John Roberts is well-qualified for the post of Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. By all expectations he will be more moderate than Justice Renquist which will move the court slightly to the center. During his hearing Roberts came near to promising that he would respect the precedent of RoeVsWade. Nothing in his background is controversial which was implicitly acknowledged when the Democrats demanded privledged documents.
Given all of this, there is no valid reason to oppose Roberts' confirmation. Democrats should go ahead and vote him in and thank the stars that Bush didn't nominate Scalia or Thomas for Chief Justice. Most Democrats in the Senate know this.
But this response has the far left really upset. Posters on Huffington and elsewhere want a real fight. They want blood. Groups such as MoveOn are egging them on. One column on Huffington wanted to know what good an opposition party is if it doesn't oppose? Another complains that the Democrats always promise to fight the next battle but not the current one.
None of these people give any good reasons for opposing Roberts. The implication is that anyone Bush nominates must be unacceptable just because Bush nominated him.
This creates a big problem for Senate Democrats. If they don't fight Roberts then they anger the left wing that is spoiling for a battle.
On the other hand, if they oppose Roberts then they lose the public relations battle with the rest of the country. After all, if they oppose Roberts they will oppose anyone Bush nominates.
As the winner of the election, Bush gets to nominate justices. This is not a surprise - it was a campaign issue. That means that Bush gets to change the makeup of the court and with a Republican majority in the Senate it means that any qualified nominee should be confirmed.
If the Senate Democrats give in to the extremist wing then they are handing Bush a PR win in the fight to replace O'Connor. If they don't they risk offending MoveOn, Soros, and a vocal minority.
Just as with Cindy Sheehan's anti-war crusade, the anti-Roberts push will alienate moderate (electable) Democrats from the radical left.
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