Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, who turns 74 this month, has reportedly told a number of people that he will stay on the Court for at least three more years, through the end of Obama's first term.
This is significant, because Kennedy has morphed from a swing vote that could go either way into a fairly reliable fifth vote for the court's conservative and originalist wing. If Obama is a one-term president and Kennedy retires after a conservative Republican is elected, a conservative justice could be named to cement that 5-4 majority firmly in place.
With a little bit of luck, the two Clinton appointees, Justices Stephen Breyer(72) and Ruth Bader Ginsberg (77) will hang around long enough to give way to originalist justices as well. Or at least long enough for the midterms, when Obama's radical nominees would hopefully be unlikely to be confirmed by the Senate.
ginsberg was confirmed 96-3, beyer 87-9, i think.
ReplyDeletegranted those were dim controlled senates, but where is the opposition vote? especially with ginsberg coming 6 years after bork. now what organinzation did she volunteer/work for before becoming a supreme?
The ACLU..and yes, I get your point.
ReplyDeleteThat's one reason I lean towards the idea of Sarah Palin as our next president - she's an independent like me and not part of the GOP establishment.
"....she's an independent like me and not part of the GOP establishment."
ReplyDeleteThis is actually part of the problem. Any "Conservative" nominee or someone who see eye to eye with Ms. Palin will be opposed by both Democrats and Republicans. One of the few areas of agreement among Democrats and establishment Republicans is they both despise Sarah Palin. Another area of agreement is both believe the country should move "left". They just differ in how quickly they think it should be done.