Dems Block GOP Nominee From Appeals Court

[kayell]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20031106/ap_on_go_co/senate_judges_3

WASHINGTON - Senate Democrats on Thursday blocked Alabama Attorney General William Pryor from a U.S. Appeals Court seat for a second time as Republicans, meanwhile, moved California judge Janice Rogers Brown toward what is likely to be the same fate in the closely divided Senate.



Pryor again failed to get the 60 votes needed from the 100-member chamber to break a filibuster of his nomination to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals (news - web sites) in Atlanta. His nomination was first filibustered by Democrats in July.


Republicans say liberal groups have unfairly painted Pryor as an extremist from the far right.


"They call him an extreme ideologue, a crusader to push the law far to the right," said Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala. "Anybody who knows him and knows the circumstances under which he has operated knows the courage he has shown, knows that these charges are just bogus."

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[davidinalameda]

1. good to see them using that backbone again

can't wait until Bush is out of office and we get decent nominees for the federal courts again

[MoonAndSun]

2. Let's hope they keep that strong backbone with the other

nominations that bush* is trying to ram thru.

[bridge]

6. I'm just wondering...

if this filibuster-blockade strategy is fueling any local-voter backlash? Does anyone know if something like this (for example, blocking Pickering's nomination)was cited as a campaign issue in the Mississippi governor's race?

[TacticalPeek]

3. Right action.

:kick:

[jbfam4]

4. Yeah for our side.

Can't stand to hear Hatch out talking about this subject. He is such a cry baby.
What is it that don't understand about NO.......we don't want them.

[BuckeFushe]

5. Who were the Republicans who voted against him?????

Pryor only got 51 votes in the Senate, which has 51 Republicans, 48 Democrats and one independent senator. The only Democrats to vote for Pryor on Thursday were Sens. Zell Miller of Georgia and Ben Nelson of Nebraska.

[snippy]

7. Roll Call has a story about a 30 hour debate scheduled for next week.

http://www.rollcall.com/pub/49_50/news/3508-1.html

Republicans were on the news again tonight lying again about the blocking of Bush's judicial nominees.

From a May, 2001 Salon article:

Senate Republicans did use myriad bureaucratic tools to block a staggering and unprecedented 167 of Clinton's judicial nominees -- tools that Hatch is now trying to throw into the incinerator. In particular, he wants to nix an agreement that allows senators to block a nomination of a judicial candidate from their home state. Senate Democrats worried that Hatch was trying to pave the way for the Bush team to push as many hard-right conservatives onto the bench as possible, with little regard for moderation or bipartisanship.

http://archive.salon.com/politics/feature/2001/05/10/judiciary/

The republicans did change the rules so that now the only way to block a nomination is by filibustering it. So far the democrats have blocked 4 nominations and are likely to block at least one more.

From an October 28, 2003 statement by Senator Leahy:

When the Administration has been willing to work with the Senate, we have made progress. Indeed, last night the Senate confirmed the 167th judicial nominee of this President.

In less than three years’ time, President George W. Bush has exceeded the number of judicial nominees confirmed for President Reagan in all four years of his first term in office. Senate Democrats have cooperated so that this President has now exceeded the record in his entire four-year first term of the President Republicans acknowledge to be the “all time champ” at appointing federal judges. Since July 2001, despite the fact that the Senate majority has shifted twice, a total of 167 judicial nominations have been confirmed, including 29 circuit court appointments. One hundred judges were confirmed in the 17 months of the Democratic Senate majority and now 67 have been confirmed during the comparative time of the Republican majority.

http://www.senate.gov/~leahy/press/200310/102803b.html

The vacancy rate for federal judges is at its lowest point in 13 years due to the number of judges nominated by President Bush and recently confirmed by the Senate.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=201983#202075


Whenever I hear a republican complain about democrats blocking "all of Bush's judges," I interrupt immediately and say that a person would have to be astonishingly ignorant or misinformed to believe the lying hypocrisy of the republicans about this. I then ask how many judges Bush has had confirmed and how many blocked and how many Clinton had blocked. They never know. So I tell them. I usually, though not always, then point out that that person has proved my initial point about astonishing ignorance, misinformation and lying hypocisy.