I am now seeing McCain/Palin signs in the front yards of people I know to be conservative Christians. One of the myths that many of these Christians believe, and many other conservatives as well, is that the Republican Party is the lesser of two evils because a Republican president will at least appoint “good” (usually identified as pro-life) justices to the U.S. Supreme Court. This myth was recently exploded by Gregory Hession in The New American.
Beginning with the appointment by Herbert Hoover of Charles Evans Hughes (who once quipped: “We are under a Constitution, but the Constitution is what the judges say it is.”), Hession traces the history of Republican appointments to the Court. Among other gems along the way we see that Harry Blackmun (appointed by Nixon) wrote the infamous Roe v. Wade decision. Hession’s conclusion: “Would McCain’s judicial nominees at least be better than those Barak Obama would choose? The evidence examined above suggests that that’s far from certain.”
And as for McCain, he voted to confirm Clinton’s appointments of Stephen Breyer and Ruth Ginsburg, as well as Bush Sr.’s appointment of the liberal David Souter. Yet, McCain recently said that as president he would not have appointed them.
McCain believes that Bush appointments John Roberts and Samuel Alito “will serve as the model” for his judicial nominees. If so, then we are in trouble. Both recently voted against the right of habeas corpus in the case of Boumediene v. Bush.
4:05 pm on September 28, 2008
