Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer to retire at end of term

Justice Stephen G. Breyer, the most senior member of the U.S. Supreme Court's liberal wing and staunch defender of a nonpartisan judiciary, will retire from the bench at the end of the current term, fulfilling the wish of Democrats who lobbied for his exit and clearing the way for President Joe Biden's first high court appointment.

Breyer, the court's oldest member at 83, will step down despite apparent good health, deep passion for the job and active involvement in cases, three sources familiar with the situation confirmed to ABC News. There has not yet been official confirmation from the court or from Breyer's chambers.

When asked for comment Nancy Pelosi said "His ice cream is the best in the world and I'm sad to see it go".

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/supreme-court-justice-stephen-breyer-retire/story?id=74363429

Breyer supposedly is upset that the news of his retirement was leaked. Hey, WASHINGTON!!!

Fox News panel reacts to Breyer retirement with immediate backlash to Biden picking a Black woman: 'What you're talking about is discrimination'
Jake Lahut, INSIDER
Wed, January 26, 2022, 11:51 AM·2 min read

A Fox News panel reacted strongly to news of Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer's plans to retire.

The focus quickly settled on President Biden's promise to nominate a Black woman.

Host Harris Faulkner said "what you're talking about is discrimination."

Minutes after news broke that Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer will be retiring, Harris Faulkner's show "Outnumbered" on Fox News quickly turned to outrage over President Joe Biden's campaign pledge to appoint a Black woman to the nation's highest court.

Jonathan Turley, a Fox News contributor and constitutional law professor at George Washington University, compared Biden's pledge to college admissions and tried to argue picking a Black woman would be unconstitutional under any other circumstances.

"And the irony is the Supreme Court just accepted two cases on the use of race preferences in college admissions," Turley, who was a pro-Trump impeachment witness, said over the phone. "And so this is obviously going to come up where the president's going to have to decide if he intends to fulfill a pledge that the court would never allow if he was actually admitting someone into a college."

Faulkner replied, "Jonathan Turley, what you're talking about is discrimination."

"And what we're about to see now is if the President of the United States would engage in that against a court who would say no to it otherwise, and that's an important thing," he continued. "Race is at the heart of just about everything we see from the left right now. It is so much in the nomenclature of politics that are most divisive in America right now, not bringing us together. Would this further divide?"

Earlier in the show, Fox Nation streaming host Tomi Lahren said she hopes Biden has "a better choice in mind" than a Black woman.



"We saw how well that worked out with Kamala Harris, but here's to hoping he has a better choice in mind for this position," Lahren said.

After asking if adding a Black woman to the bench — which would be a first in US history, with the only other woman of color to serve on the Supreme Court being Justice Sonya Sotomayor — could "further divide" the nation, Faulkner pivoted to speculation that Biden would nominate Vice President Kamala Harris.

How about Elizabeth Warren? She's 1/1024th black.

BIDEN ANNOUNCES HIS PICK -

oliver clotheshoffe wrote:

    BIDEN ANNOUNCES HIS PICK -


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More identity politics
Rupublicans will prolly uncover the multiple rapes she committed 40 years ago while in school

I mean, this is Joe "I Wrote The Damn Bill" Biden we're talking about.

Joe "Strom Thurman is a Helluva Guy" Biden.

Joe "Racial Jungle" Biden.

Joe "Poor Kids Are Just as Smart and Just as Talented as White Kids" Biden.

Joe "Lemme Tell You About Corn Pop" Biden.

Whoever he nominates is first and foremost going to be just another corporate stooge. Fuck identity politics; that's a distraction to keep people from uniting over the real issues.

Anybody tying themselves into knots over racial identity politics is a fucking willing dupe and therefore too stupid to take seriously about... well, anything.

US Supreme Court: The women in the running to replace Stephen Breyer
Published 51 minutes ago | BBC

US President Joe Biden has affirmed that he will appoint an African-American woman to the top US court for the first time in history.

She will take up a seat to be vacated by liberal Justice Stephen Breyer, who will retire in June.

Appearing with Mr Breyer on Thursday, Mr Biden promised a replacement with the "experience and integrity" needed for the role.

He said he'll announce his nominee by the end of February. Three judges are considered top contenders.


Ketanji Brown Jackson

Ketanji Brown Jackson, 51, is widely believed to be the top contender to replace Justice Breyer.

Born in Washington DC, Ms Jackson currently serves on the influential US Circuit Court of Appeals for the DC circuit. Three current justices previously served on the court.

Previously, Ms Jackson also served as a district court judge in DC from 2013 to 2021.

The jurist has two degrees from Harvard University, which she attended as an undergraduate and as a law student, once serving as editor of the Harvard Law Review.

Ms Jackson has also clerked for three federal judges in the past, most notably Justice Breyer himself from 1999 to 2000.

In January 2021, she was among President Biden's very first judicial picks, to fill the court seat vacated by his current Attorney General Merrick Garland.

At that confirmation hearing, former House Speaker and Republican vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan introduced her; Mr Ryan is a relative by marriage.

"Our politics may differ, but my praise for Ketanji's intellect, for her character, for her integrity, it is unequivocal," he said.


Leondra Kruger

Leondra Kruger, 45, is in her eighth year on the California Supreme Court.

Born to a Jamaican immigrant mother and a Jewish father, the Pasadena native is a graduate of Harvard University and Yale Law School, where she was the first black woman to serve as editor of the Yale Law Journal.

Ms Kruger previously worked in the Obama Department of Justice, from 2007 to 2013.

During her tenure, she argued 12 cases before the US Supreme Court as deputy to the Solicitor General, the official who represents the government before the high court.

She reportedly twice turned down offers to serve as the Solicitor General.

The jurist also once clerked for late Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens.


J Michelle Childs

Julianna Michelle Childs, 55, has served on the federal bench in South Carolina since 2010.

She also previously served as a circuit court judge in the state.

Unlike Ms Jackson and Ms Kruger, Ms Childs did not attend an Ivy League school, instead going to the University of South Carolina Law School.

In private practice, she was the first black female partner at a major law firm in the state.

Congressman Jim Clyburn, an influential black politician in the state whose endorsement of Mr Biden is widely credited with turning his 2020 campaign around, has advocated for Ms Childs to be nominated because of her unorthodox resume.

Most recently, Mr Biden nominated Ms Childs to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals.

Why it matters

Black women make up only about three percent of the federal judiciary, according to data from the Federal Judicial Center, the court system's research arm.

Dr Taneisha Means, a political science professor at Vassar College, who researches race and judicial politics, says that a history of racism, sexism and elitism in the legal profession contributes to the scarcity.

Black law students are often left on the outside looking in because they did not go to an Ivy League university, or because they never clerked for a federal judge, said Dr Means, meaning few ever become eligible for the high court.

Ms Means added that a gruelling confirmation process in the US Senate likely makes federal judgeships even less palatable. Recent analysis indicates non-white nominees often face much longer waits than their white counterparts to be confirmed by the mostly white chamber.

Strengthening the diversity of the judicial branch has been a key priority for the Biden administration.

The Senate confirmed 40 new district and appellate judges last year, the most for a president in his first year since Ronald Reagan in 1981. Among them are the first openly LGBT female judge, the first Muslim American judge and five black women.

See?

Fuckall about who they have connections with, what sorts of decisions they're known for, if they have personal/familial ties to corporations or government agencies that will likely have business in front of the supreme court, etc.

You know... the kind of information that's ACTUALLY RELEVANT.

They think we're fucking stupid and unfortunately they're usually correct.

New poll: 55% of Americans say nominating a Black woman to the Supreme Court is not 'important'

Andrew Romano·West Coast Correspondent
Fri, February 11, 2022, 3:00 AM

With President Biden set to announce a nominee to replace the retiring Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer by the end of February, most Americans now say they’re lukewarm about his promise to pick a Black woman for the first time in U.S. history, according to a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll — while also saying the top three Black women on Biden’s shortlist are “qualified” to sit on the court.

The survey of 1,628 U.S. adults, which was conducted from Feb. 3 to 7, found that a clear majority of those polled (55 percent) say nominating a Black woman is either “not very” (19 percent) or “not at all” (36 percent) important to them. Just 23 percent say it is “very important.”

The Survey (PDF file - https://www.scribd.com/document/558113330/New-poll-55-percent-of-Americans-say-nominating-a-Black-woman-to-the-Supreme-Court-is-not-important#download&from_embed )

Predictably, the overall number who say nominating a Black woman is either very or somewhat important is much higher among Democrats (80 percent) and 2020 Biden voters (78 percent) than among independents (35 percent), Republicans (16 percent) or 2020 Donald Trump voters (10 percent).

Likewise, just 36 percent of Americans say Biden’s pledge was a "good idea," while the rest say it was either “a bad idea” (32 percent) or “neither good nor bad” (32 percent). And just a third of Americans say they have “a great deal” or “quite a bit” of confidence that Biden will select "the right kind of person" to replace Breyer on the court (33 percent), or that they themselves expect to support the nominee Biden puts forward (34 percent) — noticeably lower than the 39 percent who said they expected to support "President Trump's Supreme Court nominee" in September 2020, just before he nominated Amy Coney Barrett.

One possible explanation for this tepid response is that many Americans seem to believe that their leaders can and should choose only "the most qualified" person regardless of race, gender or politics — an ideal they think Biden failed to live up to when he explicitly limited the pool to Black women.

Yet the striking thing is that the vast majority of those same Americans polled — and a smaller but still significant majority of Republicans — agree that all three of the Black women reportedly at the top of Biden’s shortlist meet the standards for qualification.

The results of the poll are unambiguous. When shown a name, photograph and a brief résumé, including age, education and prior experience, the share of Americans who say that Ketanji Brown Jackson, Leondra Kruger and J. Michelle Childs are either “very” or “somewhat” qualified to “sit on the Supreme Court” hovers at around two-thirds.



For all the controversy and consternation over Biden’s decision to consider only Black women, that represents a remarkable degree of consensus in a country as divided as the U.S.

All three were listed as “potential Supreme Court nominee[s]” but not as “potential Biden Supreme Court nominee[s].” Given the context, many partisan respondents likely assumed that they were candidates on Biden's shortlist and then took that into account when rating their qualifications, for better or worse.

Childs was identified as 55 years old; a graduate of University of South Carolina Law School, with a legal master's degree from Duke University Law School; a former senior partner in a South Carolina law firm; and a current judge on the U.S. Circuit Appeals Court for South Carolina who has been nominated to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. A full 70 percent of Americans say Childs is qualified to sit on the court, including 60 percent of Republicans.

Jackson was identified as 51 years old; a graduate of Harvard Law School; a former clerk for a Supreme Court justice; and a current judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. A full 69 percent of Americans say Jackson is qualified to sit on the court, including 57 percent of Republicans.

Kruger was identified as 45 years old; a graduate of Yale Law School; a former clerk for a Supreme Court justice; and a current judge on the California Supreme Court. A full 65 percent of Americans say Kruger is qualified to sit on the court, including 53 percent of Republicans.

As a point of comparison, the poll also asked whether three former Supreme Court candidates — Amy Coney Barrett, Merrick Garland and Sidney Thomas — were qualified to serve at the time when they were either nominated or considered for a seat.

Left unsaid — but presumably widely known — was the fact former President Donald Trump appointed Barrett to the court and President Barack Obama nominated Garland, who was then blocked by a Republican Senate. Thomas, who was shortlisted for the Supreme Court under Obama, was included in the survey to gauge whether a relatively “generic” older white male candidate would generate higher ratings.

He did not — nor did Barrett or Garland, at least not overall.

Despite the polarized reactions among partisans — Democrats (59 percent) were 21 points less likely than Republicans (80 percent) to rate Barrett as qualified; Republicans (59 percent) were 23 points less likely than Democrats (82 percent) to rate Garland as qualified — their combined ratings among Americans as a whole (67 percent each) were statistically indistinguishable from the ratings of the three Black women on Biden’s shortlist.

Meanwhile, Thomas, a graduate of the University of Montana Law School who served as chief judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (covering the Western U.S.), was actually rated the least qualified of all the candidates, at 63 percent.

This raises an intriguing question: If today’s leading Black women candidates are as qualified as their predecessors to sit on the court, why do so many Americans seem uncomfortable with Biden’s decision to focus on inclusion by considering only judges of that particular race and gender?

As anyone who has followed a Supreme Court confirmation process over the last several decades knows, there has never been a justice selected on qualifications alone. Politics and identity always enter into the equation. For most of U.S. history, only white men were considered for the job. During the 1980 presidential campaign, Ronald Reagan said, "One of the first Supreme Court vacancies in my administration will be filled by the most qualified woman I can possibly find.” And after Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died in 2020, President Trump said, "I will be putting forth a nominee next week. It will be a woman."



Tellingly, about twice as many Republicans say the pledges from Reagan (31 percent) and Trump (28 percent) were a “good idea” than say the same about Biden’s (14 percent), while the number of Democrats who say Trump’s pledge was a good idea (45 percent) is 22 points lower than the number who say Biden’s was (67 percent). Partisanship plays a significant role here.

Yet regardless of how elastic the definition of “qualified” appears to be, evidence of the power and persistence of the ideal that it can be defined — and then applied dispassionately to the Supreme Court confirmation process — is everywhere. Earlier this month, for instance, ABC News and Ipsos asked whether Americans want Biden to “consider all possible nominees” or “only nominees who are Black women, as he has pledged to do.” More than three-quarters (76 percent) said they want the president to break his pledge and consider all possible nominees.

While that question framed Biden’s promise as exclusionary rather than inclusionary, even the more neutral options provided in the new Yahoo News/YouGov poll reveal that many (if not most) Americans say they would rather their leaders ignore politics and identity in pursuit of some Platonic vision of unalloyed merit.

Asked whether “the best possible candidate should be chosen regardless of race, gender or sexuality” or whether “the best possible Supreme Court should include qualified justices with a variety of backgrounds and experiences,” the former beats the latter by 8 percentage points, 49 percent to 41 percent.

A follow-up about the role that ideology should play in a senator’s decision to confirm or reject a nominee exposes an even clearer preference, with the vast majority of Americans saying it’s more important for senators to consider whether "the nominee is qualified to serve on the court" (72 percent) than whether "the nominee will rule the way the senator wants on major issues" (10 percent). Unusually, the numbers among Democrats, Republicans and independents were essentially identical on this question.

Nonetheless, the vast majority of all three groups see Biden’s leading candidates as qualified — at least for now. Once an actual nominee emerges and the confirmation process begins in earnest, it’s likely that politics will reshape perceptions of her qualifications. But at the moment, before all that, roughly 4 in 10 Americans rate each of the Black women on Biden’s shortlist as “very” qualified: 37 percent for Kruger; 39 percent for Childs; 42 percent for Jackson.

Those numbers are on par with — or higher than — Garland’s (41 percent) and Barrett’s (37 percent).

_____________

Ketanji Brown Jackson is Biden's Supreme Court pick
BY MELISSA QUINN, NANCY CORDES
UPDATED ON: FEBRUARY 25, 2022 / 10:26 AM / CBS NEWS

Washington — President Biden intends to nominate federal appeals court Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer on the Supreme Court, according to a source familiar with the process, fulfilling Mr. Biden's campaign pledge to name the first Black woman to the nation's highest court.

Mr. Biden plans to announce Jackson, 51, as his pick on Friday, setting in motion a confirmation battle in the Senate that will play out amid Democrats' efforts to maintain their majorities in Congress in November's midterm elections.

With Republicans and Democrats each controlling 50 seats in the Senate and Vice President Kamala Harris casting tie-breaking votes, Jackson will need support from all 50 Democrats — if GOP senators oppose her nomination — in order to be confirmed to the Supreme Court, which she is expected to receive.

It's unclear when confirmation hearings in the Senate Judiciary Committee will begin, but Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and committee Chairman Dick Durbin have pledged to take up the nomination expeditiously. The pace of the confirmation process for Jackson is expected to be similar to that of Justice Amy Coney Barrett, whose nomination to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in 2020 was approved by the GOP-controlled Senate in less than 30 days.

Jackson will be guided through the confirmation process by former Alabama Senator Doug Jones, who is serving as her so-called "Sherpa."

With Jackson's nomination, which comes nearly a month after Breyer announced his retirement, Mr. Biden has his first opportunity to put his stamp on the Supreme Court. While Jackson's appointment will not alter the ideological composition of the high court, which currently has a 6-3 conservative majority, she is likely to serve for decades if confirmed by the Senate.

Breyer revealed in late January he will retire from the Supreme Court once a successor is confirmed, capping months of pressure from liberal judicial groups to step down and allow Mr. Biden to name a successor while Democrats control the Senate.

The president swiftly reaffirmed he would select a Black woman as his nominee, following through on a promise he made during the 2020 presidential campaign to do so and make history with his pick. Jackson was one of more than a dozen candidates Mr. Biden weighed to succeed Breyer, alongside California Supreme Court Justice Leondra Kruger and federal district Judge J. Michelle Childs.

Still, Jackson was considered a leading candidate for the Supreme Court before there was a vacancy, with her professional experience representing indigent criminal defendants and nearly nine years on the federal bench making her a favorite.

She was selected by Mr. Biden last year to replace Attorney General Merrick Garland on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which is considered to be the nation's second most powerful court and on which three current Supreme Court justices served. Jackson was confirmed to the D.C. Circuit in June 2021, winning support from all Senate Democrats and three Republicans: Senators Susan Collins of Maine, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

Before her appointment to the D.C. Circuit, Jackson served for more than eight years as a judge on the federal district court in the District of Columbia. She was selected for that post by former President Barack Obama in 2012 and introduced at her confirmation hearing by the-Congressman Paul Ryan, a Republican from Wisconsin who would go on to serve as speaker of the House before retiring in 2018.

Ryan and Jackson are related by marriage, and the congressman said at the time his "praise for Ketanji's intellect, for her character, for her integrity, it is unequivocal. She is an amazing person."

Obama considered Jackson for the Supreme Court in 2016 to fill the vacancy created by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia.

During her tenure on the district court, Jackson ruled in the high-profile dispute between the House Judiciary Committee and former White House counsel Don McGahn, finding in 2019 that McGahn had to comply with the subpoena for testimony.

"Presidents are not kings. This means that they do not have subjects, bound by loyalty or blood, whose destiny they are entitled to control," she wrote. "Rather, in this land of liberty, it is indisputable that employees of the White House work for the people of the United States, and that they take an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

She also was on the three-judge panel on the D.C. Circuit that rejected former President Donald Trump's attempt to keep the National Archives and Records Administration from turning over his White House records to the House select committee investigating the January 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol. Jackson joined the opinion written by Judge Patricia Millett that found Trump "provided no basis for this court to override President Biden's judgment and the agreement and accommodations worked out between the Political Branches over these documents."

The Supreme Court ultimately gave the green-light for the National Archives to give the records to the January 6 committee, declining a request from Trump to block their release.

A native of Washington, D.C., Jackson grew up in Florida. A White House bio page that went up late Friday morning notes that her parents attended segregated primary schools in the South, and eventually became public school teachers and administrators in the Miami area.

Jackson attended Harvard University and Harvard Law School. According to the White House, when she told her high school guidance counselor she wanted to go to Harvard, the counselor cautioned her against setting her sights "so high." Jackson graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College and cum laude from Harvard Law School.

She clerked for Breyer on the Supreme Court during the term beginning in October 1999 and, after stints at elite law firms, went on to serve as assistant special counsel for the U.S. Sentencing Commission.

She also worked for two years as an assistant federal public defender before returning to the U.S. Sentencing Commission in 2010 as vice chair. Jackson's time as a public defender makes her the first justice since Thurgood Marshall to have experience representing criminal defendants.

If confirmed, Jackson will not only be the first Black woman to sit on the Supreme Court, but it will also mark the first time there will be two African-American justices and four women serving at the same time. At 51, she would be the second-youngest justice, behind Barrett, who is 50.

Senate confirms Ketanji Brown Jackson’s historic nomination to Supreme Court
Dylan Stableford·Senior Writer
Thu, April 7, 2022, 12:17 PM

The Senate on Thursday voted 53-47 to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s historic nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Three Republicans senators — Mitt Romney (Utah), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Susan Collins (Maine) — joined all 48 Democrats and two independents in voting to confirm Jackson to the nation’s highest court.

Jackson, 51, will become the Supreme Court’s 116th justice and first Black woman ever to sit on its bench.

Vice President Kamala Harris, the nation’s first woman, first Black person and first Asian American to hold that office, presided over the historic vote.

The final tally — which was delayed by more than 15 minutes by GOP Sen. Rand Paul's absence — was met with applause in the chamber when Harris announced it.

Of the 115 justices that have come before Jackson, 110 were white men, two were Black men, four were white women, and one was a Latina woman.

“In the 233-year history of the Supreme Court, never, never has a Black woman held the title of justice,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said in a speech before the vote. “Ketanji Brown Jackson will be the first and I believe the first of more to come.”

Jackson watched the vote unfold with President Biden at the White House Thursday.

"Judge Jackson’s confirmation was a historic moment for our nation." Biden tweeted. "We’ve taken another step toward making our highest court reflect the diversity of America. She will be an incredible Justice, and I was honored to share this moment with her."

Jackson faced numerous attacks from Republicans during her marathon confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee last month.

Her confirmation comes less than two months after Biden introduced the federal district court judge as his pick to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer — fulfilling his campaign promise of appointing a Black woman to the Supreme Court. Breyer will retire at the end of the court's current term later this year.

Biden and Harris will host Jackson at an event on the South Lawn Friday to celebrate her confirmation.

When she does take her seat, the nine-member court will be composed of four women — Jackson and Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Amy Coney Barrett — the most ever at one time.

It will also be the first time in U.S. history that white men won’t be the majority on the Supreme Court. The bench will include five men, four of them white.

Her confirmation also represents a monumental moment for Black Americans — especially women.

“So many children and generations to come will never know a Supreme Court without a Black woman,” said Keenan Austin Reed, co-founder of the Black Women's Congressional Alliance. “I am excited about all the students who will now go to law school because of her and for all the brown babies that will be named Ketanji. Judge Jackson's story is a story of perseverance and I could not be more inspired or proud."

“Today marks an important new chapter for America's highest court - one that includes a Black woman," said Dr. Deborah Turner, board president of the League of Women Voters. “Without a doubt, Judge Jackson’s appointment is a historic confirmation."

Jackson was born in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 14, 1970. As a young child, she moved to Miami, Fla., with her parents — graduates of historically Black colleges and universities who worked as public school teachers.

Jackson had credited her father for inspiring her to pursue law, as he became a full-time law student when she was 4 years old.

“My very earliest memories are of watching my father study,” Jackson said during her confirmation hearings. “He had his stack of law books on the kitchen table while I sat across from him with my stack of coloring books.”

She graduated from Harvard University and Harvard Law School, where she met her future husband, Dr. Patrick Jackson, a gastrointestinal surgeon. They married in 1996 and have two daughters, Leila and Talia.

Jackson will also be the first Supreme Court justice since Thurgood Marshall to have represented indigent criminal defendants.

She represented Guantanamo Bay detainees as a public defender and later worked on the issue in private practice.

In addition to her public-defender work, Jackson served as vice chairman of the U.S. Sentencing Commission, working to reduce the penalties for crack cocaine offenders.

She was appointed to that post in 2009 by former President Barack Obama, the nation’s first Black president.

Obama also nominated Jackson to be a district court judge for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in 2012. She was confirmed with bipartisan support in 2013.

Quote :

Jackson faced numerous attacks from Republicans during her marathon confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee last month.

pffff ..pleezz! .. Her's was a walk in the park compared to the attacks Kavanaugh faced from the democrats


Those were the worst, most desperate, pathetic attacks ever committed to prevent the confirmation of a nominee to the supreme court .. It should never be forgotten how low the democrats went to get their way .. it took an FBI investigation before he could be confirmed and they *still* couldn't accept it .. It was worse than a bad Jerry Springer show