Souter's retirement from the Supreme Court

Do you just make this stuff up and expect everyone to buy into your propaganda.

Of course there are more republican appointed judges. There has only been 2 democratic Presidents in the last 40 years ( Carter/Clinton) Yet the figures you quote are fairly evenly matched considering only 12 of those 40 were controlled by the dems.

The dems blocked bushes nominees and would not allow an up or down vote.

Thats are system, the president gets to pick the judges. So when the left continues to win elections the courts will also turn to the left. I doubt this will happen because the American public is smarter then the left gives them credit for.

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Originally Posted by Eric Johnson

Your post relies on your interpretation of the situation....as did mine. I was simply asking if you had any facts. It appears that you don't.

Eric

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Unlike alot of posters here, ole Jeff there uses facts to base his opinions on. Next time you will know better LMAO:p

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Originally Posted by code3retrievers

Do you just make this stuff up and expect everyone to buy into your propaganda.

Of course there are more republican appointed judges. There has only been 2 democratic Presidents in the last 40 years ( Carter/Clinton) Yet the figures you quote are fairly evenly matched considering only 12 of those 40 were controlled by the dems.

The dems blocked bushes nominees and would not allow an up or down vote.

Thats are system, the president gets to pick the judges. So when the left continues to win elections the courts will also turn to the left. I doubt this will happen because the American public is smarter then the left gives them credit for.

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I'm sorry. What part are you suggesting I made up or is propaganda? As I noted, Democrats blocked more of Bush's candidates than Republicans blocked of Clinton's. One reason is because Bush had the opportunity to fill 50% more vacancies because of the positions that Clinton was not permitted to fill. Another is because The Dems ultimately allowed Bush to fill the positions that were vacant while the Republicans did not permit Clinton to fill over 20 positions despite the fact that nominees were provided in some cases years before his term expired. The difference is that Orin Hatch didn't even allow hearings to be scheduled on the nominees that he did not want. No votes were held. Under Bush, the Judiciary Committee was Republican controlled when most nominations were submitted. The Democrats used the filibuster to prevent a vote as the Republicans and Democrats have both used before and since for many purposes included blocking votes of judicial nominees (for example, the Republicans used the filibuster to block Johnson's nomination of Abe Fortas to the Supreme Court). The issue was an allegation that Democrats treated Bush nominees to the courts worse than Republicans treated Clinton's.

The fact is that both sides used what power they had in the Senate to influence the President's nominations. I also pointed out that statistically the Republicans were more effective in blocking Clinton appointments than Democrats were in blocking Bush appointments. Other than contradicting whining by Republicans that Democrats were in some way abusing poor defenseless Bush, I'm not sure what part of my observation upsets you. That is the way the game is played, as you noted. However, the President doesn't get to pick his own judges, he appoints judges subject to the advice and consent of the Senate. The Senate hjas always had the right not to consent and to use its own judgment concerning the procedures that it will use in making its decisions.

My personal hope is that Obama plays it better than either Bush or Clinton. Our country is pretty evenly split between those who identify themselves as Democrats, those who identify themselves as Republicans, and those who identify themselves as Independents. Currently, two thirds of those identifying themselves as independents indicate that they lean towards Democrats and the balance lean towards Republicans. Those numbers have changed in the past and will change in the future. There was a shift towards Democrats because of the extreme unpopularity of Bush, and there may be an equally extreme shift towards Republicans if Obama fails to address the economy successfully in the opinions of the majority of the public (not this forum;-)). My hope is that the judiciary, Congress, and State legislatures become a better reflection of the balance of our population. That will only happen if there are aggressive efforts to use the current balance in Congress to push more Democrat judges and if reapportionment following the 2010 census can reverse some of the gerrymandering that happened following the 2000 census.

Republicans were very successful in using the 12 years that they controlled Congress (1994-2006) to consolidate their position. My hope is that Democrats can be equally effective while they control Congress, whether it is for four years or ten. While it may sound strange, it is also my hope that neither party is very good at retaining control for too long. I like the fact that things swing back and forth and that the extremists on both sides are held at bay by those in the center (which includes almost no one on this forum;-)).

Just a post of clarification. The "Circuit Court" and the "appellate court" refers to the same general level of the courts. The one you missed is the District Courts and it would take a month to sort that out and the reasons behind the numbers.

I think I found the same article. When we look at just the judges appointed by Clinton and Bush, we find that at the appellate level, the numbers are very close. I'm not certain whether there is much to the claim that "x% are Republican" as the party is pretty inconsequential after a relatively short time on the bench. The questions argued don't tend to reflect party affiliation so much as the degree of strict or loose interpretation of the Constitution. In regards to the issue of which President made the most appointments, the figures are remarkably close....perhaps statistically insignificant for the population.

The Hatch strategy was probably founded in what the Democrats did to Bork. Previous to that time, with just a few notable exceptions, partisan politics didn't apply to the naming and approval process of judges with the intensity we see now. A vacancy existed and the Senators of the state were consulted. If they were of the party of the President, their candidate was a shoo-in. If they were both from the other party, the discourse was at least gentlemanly and often, the President still consulted them. He maybe would name someone that they hadn't named, but at least they were consulted. Now I'm not certain that happens.

Eric