The NYT reports Democrats plan to call two witnesses to challenge Alito’s integrity: one chap who says the judge did not recuse himself, as promised in his 1990 confirmation hearings, from a case involving Vanguard, which managed his investments; the second a journalist who has critized Alito’s membership in Concerned Alumni of Princeton, a defunct group that opposed admission of women to the school among other regressive goals.
Bad strategy. Alito did not break any court rules by hearing the Vanguard case, only a more restrictive set of guidelines he promised to adhere to in 1990; he says a computer screening system made a mistake, and recused himself from a re-hearing. Hardly a hanging offense. He did not play an active role in the regressive alumni club, and it no longer exists. No legs on that one either.
A better strategy, if Democrats really want to derail this nomination, is to link Alito’s expansive view of Executive power to Bush’s warrantless domestic spying. Kennedy and Schumer seem to be headed down this road. They should drop the appetizers and concentrate on the main course. Illegal spying is an issue people care much more about than conflict of interest guidelines for mutual fund cases — and one where the nomineee can’t blame his mistakes on a faulty PC.
has an article reporting that several Democrats see executive power as the key issue in these confirmation hearings. And I suspect that is how it will play out, since important Republicans (notably Chairman Specter) care a lot about that issue too. The Vanguard and Princeton stuff is a sideshow (though I suspect Alito is being disingenuous about the Princeton thing). Nobody cares about what the pro and con witnesses say at these hearings – the main event is what the nominee says, and that’s as it should be.
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These hearings are tremendously important, and they are going to go way beyond the Supreme Court. Everyone should pay close attention.
That Kennedy and Schumer seem to be headed down this line, and that others should join them: One Message, One Party, One Nominee.
I am not sure why Congress is so concerned about what Alito thinks about executive power. Their concern makes it seem as though the Supreme Court has handed Bush all of his power (which I guess it has since it coronated him in 2000). However, this is hardly the case. For the last 5 years Congress has sat back and abdicated its power to the President and where the balanace of power was not specifically enumerated Congress has simply allowed the President to take power. If these people in Washington were truly interested in eclipsing Bush’s power they could do so without changing a law and without having to go before the Supreme Court. It is high time the boys and girls in Washington D.C. woke up and joined the rest of us in realizing that President Bush has abused his power and usurped that which is not his; it is high time for the people’s branch to find its voice again and start speaking the will of the people because over 50% of them think the guy in the oval office is a joke.