Lynch at Large

Clues sought in Roberts' legal record
USA Today

First of all, Judge John Roberts will be confirmed for a lifetime appointment to the United States Supreme Court. While Ann Coulter complains that stealth candidates, those without much of a judicial paper trail, always serve conservatives poorly, Roberts has plenty of a record to suggest that he is exactly the kind of mind Mr. Bush was seeking. He is obviously smart and very conservative.

In my mind, the most distressing thing about Roberts is his decision in the French fry case. This is the episode of the teenage girl who was handcuffed and taken off to jail by District of Columbia transit cops for the offense of eating a French fry in the subway. This is another in a sorry chain of rulings which seem to say that police need not take the rights of ordinary people seriously and that any type of public humiliation or physical is just part of being an American.

Figuring out where Roberts stands on abortion is like trying to predict the future using chicken bones tossed into the air. He once wrote a decision for the government, which was his client at the time, arguing that Roe was wrongly decided. Later, he went to pains pointing out that his opinion was actually the opinion of his employer. That has Ms. Coulter in a dither, but I am not sure you can read much out of it.

Several Democratic Senators, including Kennedy and Boxer, have promised to pose some extremely serious questions. While well intentioned, I wonder if they would tolerate the same tone being taken toward a more liberal candidate.

Right wing fanatics will be trying to devine where he is on property rights, as if the high court made some sort of enormous legal blunder in the recent Connecticut eminent domain case. The Democrat Gazette has a terrific editorial in the Wednesday paper that also takes a shot at GOP gubernatorial candidate Asa Hutchinson. It is nt linked, so you will have to find a copy on your own.

Without some sort of Anita Hill type revelation, Roberts will be confirmed within the month. That development may prod the ailing Chief to step aside. Things are tough, but donÂ’t blame me. I voted for Kerry.