Where's the !@#%$ Outrage?

In the comments on the previous thread about the lack of commotion over the confirmation hearings of Judge Sam Alito to the Supreme Court, Renee asked, "This appointment is for LIFE--why do we care what he says to get the job? Promises he makes in the job interview are not as important as his record."

Renee has a point. Alito came into this process with a much longer paper trail to evaluate than John Roberts did. But he refused to not only defend his record, he ran away from it. Fortunately, we only have to go as far back as 1985 to get a sense of his judicial philosophy:

I am and always have been a conservative and an adherent to the same philosophical views that I believe are central to this [Reagan] Administration. . . . I believe very strongly in limited government, federalism, free enterprise, the supremacy of the elected branches of government, the need for a strong defense and effective law enforcement, and the legitimacy of a government role in protecting traditional values. In the field of law, I disagree strenuously with the usurpation of the judiciary of decision-making authority that should be exercised by the branches of government responsible to the electorate....

. . .I am particularly proud of my contributions in recent cases which the government has argued in the Supreme Court that racial and ethnic quotas should not be allowed and that the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion.

. . . I am a life-long registered Republican . . . I am a member of the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy and a regular participant at its luncheon meetings and a member of the Concerned Alumni of Princeton University, a conservative alumni group. During the past year, I have submitted articles for publication in the National Review and the American Spectator.

Why has there been no fuss when there was plenty of material to work with? As Robert Bork said, "The object nowadays is to get confirmed. People will say pretty much -- or avoid saying pretty much in order to get confirmed." And the media went right along by declaring that Alito was headed toward confirmation.

Over at Kos, georgia10 vehemently disagreed: "The burden, from the start, was on Alito to counter his record as an ideologue. Alito walked into that hearing room saddled with a record as one of the most pro-government Republican judges in the nation. [...] The burden was on him to explain his record. And he didn't."

She's right: Alito confirmed suspicions that he's the type who'll say anything to get the job he wants. During the hearings he never embraced his record--he wouldn't touch it with a 10-foot pole, droning on and on, probably hoping that the original question would be forgotten. If you can't convince them, confuse them.

But I also think georgia10 was wrong about the burden of proof being solely on Alito. The Judiciary Committee went along with Alito's well-memorized script. Lindsay Graham and Orrin Hatch were the lead Republican cheerleaders when they should have been serving up questions to demonstrate Alito's fitness to serve on the Supreme Court. And Republican moderates like Susan Collins, Arlen Specter and Olympia Snowe are expected to confirm Alito because they see no reason not to.

All the saber-rattling proved was that yet again, the Democrats didn't have the stomach for the fight. "The fact that Sam Alito spent all week stonewalling was to be expected, but I think some of the Democrats on the Judiciary Committee deserve equal blame for treating this more like political theater than a job interview. ... a lot of the exchanges makes it clear that most of the Democrats think they're a tough question away from getting Alito to blurt out some incriminating remark like "Abortion is worse than the holocaust" or "the President should be considered a monarch". ...the hunt for a smoking gun is coming at the expense of helping the American people figure out who the hell this Alito guy is." (The Talent Show)

The Democrats blew this in a big way. They absolutely failed to show just how dangerous Alito will be on the court even though there were moments when I thought they could pull this one off, such as Russ Feingold asking about the "murder court" and Biden asking about John Yoo. In the end, though, they couldn't make the charge stick because the Democrats lack a sense of self-preservation. What did they do when charged with making Martha-Ann Bomgardner cry? Not a thing.

Why the lack of outrage over Alito's record? Because the blogs have been trying to do a Sisyphean task--generate the necessary opposition on our own. As Peter Daou said: "Simply put, without the participation of the media and the political establishment, the netroots alone cannot generate the critical mass necessary to alter or create conventional wisdom."

Daou continues: "But rather than a Democratic triumph, the Alito hearings have thrown the dichotomy between the netroots and the Democratic leadership into even starker relief, illustrating the profound dysfunction of the left’s triangle. As well, the depth and breadth of media complicity and the obliviousness of so many Democrats to it, is alarming. From the choreography of Specter and Alito creating the "open mind on abortion" sound bite that media outlets dutifully ran with, to the Sen. Graham/Mrs. Alito tear-fest that should have prompted Dems to slam the Republicans for bringing the Judge's wife to tears but instead turned into another Dem-bashing occasion, to the complete failure of the Democratic leadership to create the appropriate tone of outrage (in sound bite form), the chronic breakdown of the establishment and media sides of the left's triangle is apparent.

"This, then, is the reality: progressive bloggers and online activists - positioned on the front lines of a cold civil war - face a thankless and daunting task: battle the Bush administration and its legions of online and offline apologists, battle the so-called "liberal" media and its tireless weaving of pro-GOP narratives, battle the ineffectual Democratic leadership, and battle the demoralization and frustration that comes with a long, steep uphill struggle."

And you know what really pisses me off about this? This incompetence is going to make Howard's job that much more difficult to do. As if his job wasn't hard enough already.

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