The Impending Supreme Court Vacancies

What do they mean? Well, for most people, who couldn't care less about the ins and outs of politics, they simply mean that we'll be barraged with ad after ad from conservative and liberal groups alike. Liberals will claim that the right to an abortion is at stake, and conservatives will claim that their religious rights are at stake. In other words, everybody will be playing their emotional cards from the get-go.

As always, Mark Coffey at Decision '08 is a good source of information on this (and many other things). Read through some of his more recent posts to catch up on some of the Supreme Court speculation.

As for who will be nominated, there's plenty of speculation there as well. Many think that Alberto Gonzalez will be nominated as the court's first Latino Justice. Many on the right think that Owen, Brown or Pryor should be nominated, since they already have been passed through the "extraordinary circumstances" test posed by the Senate's notorious "Gang of 14." There are a lot of other people that you and I have never heard of who are under consideration as well, and I'm about to direct you to a bunch of people who know a lot more about all this than I do.

I'd like to see justices passed through who would agree with what I would want. Who wouldn't? I'd like to see justices passed through who would view bans on gay marriage as unconstitutional. I'd like to see justices passed through who wouldn't overturn Roe v. Wade. I'd like to see justices passed through who understand and respect the wall of separation between church and state. But all that is too much to hope for.

At this point, I'll just be happy if someone nominated to the Supreme Court pisses off James Dobson, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Jimmy Swaggart, etc.

Whatever's the case, though, the politics and strategy and nastiness will likely surpass anything we've seen recently, even with how nasty it's already gotten.

Fargus...

LINKS: 43rd State Blues on Harry Reid's pre-emptive bipartisan strategy.
KarensKorner has a Gary Bauer article beseeching the President to fill vacancies with Scalia-like nominees.
The Narrow thinks Alberto Gonzalez is too soft on abortion.
Civil Commotion liked the Ten Commandments decision as well, but is scared that the likes of Dobson are trying to ratchet up believers for the coming vacancy.
Election Law warns about the imposition of special interest groups on judicial nominations and elections.
Jeff Gannon (yes, that Jeff Gannon) thinks that Democrats won't be in a place to strongly oppose Supreme Court nominees after the brouhaha over Bolton.