Ah, but if only the "opposition" party were as quick to pick a fight as the rest of us.

Steve,
This guy supports strip searching 10 year old little girls. He's a sicko and has no place on the supreme court.

Why does anyone believe the Democratic leadership will finally step up and demand accountability, even now? The silence so far has been deafening. The truth is that there is no organized opposition to anything Bushco foists onto us. Sadly, I don't expect anything in this case either.

Only political halfwits would fail to see that the Alito nomination is at least as much an opportunity as a crisis. We may lose, but in the process, we will get lots of opportunities to educate America, in ways that we never could since Bork.

Remember, too, that for them to "go nuclear," BigTime Dick has to be the guy to pull the trigger. I don't doubt that he is sufficiently indifferent to shame to pull that off, but I think it's going to look deeply corrupt for a guy this closely connected to a serious crime to be pulling a stunt like that.

Strip searching mothers and ten-year-old daughters, for the crime of -- well, the only crime was the pervert cops who conducted the search, and the judge who said it was A-Okay. THAT ought to go over REAL BIG in Bobo's world.

In fact, that is the most damning thing I've read about this monster -- other than he makes Scalia look like a moderate.

Steve, I think your analysis is right on the money...and dj too.

Nailed it, Steve. We can do our part, too. Use the Social Security defense effort as a model.

Eh, this is probably a slam dunk. Like Roberts. You guys wanted to oppose him to your last breath, and he's in. I doubt we'll see a filibuster. Presidents get to pick their justices. That's just life.

You guys wanted to oppose [Roberts] to your last breath, and he's in.

That's a pretty selective memory you've got there, Muck. There were certainly people who wanted to oppose Roberts to the last breath. Steve was not one of them; nor was I.

He was too good, and too unknown, and there was a second slot to be filled. Alito may be good, but he's a known quantity, and we don't have any strategic worry about looking like obstructionists. This is the fight we were anticipating when we gave Roberts a reluctant pass.

Muckdog,
I seem to recall similar bravado from wingnuts when it came to Social Security. Time will tell, but I sure wouldn't count those chickenhawks just yet.

I'm not sure, but I have a suspicion Scalito might just be too radical at this point to go through. Bush and his wingnuts may have overreached in their zeal.

We may lose, but in the process, we will get lots of opportunities to educate America, in ways that we never could since Bork.

Sadder but wiser once the implications of such a pick become widely known? I'd rather prevent than cure.

Sadder but wiser once the implications of such a pick become widely known? I'd rather prevent than cure.

If we filibuster—and we should—and lose because the GOP changes the rules illegally, there won't be much we can do except raise hell.

I'm particularly interested in all the legal writings that will come out. His widely discussed dissents are not, on their face, as outrageous as people make out. The PA law in question required notification, not permission, and it allowed four categories of exception, including safety of the woman. Alito specifically said that requiring permission, or ignoring these four exceptions, would be an "undue restriction" on women's right to an abortion. On FMLA, he did NOT rule that the law was unconstitutional or that it should be overturned. He merely said that the law did not apply to state government employees because of the 11th Amendment. He did not claim that the FMLA was beyond the reach of the Commerce Clause. I don't have a lot of opinion regarding the 11th Amendment, but his objection was not the sort of nut-case Constitution-in-Exile crap of people like Janice Rogers Brown. More troubling were his rulings on the strip search and the maching gun ban. He was right that a strip search of a girl might, sadly, have been necessary. But he should have insisted that the Search Warrant specify such a search, instead of allowing the police to search anybody they pleased. And on the machine gun case, his determination that the issue was "non-economic" is troubling because it opens the door to broader threats against the New Deal.

I suppose his legal writings will reflect whether or not he is a real Constitution-in-Exile nut, or has just made a few rulings with unfortunate outcomes.

YES, Gosh Darn IT! Bring it on...time for us to stand up and be counted...fight for what this party SAYS it believes in...show that the WINNING isn't all that's important...it's the fight, the truth, the absence of hyprocisy, the actual meaning of the Constitution and Freedom and the continuation of a great experiment that is doomed to death by the continuing behaviors and policies of the current administration and it's fundamentalist supporters!!!

Muck,
You support a candidate who thinks strip searching 10 year old little girls is a good thing? This morning I thought that there would not probably be much of a chance of Alito being killed but when it came out about the strip search ruling it looks like he might be toast. How many Senators want to go back to their constituents and tell them they supported a judge who ruled for strip searching 10 year old little girls? I would imagine not many. It looks like we have another nominee just thrown out with very little vetting. That or the fact that the vetting team is incompetent.

Bring it on is right. This is not June, the stakes are too high for a compromise. It's time all these "pro choice Republican women" (my office is full of them) see how much they really matter to Bu$hco. Will they love you in 2005 as they did in 2004? The answer is a resounding no.

The Democrats have ehtnic and generational demographics on their side already, this will make the gender gap permanant, bring it on!

I like those that talk about the fight. Show some spine and take the bloody nose. Something to be proud of.

Did anyone bother to read what Alito wrote about the search?

"[T]here is no doubt that the search warrant application sought permission to search all occupants of the premises. Indeed, the affidavit made this request in three separate paragraphs."

I guess it's more fun to regurgitate talking points than to actually read what the man wrote.

I read the decision on the strip searching. I still find it horrific.

JWG,
The point is not what was in the search warrant application. The point was what was granted by a judge.

Law enforcement wants all kinds of things. We have a Constitution which denies them some things. That is as it should be.

The bottom line is that Scalito thinks it's just fine to strip search 10-year-old girls without a warrant, if that's what law enforcement wants to do.

Agreed; the Democratic Senate Minority should "dare" the Republicans to try the "nuclear option," which still requires 50 Republican votes (plus Cheney). I'd bet a lot of money on an insufficient Republican vote for such an action in this particular case. Moderate Republicans will find their courage in this environment, IMHO. And if they don't, then we have an excellent campaign issue for moderate America.

Here's the problem with the ruling on the strip search: the warrant allowed the officers to search others on the premises who might have been purchasing drugs. Nothing in the warrant even suggested that there might be children being used as drug mules, so why would a warrant covering suspected purchasers of drugs apply to children on the premises?

its also useful to remember that Alito was in SOLE DISSENTER in the strip search case. obviously his fellow judges didnt like the idea of strip searching 10 year olds.

the above post is mine

I think we should fund a television commercial that dramatizes a situation where cops bust in to someone's home and strip search their ten year old daughter. And another one where a pregnant woman can get down on her knees and beg her drunk, jealous nineteen year old abusive husband for permission to have an abortion. It's long past time to turn over the rock and let Mr. and Mrs. Red State America get a nice close up look at what they've voted for.

It appears time for an economic revolt against the companies that fund George W Bush and the Republican Party. Go call and email these companies and tell them you have had enough of the actions of the Republican Party and you will not take it anymore.

http://www.hoflink.com/~dbaer/petitions.htm

.

That picture is hilarious. Do you think those two actually care, or think, about Rosa Parks?

can we do something about the buckfush spammer? this guy is forever spamming up Kos also.

"the only crime was the pervert cops who conducted the search"

you mean the female officer who conducted the search in private, with the mother present, and which involved going down only to her underwear? Some pervert.

As a progressive, I find this and other instances of playfulness with the facts of the case to be downright...Republican. Stop it, please.

you mean the female officer who conducted the search in private, with the mother present, and which involved going down only to her underwear? Some pervert.

Now, imagine for a moment that you are a 10 year old girl in a dysfunctional home (even though both mom and dad are present, btw) and you are taken by a stranger and made to strip to your underwear in front of your mother. That goes so far beyond humiliating and degrading, I can't believe you honestly think it was okay.

Tell me TorridJoe where in the case write-up does it say that the search went down "only to her underwear?"

The point here is that Alito looked for ways to justify a search of a mom and daughter

-not covered by a search warrant;
-without probable cause;
-and contrary to previous court decisions.

It is an example of a guy itching for a chance to be a judicial activist and rewrite the laws himself if he gets the chance.

And tell me TorridJoe, how old is your daughter?

I'm appalled by the comments above and their attempts to be fair and even-handed. We have a chance to prevail here, but not if we get hung up on details. It's time for us to go all Rovian on the GOP's collective ass.

Fuck this guy--if we can bring him down, we owe it to the future of civil rights in America to do so. The detail are unimportant; the man favors unregulated machine guns, and strip-searching ten-year-old girls.

I wonder how Sammy would like someone searching in his Daughter's underpanties.

to ann:
humiliating and degrading are, alas, not relevant terms for discussing whether Alito made the correct legal determination or not. I would argue ANY strip search, child OR adult, is degrading...but certainly you would not claim that they are illegal on that basis?

to Steve Soto, respectfully:
page four of the ruling, bottom of the left hand column:
"The officers decided to search Jane
and Mary Doe for contraband, and sent for
the meter patrol officer. When she
arrived, the female officer removed both
Jane and Mary Doe to an upstairs
bathroom. They were instructed to empty
their pockets and lift their shirts. The
female officer patted their pockets. She
then told Jane and Mary Doe to drop their
pants and turn around. No contraband
was found. With the search completed,
both Jane and Mary Doe were returned to
the ground floor to await the end of the
search."

As much as I don't like Alito's judicial ideology, I think you make an unsupported assumption that he "sought to justify" anything other than his view of case law. In his view the search WAS covered, as it was clearly identified on the affadavit to search all occupants. The fact that it was not on the warrant itself is the key point. Was the officers' judgement to rely on the affadavit in conjunction with the warrant prejudicial? In his view it was not, pursuant to many examples where police power exceeded without malice does not represent an actionable violation. Since your other two points flow from the first, I won't address them (since if he felt the search was not prejudicial, then there was probable cause as validated by the judge issuing the warrant, and if there was cause, then it didn't violate any precedent).

What is bothersome to me is that Alito's ruling is being characterized as one indicating that it's OK to strip search children...as if there's some law that it's not OK. There isn't. Children aren't afforded any more protection from search in this case than adults, and I find it curious that the mother is so far not getting any love for what would ALSO be a prejudicial search--because as far as the law is concerned she's no different from her daughter.

So if everyone can at least agree that the law does not per se prohibit strip searching children, the prurience of this attack on Alito must fall away. He did not rule on whether it was OK to strip search 10 year olds; he ruled on whether it was OK to search people under standards in an attached affadavit, as opposed to the text of the warrant itself. In fact, he didn't even rule on that--he ruled on whether the cops were UNREASONABLE in assuming from the affadavit that all occupants were to be searched.

If you want to argue that, go to town. I don't have a keen enough sense of the legal line of police error, that separates "honest mistake" from "impermissible violation of procedure" to make a strong call either way. But to make this somehow about Alito being so cruel as to think that it's OK to strip search children--when that is in fact the general law of the land--is IMO distortive, and will not help us. There is far too much else in his record to attack, to make this sensational charge that unfortunately wilts under scrutiny.

And for the record, my daughter is five. I have to say I'm rather offended by the implication that if only I had children, I'd understand.

TJ:

His view of case law, that a warrant wasn't needed nor probable cause, to strip-search a ten year-old girl, was at odds with his peers and case law. Why was he even pursuing that line of thinking in the first place?

You also infer that the search went down to underwear only, which is not stated in the court case.

Respectfully, I don't care whether or not you are offended at my implication. I am more concerned that a guy who looked for ways to justify the actions of police in the absence of a search warrant or probable cause against a ten year-old girl, and contrary to case law and his peers, is being nominated as a man of judicial restraint to the highest court in the land.

We'll agree to disagree on this one.

If a cop comes to a judge saying "there's a dealer in the neighborhood, so I need to be able to search everyone I meet," and the judge issues a warrant approving searches of the dealer and his associates, the cop does not have a warrant that covers the whole neighborhood. The fact that the cop originally cast as wide a net as possible is simply not relevant to the sweep of the warrant as approved.

Can you guys get anything right?

It wasn't evangelicals who opposed Miers. James Dobson endorsing her ring a bell?

Just because you'd like to think the religious right derailed her doesn't make it so.

Real Truth, check your facts. Dobson changed his mind, a day before she quit.

Steve:
"His view of case law, that a warrant wasn't needed nor probable cause,"

once again, you provide no basis for this assertion. Alito was using the principle of qualified immunity to assert that the cops got it wrong, but not unreasonably so. Argue that judgement if you like, but get off the strawmen please.

The description I posted was highly detailed. There is no mention of removing underwear. Therefore, it's you who is inferring that they DID. It is, however, a near-irrelevant point.

Your unfortunate response to my response of your question, indicates that you don't even perceive your error. You presumed I didn't have any daughters, and sought to exclude my opinion on that basis. You were wrong, but rather than apologize and reconsider your statement, you minimized your culpability and changed the subject. Frankly, given your often-brilliant political insights, I expected better.

It wasn't evangelicals who opposed Miers. James Dobson endorsing her ring a bell?

Just because you'd like to think the religious right derailed her doesn't make it so.

The Real Truth, your kidding, right?