President Bush, in announcing Judge Samuel Alito’s nomination, has urged the Senate to hold a vote on Alito by the end of this year. That seems very unlikely – last I heard, both Republicans and Democrats were saying that the Judiciary Committee probably would not even hold hearings before January. Bush probably would prefer to have Alito voting on the cases that the Court has already heard, rather than the arguably more centrist O’Connor, but at this point it doesn’t look like that will happen.
NBC News is reporting that Sen. Schumer (D-N.Y.) is already describing Alito as a "controversial" nominee. Dems are not holding their fire on this one. Fireworks to come, no doubt.
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Of course he wants a quick nomination hearing.1. It takes the attention off of Abramhof, DeLay, Libby, Rove, Cheney, et al.2. It takes the attention off of the 2000 dead American soldier in Iraq “milestone”.3. It takes the lingering attention off of the horrible hurricane response.4. It takes the attention off of the Democrats’ success in the 2005 elections (NJ, perhaps VA, etc).5. It takes the attention off of Bush’s 39% approval rating.Scalito is surely more conservative than O’Connor, so the sooner the better for the GOP.On a side note, how ironic that Bush brings up “up-or-down vote” for Scalito, when his own party wouldn’t give one for Miers.
Be fair – it isn’t that Bush didn’t ASK for a vote on Miers, too!