One more reason to line the bird cage with USA Today

This editorial by columnist DeWayne Wickham. He advocates the nomination of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

I think I'd rather see Elian Gonzales in the High Court before Alberto.

DeWayne's argument includes:

"Instead of giving in to either side, Bush should make Attorney General Alberto Gonzales his choice to fill O'Connor's seat. Gonzales is neither a doctrinaire conservative nor unyielding liberal. His selection would make some people in both of those camps grimace.


"Gonzales' conservative critics believe that a Justice Gonzales wouldn't vote to end abortion and affirmative action. His liberal detractors worry that he would vote to weaken civil liberties and expand the court's support for the death penalty."

This mutual disgust is apparantly a good thing. Following that argument, Bush could also nominate, oh, Osama bin Laden, since both sides would think him reprehensible, and still be thinking about his stance on abortion and civil rights. Look, you don't put someone on the highest court in the land because everyone finds something abhorent about him or her! If your want bipartisanship, nominate someone who both major parties find something they admire.

Well, as a liberal, I can say that I opposed Gonzales' appointment as Attorney General, and even more viscerally oppose him getting a seat on the Supreme Court because of his abysmal history of supporting torture and unethical behavior. I'm not talking about something as (relatively) piddly over should flag burning be allowed, but his approval of a memo (when White House Council) including the opinion that laws prohibiting torture do "not apply to the President's detention and interrogation of enemy combatants" and that an interrogation must include "injury such as death, organ failure, or serious impairment of body functions—in order to constitute torture."

It's not just about him maybe upholding more death penalty sentences, it's his history of obfuscating important details about defendants when, as chief legal counsel, briefing his boss Gov. Bush of Texas about whether these people should live or die. How can he judge cases involving lack of due process when he himself was often guilty of it?

And how about his history of accepting campaign contributions from defendants, and then ruling in favor of those defendants, while he sat on the Texas Supreme Court? Do we really want someone who does this as a Supreme Court Justice?

NO!

For more information on Gonzales' history, see here for a great synopsis.

I am sick of this administration promoting its unethical obsequious lackeys in positions of extreme power. I don't know who GWB will nominate, but Gonzales is NOT a suitable candidate.