The lines are being drawn as the U.S. prepares for an epic battle over the next Supreme Court nomination. The ideological battle looks to have all the makings of a classic political spectacle of the highest order.
This past Friday, Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor ended her distinguished 24 years of service to the highest court in the land. She was appointed by Ronald Reagan and passed the Senate on a 99-0 vote. She’s been considered a moderate conservative throughout her tenure and has been in middle ground in a number of crucial decisions during her time.
Since she made this announcement, literally thousands of stories from all over the world have appeared discussing the issue of who will fill the empty seat. At this point, speculation is rampant and insanity is not far behind.
In addition to all the stories, all the television news networks, bloggers, and podcasters everywhere offer their notions and thoughts on what this new justice should be like. Various advocacy groups of all types will throw in their thoughts to the mix to sway the president and the Senate one way or the other.
Many are calling for moderation, others to get rid of activist judges, and others still saying the judges aren’t activist enough. Some will want states’ rightists, others want religious conservatives and many more will want liberals or some other ideology.
Right now, there’s been no word on embedded journalists on the front lines of this war though. Not sure if Geraldo Rivera will be giving map info drawn into the sand? One can probably assume though that journalists will be attached to the various military units involved, like the Democratic Senatorial Caucus and medical marijuana advocacy groups. This fight is surely to be one of the nastiest battles in the modern era. One hopes politicians will observe the rules of no dueling.
In any event, the media will be there to cover it for the next few months. Millions of stories from across the globe, pundits from across the living room and everywhere else will dominate political talk and discussion like no other in the weeks ahead. Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) even suggested holding hearings during the recess in August to get the process moving.
As the stories and commentaries continue to be written and we all get mad because Bush doesn’t nominate who we thought was the best choice for the job, we will be saturated with this information (we already are) in anticipation of who it might be, the hearings themselves, the Senate vote (and the ensuing filibuster), and then why all this did or did not work. With any luck, all this will get done on the first try. And then Chief Justice Rehnquist starts and we go through it again.
John Stith is a staff writer for Murdok covering technology and business.
