Out With a Whimper

Back in the spring of `05 a collection of knock-kneed Republicans, led by ``still in Saigon John`` McCain, made a deal which I believe ultimately lead to the Republican debacle this year; they agreed to work with a number of key Democrat obstructionists to get some of President Bush`s judicial nominations to the floor for a vote. The Republicans, fed up with the Democratic parliamentary trick of filibustering qualified judicial candidates, were prepared to ``go nuclear`` by making an unprecedented rule change which would allow cloture (ending debate) on judicial nominees with a simple majority vote, rather than having to obtain 60 Senators to end the filibuster. This unprecedented plan, having never been done before-well, not since the 1970`s, but to the MSM it was unprecedented-would have meant all of the President`s people would have been given the courtesy of an up or down vote. McCain and his gang derailed this operation by making his agreement with his beloved comatose, era, comitous Democrats, derailed the entire thing.

As usual, President Bush did not fight for the rule change.

In hindsight, this was a disaster. Actually, in foresight (mine, anyway) it was a disaster, and I made that quite clear. When President Bush sneakily nominated John Roberts (a stealth candidate) for the estrogen seat on the Supreme Court, I balked; we needed to have that fight, we needed to get those judges through, we needed to stop the hemorrhaging of effectiveness by the Republicans, we needed to LEAD. The public would have, I am firmly convinced, had far higher approval ratings for the Congress had they managed to muster the courage to fight. Of course, they were following the lead of President Bush, who believed (and still believes) in consensus and his new tone. He listened to those polls which claimed that America was tired of rancor, and so has tried to turn the other cheek. You cannot do that with Democrats-you`LOL have no cheek left on your face in short order.

Ultimately, people respect strong leadership. President Bush is at his best when leading on the War because he actually got out there and showed some spine. His popularity has always gone up when he has been firm. Unfortunately, far too often he has seemed tired, old, and spineless, and has allowed the Democrats to run roughshod over him.

So has Congress, and the Democrats have slowly leagued authority from the Republicans. You cannot allow the enemy to define terms, choose the battlegrounds, and hit you without an effective response! Had the Republicans stiffened their linguini spines when the Gang of 14 made their deal the momentum would have shifted, and the Democrats would have found it hard to regain the offensive. Little issues-such as the Mark Foley scandal-would not have loomed so large. The Republicans may have taken a lot of heat from the Media, but the public would have seen them lead; THAT is what they want out of our representatives in Washington. America grew bored with the selfish spoiled brats we had running the show, wanted more. The Democrats won`t deliver more, but at least they will be more entertaining-and all the bickering may, just may, die down-at least so the thinking went.

Now, thanks to the McCain Gang, Bush and the Conservatives are SOL. There is no hope of getting judges confirmed, unless we want more Harriet Miers`. Had the Republican launched the nukes, they would be in no worse shape now than had they not made the rule change, since the Democrats cannot actually offer up their own candidates. The Republicans were fearful of a Democrat takeover in `08, a strategy for losers if there ever were one. Not with a bang, but a whimper!

Bob Novak covers the depressing collapse of the Republican judicial revolution at the Evans-Novak Report:



Judicial Nominees: With the Democratic takeover of the Senate, four of Bush's nominees to the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals -- William Haynes, William Myers, Terrence Boyle and Michael Wallace -- are withdrawing their names from the nomination process. The White House had been willing to renominate all of them, but three had been languishing for years and had no desire to continue the charade. Wallace, the fourth, had gotten a poor rating from the American Bar Association.

This is a reflection of two things: First, Democrats are expected to obstruct judicial nominees as they have since Bush took office in 2001, which is no surprise. Second, after an entire session of Congress in which they all but ignored the issue of judges, Republican leaders in Congress have given nominees little or no confidence that there will be a fight on their behalf. The administration also did very little to push these nominees through a Senate that had a 55-seat Republican majority.

Further evidence of this nominee-confidence problem came with Kenneth Tomlinson's decision yesterday not to seek renomination as chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors. Tomlinson was so brutally battered by Democrats throughout his tenure -- as Republicans stood by and watched -- that he did not feel it worth his while to put himself through more misery in the form of confirmation hearings.