A Stitch in Haste

Probably the only senator who is more "George Allen" than George Allen and more "Rick Santorum" than Rick Santorum is Kansas Senator Sam Brownback. Like Allen, Brownback is under the mistaken impression that he is running for president in 2008.

So, what do we know about Senator Brownback? Well, we know that he sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is responsible for reviewing presidential nominations of federal judges:

I have sought to ensure that the federal courts are fully staffed by judges of the highest intellectual and personal qualities, those committed to strict adherence to both the letter and the spirit of our Constitution.

We also know that he's very good at combining bigotry, ignorance and incompetence in a single act:

Republican Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas has placed a hold on the nomination of Michigan Court of Appeals Judge Janet T. Neff, saying her presence at [a] 2002 Massachusetts [same-sex couple's commitment] ceremony raises questions about her judicial philosophy.

"It seems to speak about her view of judicial activism," Brownback said Friday. "It's something I want to inquire of her further."

Brownback, a vehement opponent of gay marriage who has presidential ambitions, said he wants to know whether Neff might have presided over "an illegal marriage ceremony" that skirted Massachusetts law. He has asked the Justice Department for a formal legal opinion on Neff's conduct.

First of all, how is this not being an "activist legislator"?

Second, someone so ignorant as to not understand the strictly symbolic nature of a same-sex couple's commitment is too ignorant to have an opinion one way or the other about gay civil marriage. You cannot rationally oppose that which you simply do not understand.

Meanwhile, as I've said in other contexts, if this is the best that the panderers to the Red State Rednecks can come up — "She conducted a commitment ceremony!" — then they really must be running out of ideas. You can almost envision them fighting to repeal their own bigot amendments, just so they can pass them again.

When you have a radical base, it's one thing to say the things that you think they want to hear. But to knowingly make a fool of yourself in the eyes of every single person who is not part of your base is another matter altogether. In other words, there's a difference between having those outside your base thinking "I don't like Brownback's positions..." and "My god, Brownback is a flaming idiot..."

Hopefully Judiciary Committee Arlen Specter, having now surrendered on the habeas corpus question in the Military Commissions Act, can turn his attention to this unfair, inexplicable, and just plain stupid Brownback hold.

Via How Appealing. More thoughts from Pam's House Blend, Straight Not Narrow.

Just a quick update that Kansas Senator Sam Brownback has lifted his unethical, despicable and just plain silly block on a judicial nominee, Janet Neff, who had the audacity to attend a same-sex commitment ceremony. I commented on Brownback's buffoonery previously.

Three post hoc hasty stitches:

--Whatever happened to the Gang of Fourteen? Or, for that matter, "They all deserve an up-or-down vote..."?

--Might now be a good time for the Senate to revisit this indefensible rule that any Senator may block any judicial nominee? My understanding is that there is an informal policy — an interbranch courtesy, if you will — that a sitting President will never nominate a District Court judge without first clearing it, sotto voce, with the two senators of the state in which the judicial District is located. I might — might — be comfortable with such an informal policy, so long as it remains informal.

But this Brownback garbage was something completely different. Judge Neff was nominated to a Michigan District; Brownback represents Kansas — the two states aren't even in the same appellate Circuit!

--Two words: activist politician.

I will never — never — be more afraid of judges than of politicians. And I will always — always — be afraid of those who are.

More thoughts from PoliBlog, Althouse, Carpetbagger Report.

To review: I took Kansas Senator Sam Brownback to task for single-handedly obstructing the nomination of a Michigan federal judge, in a despicable act of pandering to anti-gay bigots, because the nominee, Janet Neff, had attended a symbolic "commitment ceremony" by a lesbian couple. After some kangaroo-committee huff-and-puff, Brownback was sufficiently magnanimous to allow the nomination to proceed to a vote. How nice of him...

Well, in the spirit of equal-opportunity indignation, it turns out that the one senator who probably would best qualify as the philosophical reciprocal of Brownback is no better:

Senator Feingold of Wisconsin, a foe of the federal death penalty, is stalling the elevation of the United States attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Roslynn Mauskopf, to the federal bench. The senator from the Badger State ... has been badgering the Brooklyn prosecutor about how often she requested the death penalty. Mr. Goldstein reports that she brought death penalty charges in 12 cases out of more than 100 in which the law provided that she had the option to do so.

Feingold, incidentally, is generally considered the most anti-death-penalty member of the Senate. Which is fine, except when he abuses his office to further his agenda.

Little needs to be said that I didn't say when Brownback was being an ass in this manner. The way for a senator to oppose a judicial nomination is first to speak out against it during debate, and then to vote against it on the Senate floor. Abusing the Senate's (cockamamie) rules to wield the equivalent of a single-handed veto power is unconscionable, ignoble, and prima facie proof of moral defectiveness.

As loudly as I denounced Brownback, so too do I denounce Feingold.