Here we go again...

President Bush has nominated longtime judge Samuel Alito for the Supreme Court.

Congratulations Republicans, you picked a fight with Bush and got your ideologue.

Now here's where it gets fun. Certainly Alito is immensely more qualified for the Court than Harriet Miers was (and I don't believe he's ever written any love letters to the President either). However, he is known as a very conservative judge, similar in mold to Antonin Scalia. This is, of course, right up the conservatives' alley, as they will embrace a far-right judge (separation of church and state? women's rights? LAME!) under the transparent guise of 'strict constructionism'. This nomination was completely for the far-right faction of Bush's base, something to make them happy and buy their forgiveness for Miers and his current messes (Libby, etc... not that it bothers them anyway). Certainly he will need the support of his base in the rough days ahead and he would do anything to pacify them. This will likely do the trick.

Of course, given Alito's views, it is likely that many Democrats will oppose him. His nomination process will be a tough one, as the Democrats try to find out what kind of judge Alito is. As Harry Reid said this morning, "The Senate needs to find out if the man replacing Miers is too radical for the American people". This is the fun part. This is the part where the hypocrisy of Republicans (recently seen in their 'perjury technicality' ploys with the Plame investigation) will come into play. If the Democrats do openly oppose this nomination (and I believe they should), the Republicans will once again, without even noting the irony, cry out in anger and blast the "obstructionist" tactics of Democrats... ignoring, of course, the way Republicans torpedoed the Miers nomination like a well-oiled attack machine. For the last few weeks, you couldn't open a newspaper without seeing an editorial piece by a conservative columnist demanding the immediate withdrawal of Miers' nomination. And the Republicans were absolutely right to oppose her nomination, though for the wrong reason (their real reason was fear of another 'liberal' like O'Connor, rather than caring about the cronyism and not being qualified). I will certainly not be forgetting the anti-Miers brigade (Kristol, etc- I'm looking at you guys) when the Democrats begin the process of evaluating Samuel Alito.

This isn't to say that Alito won't be confirmed. I hope he isn't, but he probably will be. But the Democrats will be doing this country a serious disfavor if they don't at least put up a fight. The Republicans did with Miers. And look how well that turned out for them.

The AP article:
Bush Picks Alito for Supreme Court

I end with a quote from former Justice Thurgood Marshall on the danger of strict constructionism:
“Moral philosophers may debate whether certain inequalities are absolute wrongs, but history makes clear that constitutional principles of equality, like constitutional principles of liberty, property and due process, evolve over time; what once was a ‘natural’ and ‘self-evident’ ordering later comes to be seen as an artificial and invidious constraint on human potential and freedom.”