In Retrospect: Senators' Judicial 'Compromise' a Successful GOP Ploy?
by Chad Groening and Fred Jackson
August 4, 2005
(AgapePress) - A conservative publisher and activist is convinced that Democrats in the U.S. Senate will have a difficult time coming up with an excuse to filibuster Supreme Court nominee John Roberts. He credit's the situation to what he calls a "brilliant" political move by Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham.
David Horowitz says he was among the many conservatives who were not happy with the compromise those two senators led that forestalled the Senate from changing the rules in regard to the filibuster. But now Horowitz believes it was a shrewd political move because it painted the Democrats into a corner.
"I don't believe [the Democrats] can filibuster. To stop a filibuster, you need 60 votes, and what McCain has done is taken away eight Democrat votes," Horowitz explains. "It's a tremendous political achievement -- and conservatives ought to be big enough to give credit where credit is due here."
Horowitz, the publisher of FrontPageMag.com, believes it is time for conservatives -- including himself -- to rethink their views and the criticism they leveled at the group of Republican senators who took part in the now-famous compromise on judicial nominations.
"I was skeptical of that [agreement], but it's been brilliant," he exclaims. "The McCain-Graham move has totally boxed the Democrats. They can't really filibuster a guy whom they passed by a voice vote; whereas, if it hadn't been for Graham and McCain, it would be a dead certainty that this guy would be filibustered."
The publisher says if the Democrats were to come up some excuse to filibuster Roberts, McCain and Graham would not go along with it -- and the GOP would then use the "nuclear option" to change the rules and stop the filibuster.
Pro Bono Pro-Homosexual Work
Meanwhile, a report by the Los Angeles Times may cause concern among the conservative supporters of Judge Roberts. The Times reports the Supreme Court nominee played a role in helping homosexuals win a key legal battle in 1996.
The newspaper says Roberts did some of the background work which led to a Supreme Court ruling outlawing discrimination based on sexual orientation. The Times says Roberts did not mention the case in the 67-page questionnaire he recently completed for the Senate Judiciary Committee. The attorney who solicited Roberts' assistance in the case says the omission was likely an oversight, as Roberts -- who performed the work pro bono -- did not play a major role in Romer v. Evans.
