SC Chief Justice Rehnquist Hospitalized

It appears as though we may have another SC battle royale in the making. And this one will be a two for one, given that the new Chief Justice requires it's own Senatorial confirmation.

Rehnquist Hospitalized

They say fever but maybe he was just hot about being hounded by reporters. ;)

Time to bring Bork back. :)

Only if we get to pick Bork up and beat Bush's first nominee (whoever it turns out to be) about the head and chest with Bork's body.

what exactly was the problem with Bork, again?

His name sounds funny.

From here.

This was far from the sort of fair summation of the totality of Bork's legal philosophy that you might find at a law school seminar. But it wasn't exactly false either. Bork had criticized the portion of the Civil Rights Act banning discrimination in public accommodations, argued against extending the equal protection of the 14th Amendment to women, took an extremely restrictive view of free speech, and so on. At the time of his nomination, Bork backed away from some of his most inflammatory writings, which made the accusations against him seem unfair. For instance, he reportedly told senators in his preconfirmation talks that he was willing to reconsider whether there is a constitutional right to abortion.

We better get familiar with him again. I was reading something last week about how some conservatives want to use him as a "Remember the Alamo!" type of figure in regards to O' Connor's replacement.

Based on what I know of Bork, he makes Scalia look like a flaming liberal.

There's a reason he became a verb meaning an unjustified torpedoing.

Ted Kennedy had a histrionic fit and a soundbite won out over logic.

By all reports he's an excellent jurist.

Says the resident conservative, of course. :)

The quote I posted is referring to the Kennedy speech.

Bork's idea of "judicial restraint" is that the government gets to put everybody in handcuffs. He doesn't think the judiciary should second-guess the legislature on Constitutional issues.

Well of course we shouldn't second-guess Congress! They never make mistakes...only those damned activist judges!

Oh...sorry...had a Rush Limbaugh/Sean Hannity/Michael Savage/Bill O'Reilly/(insert witty conservative here) moment...

To steer back to the big guy's original post...why is Rehnquist holding on so tightly? Certainly a conservative will become the next Chief Justice...is it ego with him?

sycamore wrote:

To steer back to the big guy's original post...why is Rehnquist holding on so tightly? Certainly a conservative will become the next Chief Justice...is it ego with him?

There are conservatives and then there are conservatives. This court has not been a friend of the GWB administration, other than ruling on the 2000 election. Mostly, it spends a lot of time smacking down an overreaching White House.

Real 'Reagan conservatives' are probably almost as pissed at GWB as liberals. I think Rehnquist really detests the idea of being replaced by some ass-kissing 'friend' of the president. I really think he does not trust Bush to use the same care in choosing a chief justice that every other president in the past century has done.

I don't think he cares if the next President is a Republican or Democrat, as long as it's not GWB.

Rehnquist announces he's NOT retiring.

"I want to put to rest the speculation and unfounded rumors of my imminent retirement," said Rehnquist, 80, who is battling thyroid cancer. "I am not about to announce my retirement. I will continue to perform my duties as chief justice as long as my health permits."

Do you have to retire if you die in office?