Posted on 03/21/2010 2:19:15 PM PDT by SmithL
Impeccable credentials are no defense against Republican obstruction tactics for Obama nominees waiting for U.S. Senate confirmation. The Republicans seem to be stalling the president's appointments simply because they can. They held up the nomination of Barbara Keenan, selected to become the first woman on the Virginia-based Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, even though there was no controversy about her qualifications, ideology or anything else - and the court was seriously shorthanded. Still, the nomination languished for months because of a GOP filibuster. She was ultimately confirmed, 99-0.
These delay tactics go beyond the usual tit-for-tat when power shifts in Washington. Nine of President Obama's nominees for various posts, including the judiciary, have been stalled for cloture votes - the formal cutoff of debate, a common stall tactic - compared with just seven cloture votes during President George W. Bush's eight years. Only two of President Ronald Reagan's appointees had to go through Senate cloture; the first President Bush had none.
"It's gotten to an absurd situation," said Marge Baker, vice president of People for the American Way, which just released a study on the mistreatment of Obama nominees. "It does feel like obstruction for obstruction's sake."
So one can only wince at what might lie ahead for Goodwin Liu, a 39-year-old UC Berkeley law professor recently tapped by Obama for the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. He is a Rhodes scholar, a Supreme Court law clerk and an award-winning teacher. He comes with an inspiring first-generation-immigrant story and an endearing low-key style for a man of such formidable intellect. Legal analysts from the left and right have projected him as a potential Supreme Court justice - the former with admiration, the latter with trepidation.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
The technical term is “borking”, but John didn’t see fit to mention that.
Yeah, well the same thing happened with Bush 43 nominees. Payback’s a bitch.
This is a hit against the GOP because they have sworn to not approve of any ex-congressman who they think sold their vote for an executive appointment.
Not just because they can.
Because the Bamtard’s nominees are, to an alleged person, moral lepers.
A law professor from Berzerkly? He couldn’t be a liberal, could he? </s>
“The technical term is “borking”, but John didn’t see fit to mention that.”
It is odd hmmmmm? When they do it, the media says it part of the process to make sure that the minority is heard and is valid.
They seem to have forgotten the years between 2001-2006.
Well they can expect one hell of a lot more until November.
How odd. The same thing happened with GW Bush, but sfgate didn't seem to have a problem with it then. Huh. Go figure.
I seem to remember that is what they did to our nominees. Too bad.
From June 2001 to January 2003, when the Senate was controlled by the Democrats, the most conservative appellate nominees were stalled in the Senate Judiciary Committee and never given hearings or committee votes.[10] However, after the 2002 mid-term elections in which the Republicans regained control of the Senate by a 51-49 margin, these same nominees began to be moved through the now Republican-controlled Senate Judiciary Committee.[11]
With no other way to block confirmation, the Senate Democrats started to filibuster judicial nominees. On February 12 2003, Miguel Estrada, a nominee for the D.C. Circuit, became the first court of appeals nominee ever to be filibustered.[12] Later, nine other conservative court of appeals nominees were also filibustered. These nine were Priscilla Owen, Charles W. Pickering, Carolyn Kuhl, David W. McKeague, Henry Saad, Richard Allen Griffin, William H. Pryor, William Gerry Myers III and Janice Rogers Brown.[13]
That might be why, John.
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