouncing. Stay tuned as we wait to see whether Sen. Leahy will sink to a new low. For now, here are some thoughts on Peter Keisler and the IG’s report from Sen. Jon Kyl at today’s Judiciary Committee meeting and Collin Levy in today’s edition of WSJ.com's Political Diary.

Senator Kyl (seconded by Sen. Specter):
“According to the [Inspector General’s] report I’m quoting, ‘a few DOJ political employees objected to the apparent use of political or ideological considerations in the hiring process, such as Assistant Attorney’s General Peter Keisler and Aileen O’Connor, and they should be credited for raising their concerns.’ I note this with some bit of irony because … one of the things that [Keisler] said in questioning this [hiring] practice and procedure was that … it must be motivated by politics … It seems to me that one could characterize opposition to Peter Keisler in the same way, and given the fact that his nomination has been pending now for almost 2 years, and there is still plenty of time to confirm his nomination, I would hope that my colleagues who have heretofore opposed that would reconsider in the light of the IG report”

Collin Levy, Political Diary:
“Democrats are happily trumpeting the recent report from the Justice Department's Inspector General over alleged political interference in hiring decisions by the Bush Administration. … In the report, Mr. Keisler comes across as a model of even-handedness. … In particular, Mr. Keisler defended the qualifications of a Harvard law school grad whose resume listed a job with Planned Parenthood. Mmmm, that doesn't sound like the right-wing zealotry that Senate Democrats claim to detect … Senate Democrats routinely criticize politicization of the Judiciary. In Mr. Keisler, though, they've spent two years punishing a man who actually fought politicization even when the spotlight was elsewhere.”"

who cares that the DOJ hired a bunch of conservatives?

They hired a bunch of liberals under Clinton and will under Obama. How come there was no report on Clinton's DOJ and how many conservatives it hired?

Jan Greenburg's blog at ABC nails Obama on this case.

In the IL Sen he voted twice AGAINST a bill that would have allowed a hand gun in the home for self defense, after some guy used a gun in his house as he was robbed. Twice.

Now he says he's always believed in the individual right.

Check out this absurd quote:

Obama spokesman Bill Burton said Obama voted against the state-wide self-defense law because he believed municipalities should be able to pass handgun bans if they thought the laws were necessary.

"Obama said at the time that he voted that way because he believed that local communities had the right to enact common sense gun laws, and did not believe that the Illinois legislature should preempt those local decisions,"

He's always believed in an individual right yet he supports a ban if the legislature thinks it necessary!! He supports the 2nd amendment but thinks that total bans are common sense gun laws and that they're consistent with an individual right. I wonder what some of his common sense laws are dealing with 1st amendment. Maybe he wants to ban jury trials or right to counsel or confrontation as part of his common sense laws.

Can you imagine that in any other context? I've always supported freedom of speech but if Peoria wants to ban newspapers because they think it necessary, fine by me. Or, I've always supported free exercise of religion but if Oak Park wants to ban Christmas trees or menorahs in the home, be my guest.

And of course, we all know what he thinks of local decisions when it comes to abortion, school vouchers, sodomy rights, school prayer, and a whole host of other issues.

And this guy was actually President of the Harvard Law Review, the most prestigious academic journal in legal academy???

He wouldn't even pass a 1L class with that kind of awful reasoning. I mean, he makes Harriet Miers look like Learned Hand.

does anyone have atcuarial tables as to the odds of Stevens lasting from 80-88 and Ginsburg from 67-75 through the 8 years of Bush's term? If he had been able to replace even one of them, the Court would be solidly conservative for the next 25 years and Roe would be not long for this world. I'd have to guess if you asked that question in December of 2000, the odds of even one of the two outlasting 8 years of Bush would be 33% or less.

One more appointment by Bush would have totally reshaped the Court. Ah, well. I guess McCain has to finish the job.

One problem is that Leahy & Co. have no sense of shame. This lack of ethics is helpful to them.

As to Keisler, the fatal error occurred 2 years ago, as I noted at the time (to no avail as usual). Kavanaugh was confirmed to the DC Circuit about 5-28-06. Given the late date, it was imperative to nominate someone to the 11th DC seat IMMEDIATELY. But as usual , the Bush administration dallied for a month before nominating Keisler on June 29th. By then, there was not enough time left in the Session to process and confirm Keisler before the fatal November election.

On short, the game on Keisler was essetially lost in June of 2006. Everything regarding that nomination ocurring now and hereafter is simply fluff, distraction, and political grandstanding. The Pols are just playing Hide the Ball, since the Game was lost two years ago.

http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/STATS/table4c6.html

Helveticus - According to the social security period life table, in 2004, 45,747 out of 100,000 men survived to reach the age of 80, and 19,742 men survived to reach the age of 88. Using these numbers, you could calculate that an 80 year old man had at 43% chance of reaching age 88.

Also, in 2004, 84,947 out of 100,000 women survived to reach the age of 67, and 72,443 women survived to reach the age of 75. That would give a 67 year old woman an 85% change of reaching age 75.

43% * 85% = 36.5% change that an 80 year old man and a 67 year old woman would both be alive eight years later.

These statistics changes slightly every year, so this is a bit simplified, but it's a pretty good back of the envelope calculation.

Just on those numbers, you might say that the statistics didn't play out, since just looking at Stevens and Ginsberg there was almost a 2-1 chance (just based on the actuarial tables) that one of them would be singing in the choir invisible within eight years. But that would artificially limit the inquiry. You would have to look at the chances for all nine of the justices to survive from 2000-2008, and then figure out the odds for each of the different outcomes (this is complicated even more by the obvious fact that justices can leave the court without dying). We also shouldn't forget that Justices live an easier life than most, and thus probably outperform the averages represented by the actuarial tables. Anyway, that's more math than I'm willing to undertake this morning - but I suspect that President Bush getting two picks in eight years was about right from a statistical/actuarial standpoint.

I agree that conservatives should use Heller as a rallying cry just as we would have done had it gone the other way. After all, it was only a 5-4 decision. We were just a hair's breadth away from seeing the 2nd Amendment judicially interred.

I also think McCain should continue to hammer Obama on his vagueness and flip-flopping on this issue. Obama essentially agrees with Breyer, who said that even if the 2nd Amendment confers an individual right, judges should use a simple balancing test to determine if particular legislation abridges the right. In other words, as helveticus eloquently put it, you have the right until the government says you don't. McCain should emphasize that all Obama's model justices supported the ban, Obama -- who sees guns as something disenchanted Americans cling to.

On another note, it seems obvious to me that certain Justices are clinging to their seats until after the presidential election. Stevens is the primary example, but I think Ginsburg and Souter may fall into that category, too. How long do you think it will take after the election before we see those Justices retire?

Whether Obama or McCain is elected, I believe it's a near certainty that Stevens will retire after the Spring '09 term. If Obama is elected, I think will we also see 1-2 more retirements during his first term. If McCain is elected, I think any other liberals leaning towards retirement will hold out until later in the term, when they can have a better assessment of his popularity and the potential he will be upended in 2012. Although we could see some Republican nominees like Scalia or Kennedy retire during a McCain first term.

There will be three retirements in the next four years - regardless of who wins the election. That is why this election is SOOO important.