I can’t wait to see who Obama appoints. Which Federalist Society member has been lobbying the hardest?

The Sotomayor nomination was one of the few things he’s done that I agreed with. More like that.

Republic filibuster started yet?

Starrs’ name has been floated a few times

My vote is for Harriet Miers

/s

Cass Sunstein is out robe shopping.

The only good thing about a Ken Starr nomination would be watching the centrists at TPM scrambling to defend it. That would be fun.

Ah, another opportunity for Mr. Changemeister to appoint another corporate-friendly judge, for life.

Kind of warped that I feel so incredibly disenfranchised that all I do is look for the best drama.

But if someone like that was sent up, maybe, just maybe it would be that shining beacon that Liberals and other Progressives could see and realize ..

nah – I’m dreaming again

was concerned about that as well – but then read David’s “floated” link and feel a little less uneasy

“fiercely pragmatic !”

I can only count on one thing, a soft ball nomination that appeals to the right, that will be another HARD slap in the face.

Is there a RC religious requirement or can a atheist or Muslim be nominated ?

Actually, I was hoping for someone a little left of her. She’s ok, but not the best there is.

Elections in November and SCOTUS next term starts in what, October? Gonna be an interesting summer in the House of the Living Dead.

House of the Living Dead.

Peer inside and you see:

Nothing but pods!!!

Braaaaaiiiiiins!

Where is that reanimated Reagan vid again?

If past performance is any indication, Obama and his sidekick Rahm will put their heads together and pick the most sorry, conservative sunuvabitch they can think of.

Far better to stab the people that worked and voted for you in the back, than to piss off even one conservative.

I’m already preparing for the disappointment.

can a atheist or Muslim be nominated ?

Only if they are willing to pretend to be Christian like the Decider does. Otherwise, never in America. Never.

Stevens retirement is another blow to the country. I thank him for his service. Well done.

The seed is planted…terror grows.

“Well…there you go again…”

Okay, we just had a wise, fat Latina. Next up, a left-handed paraplegic homosexual of Asian descent.

I will use this space to beg, cry, and plead for Christy to make a special guest appearance for this process at least.

Alas, it was too late to do any organizing about the issues that we might want this person to stand firm on.

I can already hear the heads exploding over at Fox. Anything less than the appointment of Jesus will be met with scorn and derision, no matter how corporate-friendly the jurist might turn out to be.

Someone ought to do a spoof Thriller with the R caucus following Reagan through the streets dancing like a bunch of Filipino prisoners.

LOL !!!!!!

Jesus looks too much like a hippy and he chased the money changers out of the temple. Bad choice.

I am glad the Justice Stevens outlived the Bush Regime.

“If past performance is any indication, Obama and his sidekick Rahm will put their heads together and pick the most sorry, conservative sunuvabitch they can think of.”

…And we’ll be told that this is the most progressive candidate evah with anyone who says otherwise is part of the lunatic fringe. Then we are supposed to shout “Long live Animal Farm!” as Squealer falls off the ladder drunk.

Well I’m surprised. I thought with the trial announcement with no date a week or so ago, Stevens would stick around one more term.

The odds are that Obama will name someone who will either elicit a groan or no reaction from progressives. The odds that he will nominate someone we would cheer are virtually zero. Kagan, Garland, and Sunstein are all dreadful choices. If you look at the legal arguments the White House and the DOJ have been making, my best guess is that Obama will choose someone with an expansive view of Presidential power.

I like it.

Obama will choose someone with an expansive view of Presidential power.

It’s settled, then. John Yoo is our boy. Fox might even like the choice.

Incomming centrist female lesbian/minority nominee.

Obama doesn’t care about who would be best, he cares about what gets him the biggest bump in his polling.

I also wanted to comment that they have gone through this vetting process very recently so it would be easier for them to pick someone who has been a finalist. And they have to pick someone who at least one RINO will vote for.

You have absolutely no shame, none /s

Heh…

But in a sense this is the perfect time for Stevens to retire. You only have to get one RINO, which won’t be the case after November. And Kagan hasn’t been there long enough to be the completely obvious choice.

Doesn’t The Family believe that Jesus was too nice and that the way of the world has changed so much that Jesus is not relevant? I think the gov. of Va is a great choice. (burp)

Good call.

Seriously? The Family thinks that Jesus is not relevant? That’s rich.

Would like to take a moment to say thank you to J Stevens for his long years of honorable service.

And the GOP is putting out the predictable demands for ‘moderate’ and ‘non-activist’ judges.
I guess they’re trying to use their own definitions again: I haven’t seen a liberal judge appointed to the SC in years.

Might I suggest Eric Holder? He’s “pre-approved” in a sense having been recently confirmed. His nomination will bring out all the poisonous creatures of the opposition while tending to energize the base. This nomination is an opportunity to allow the Republicans to again showcase their darkest sides. If a left leaner is nominated. No to Kagan [torturer's apprentice supporter] No to Sunstein [propagandist's apprenctice supporter]

Help!

Holder?
No.

I think the Obama admin finds Yoo too far to the left since Yoo didn’t advocate Presidents as being able to unilaterally assassinate citizens without a trial. Obama wants someone who will say that he has a power of life or death over people so that Obama can say “Off with their heads!” to anyone he deems deathworthy.

“Off with their heads!” to anyone he deems deathworthy.

Thought that POTUS just exercised that right and power of his within the past week.

You know what is said about power that isn’t used …

God bless Stevens for his pivotal role in the Supreme Court torture cases and for a distinguished career.

He also was in the stands when Babe Ruth hit his called shot and confirmed that it happened (no foolin’), a moment that foreshadowed his future greatness.

He also was in the stands when Babe Ruth hit his called shot and confirmed that it happened

I didn’t know that didn’t know He’s a baseball guy.

Totally expected, but still I get the sense that another massive Hippie Punch is on the way.

Yup:

“As a boy, Stevens attended the 1932 World Series baseball game in Chicago’s Wrigley Field where he saw Babe Ruth call his shot.[6] He later recalled: “Ruth did point to the center-field scoreboard. And he did hit the ball out of the park after he pointed with his bat. So it really happened.”[7]” (Foregoing is from the “early life” section of his Wikipedia entry)

So far that hasn’t been challenged in court, but I’m betting Obama is looking for lapdogs who will say that he can lock someone and throw away the key or even kill them simply based on his own authority. Our country is turning into the very thing the colonists rebelled against, though even King George III couldn’t unilaterally order the assassination of a British citizen as he was a monarch but at least he was a CONSTITUTIONAL monarch.

Let the culture war begin. Pity there will be no one fighting it inside the White House. I wonder what pre-negotiation concessions Obama has already made and how few credible candidates will therefore make any publicly available short list. If the nominee ends up being Sunstein or Kagan, expect sotto voce jumps for joy from the right and a further deflation of Democratic prospects to retain Congressional seats this fall.

in response to spanishinquisition @ 51

It is Tyranny and if SCOTUS doesn’t stop it, I’m afraid someone else will

Sorry to see Mr. Justice Stevens go; one of the greats, imo. A truly great Justice worthy of the office. Sorry that I can say the same of many left on the SCOTUS; some good ones remain but some are appalling.

Act 1, Scene 1 of the SCOTUS Kabuki show has just commenced.

Bringing on the rending of tunics, beating of breasts, howls of fury, tearing of hair out by the roots and so on and so forth by the rightwing Kabuki hurly-burly players. Nonsense alert!! Distraction alert!!

I’ll bet Stevens was bribed to retire before the midterms.

As a nod to bipartisanship I expect Obama to nominate Kenneth Starr to the SCOTUS. He’ll win over the Republicans eventually.

Hard to imagine a more embarrassing choice for Obama than Holder.

have you seen Holder in front of the congressional committees?

like a beat puppy

Pfft. Any doubt who Mr. BiPartisan is going to choose?

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/04/09/stevens/index.html

There was no daylight between Ms. Kagan, who was the dean of Harvard Law School, and Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, as he led her through a six-minute colloquy about the president’s broad authority to detain enemy combatants. . . . Indeed, there was so much adulation in the air from Republicans that one Democrat, Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, joked at the hearing that she understood how Ms. Kagan “managed to get a standing ovation” from the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group.

Obama: “Dear Hippies that live on all the blogs…..’Blah blah blah’….I’m not listening.”

I hate to see Stevens go he’s one of the few good men left in Gov’t @ any level.

Oh, and this will be another Obamabot talking point (Teh Supreme Court appointments!) gone the way of a clay pigeon about why it was so important that Obama was elected instead of McCain.

Same link:

many outstanding candidates to replace Stevens, including Appellate Court Judge Diane Wood, former Yale Law School Dean and current State Department legal adviser Harold Koh, and Stanford Law Professor Pamela Karlan. And those choices, unlike Kagan (or Sunstein), would maintain the Court’s fragile ideological balance rather than shifting it decisively to the Right for decades to come.

ugh

Ruth Marcus, in truly embarrassing form:

I’m not arguing, by the way, that Obama would go wrong by picking a Stevens successor likely to edge the court to the right. Indeed, there is a plausible argument that a justice viewed as more centrist might have more chance of bringing along conservative colleagues on a particular issue.

Stupak just announced his retirement – coincidence?

bringing along conservative colleagues on a particular issue.

barf – must have gone to combat school with the french

If I hear “centrist” or “bipartisan” one more time……

Who would have ever guessed that the Obama presidency would be more excruciating than any of the Bush years. Instead of soccer moms, Obama appears to be trying to get the angry-white-guys-in-service-trucks demographic.

I need to either start tequilaboarding myself regularly over lunch hour (Skyline Chili is over hyped shit) or only read The Family Circus instead of political blogs.

tequilaboarding myself regularly

hopefully only within correct guidelines, read that long term psychological damage may ensue

As I posted on the other SCOTUS thread, who can Obama payoff or reward with a SCOTUS appointment?

Hillary?

Rahm?

Lieberman?

Dodd?

Reid?

This is why we can’t have nice things…..

Along those lines, The Atlantic’s Max Fischer just wrote:

http://twitter.com/max_fisher/statuses/11889053512

We need a centrist.

think you nailed it jake, more tire tracks

They really expect us to vote for them again?

They really expect us to vote for them again?

The conservative analysts were mentioning it for months, he’ll have to move right like Clinton did. (some predicted it very well)

He did alright, but faked a left each time he did.

It was calculated, they’re going to attempt to take from the more moderate R base. But I believe it backfired, they’ve pissed off most I’s and R’s and of course us.

I think they’re in for a huge awakening, and they’re figuring it out now

and the part the didn’t foresee, the country hasn’t had this anger since probably the Civil War (or maybe the great depression). If he’s not very careful, that will be his legacy

It was calculated, they’re going to attempt to take from the more moderate R base

See, I think this is who Obama truly is. Chose Leiberman as his mentor when he got to the Senate. Called Wellstone a “political gadfly”. Didn’t want anything from liberal blogs except money.

He’s governing how he wanted to govern, fuck the polls, fuck the liberals. Obamabots eat that shit up and lick the bowl clean, but they are the only ones. Republicans are mindless sheep, you aren’t on their team they won’t vote for you or support, much less if you happen to be black. And the progressives care more about issues than politics….we’re done.

I think hubris and genuine hatred of liberal causes will have them continue their present course. They probably figure they can take Palin, Congress be damned. Best case scenario might be a GOP Congress takes up some bullshit articles of impeachment against him. That would be a shitshow worth watching.

That would be a shitshow worth watching.

That it would be, especially if the articles overlap the shit that has me so pissed off about.

Ordering the Assassination of US Citizens, pissing all over the Bill of Rights, going where Bushy didn’t dare and such …

and I agree, this is who he is. Just that he and Rahmfuckr in their arrogance thought they could pull it off and not get caught

Called Wellstone a “political gadfly”

Ever meet Paul? Inspiring …