AT LEAST ONE HRC MEMBER REFUSES TO RE-UP HIS MEMBERSHIP BECAUSE OF THEIR SHAMEFUL ENDORSEMENT OF REPUBLICAN SHILL SUSAN COLLINS

A few weeks ago I was huffing and puffing about a gay human rights outfit, HRC endorsing Susan Collins, who has a so-so record on gay rights ("good for a Republican") against Rep. Tom Allen who has a perfect record on gay rights issues. I don't want to go through the whole thing again, but if you missed it in April, it's all at the link above. The next day Michelangelo Signorelli called and asked me to be a guest on his radio show and I tore into HRC more strongly than I intended to. After my interview was done they called Michelangelo and asked if they could have a representative on to rebut me the following day. Exciting, huh? Below I have an embedded mp3 of the HRC spokesman's interview. It's pretty amusing and I recommend listening to it.

This evening an old friend send me this:

I got two calls from HRC today.
I couldn't take the first call and, good for them, someone called me back a couple of hours later.

They asked me if I would renew my membership so they could lead the fight in anti-gay initiatives.

I told her no because HRC endorsed Susan Collins.

Her:  "Who is that? Some local person?"

Me:  "No, she's a United States Senator"

Her: "Well, I've never heard of her and we don't even do endorsements"

Me: "Actually that is one of the most visible things that HRC does."

Her: "Well, I don't think that we do that and this is the first time that I have heard of that woman's name"

Me: "Well, she is a Republican and she votes for the anti-gay Republican leadership and she has voted for Bush's nominees for the Supreme Court"

Her: "OK..... so would you like to renew to fight these anti-gay initiatives?"

Me: "No, I need to recover from the Collins endorsement.... And this when I had almost recovered from HRC's endorsement of Lieberman and D'Amato."

Her: "Well, I don't know who that is... In two days of calling this is the first time I have even heard that name.... So you don't want to renew?"

Me: "uh No....thank you."

OK, so here's the radio show: HRC Interview

Michelangelo starts by playing a couple of soundbytes from my interview the day before. They he talks with the HRC guy. You can see why Michelangelo is considered a master-- not just as a church painter, but as a radio interviewer. I actually started feeling sorry for the HRC guy after al while. I don't have a clue if many gay people read Down With Tyranny but if you are gay and if you do belong to HRC I want you to listen to that interview and think about donating whatever you would have donated to them this year, to Tom Allen instead. The money you give to them-- or at least some of it-- will go to help re-elect Senator Susan Collins who has vowed to continue voting for viciously homophobic judges who not only oppose granting rights to gay men and women but who are committed to taking away current rights, like the right to adopt children. You can donate to Tom Allen's campaign here.

Notice when they are discussing raging homophobic maniacs like Leslie Southwick, the HRC guy admits that they don't agree with her on those votes but excuses it by saying "many Democrats voted for those nominees." Well, I don't want to quibble over the definition of the word "many," but I can tell you that one was another HRC endorsee and Bush rubber stamp, Holy Joe Lieberman. I can also tell you, with no equivocation, that no one, not a Republican and not a Democrat, has ever or will ever be endorsed by Blue America if they vote against equality under the law for any minority. The "many Democrats" are reactionaries like Mary Landrieu and Mark Pryor and Ben Nelson, none of whom are supported-- and are all frequently chastised-- here are DWT.

When the Senate was debating whether or not to confirm the proven bigot Leslie Southwick, HRC's own president Joe Solomonese, didn't equivocate either. "A nominee who so callously disregarded the rights of GLBT families clearly cannot be trusted to safeguard the rights of any American... This vote for Leslie Southwick is a vote against the dignity and safety of our families, and an insult to the millions of dedicated GLBT parents raising happy and healthy children across this country." OK, we agree, so why funnel thousands of dollars from working gay men and women into her re-election campaign, when her opponent has a perfect voting record on equality and has pledged to never vote to confirm any bigoted judges?

WHO WOULD FAVOR TORTURE? ALMOST EVERY SINGLE REPUBLICAN IN CONGRESS... + JIM MARSHALL

In a largely party-lined vote, the House failed to override Bush's veto of the legislation that would have re-iterated long-standing American policy to not engage in the barbaric use of torture of prisoners. Bush "vetoed the bill over the provision that extends to U.S. intelligence agencies and personnel the current prohibitions in the Army Field Manual against waterboarding and other torture." Senator Double Talk Express (R-AZ), Bush's political heir, supports Bush on the veto while telling the public that he opposes torture. He is a very confused or a very deceptive man-- or both.

Failing to prohibit in statute the use of waterboarding and other torture undermines our nation's moral authority, puts American military and diplomatic personnel at risk, and weakens the quality of intelligence. Indeed, in 2007, General David Petraeus wrote, "Some may argue that we would be more effective if we sanctioned torture or other expedient methods to obtain information from the enemy. That would be wrong. Beyond the basic fact that such actions are illegal, history shows that they also are frequently neither useful nor necessary."

Speaker Nancy Pelosi: "In the words of retired Rear Admiral Donald Guter, a former Navy Judge Advocate General: 'There is no disconnect between human rights and national security… they're synergistic. One doesn't work without the other for very long.' Failing to legally prohibit the use of waterboarding and other harsh torture techniques also risks the safety of our soldiers and other Americans serving overseas. In a letter to the Congressional intelligence committee chairmen, 30 retired generals and admirals-- including General Joseph Hoar, the former head of U.S. Central Command-- stated: 'We believe it is vital to the safety of our men and women in uniform that the United States not sanction the use of interrogation methods it would find unacceptable if inflicted by the enemy against captured Americans…'"

There were 5 brave Republicans who joined the Democrats in trying to override Bush's veto: Roscoe Bartlett (MD), Wayne Gilchrest (MD, who lost his primary to a wingnut), Tim Johnson (IL), Ron Paul (TX) and Chris Smith (NJ). There were also 2 Democrats who voted with the Republicans because the bill wasn't good enough (Dennis Kucinich and Maxine Waters) and one disgrace to the Democratic Party who joined the GOP today, as he often does: Jim Marshall (GA).

Among the Republicans desperately seeking re-election by telling their constituents they are moderates and independent of Bush who voted for torture-- again-- were Joe Knollenberg (R-MI), Dave Reichert (R-WA), David Dreier (R-CA), Randy Kuhl (R-NY), Mark Kirk (R-IL), Jim Gerlach (R-PA), Ric Keller (R-FL), Tom Reynolds (R-NY), and Mr. Moderate himself, crazyman Chris Shays (R-CT).

The DSCC is supporting a right-of-center "business Democrat," Kay Hagan for Elizabeth Dole's senate seat in North Carolina. Grassroots support goes to Jim Neal. Jim has been campaigning hard against retroactive immunity and Hagan admits that she favors it. In a brand new poll the under-financed campaign of the guy who knows it pays to emphasize the contrast in positions with right-wing Republicans pulled ahead of the Insider shill.

Many people have pointed to the deteriorating state of Chris Shays' mental capacity lately. Even with Attorney General Mukasey and GOP presidential nominee-designate McCain admitting that waterboarding is torture, Chris Shays is still splitting hairs and playing word games. The slippery Liebermanlike Republican, who has voted for virtually every single item on Bush's war agenda from Day One, had this to say about his contemptible pro-torture vote:

"I don't know where to draw the line on some of these issues," Shays said, adding that torture used to involve pulling out fingernails and maiming people with knives.

"I wouldn't be able to go through each item and tell you," Shays said, "because I don't know the sensation. I haven't had anyone do it to me."

The progressive Democrat running against Shays in November is Blue America-endorsed Jim Himes. We asked him how he felt about Connecticut's one GOP congressman voting for torture.

"I am appalled that the President vetoed a bill that would have simply forced interrogators to abide by the methods approved by our own military. I am equally appalled that Chris Shays and the Republicans in Congress voted to sustain Bush's veto.

"Chris Shays continues to provide cover for Bush's torture policy-- a policy which has eroded our standing in the world, endangers our own troops in the field, and makes us less safe. That the President and Chris Shays can't say clearly and loudly that Americans do not torture is inexplicable and outrageous."

"Our country was founded on and draws its strength from noble ideals. We are Americans, and we don't torture. It's that simple."

Several other Blue America stalwarts are facing pro-torture Republicans in November. Dennis Shulman, who is running against the Northeast's last remaining right-wing extremist, New Jersey nutcase Scott Garrett has this to say:

"We need members of Congress who take issues of morality seriously. Instead of a reliable vote for torture like Scott Garrett, we need representatives who recognize that torture inherently generates unreliable information while reducing our standing in the world. Our great strength as a nation is that, to paraphrase Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., while the arc of our history is long, it bends toward justice."

And the Scott Garrett of the West Coast is California's most extreme right wing member of Congress, Gary Miller. Ron Shepston, his Democratic opponent doesn't favor torture any more than Dennis or Jim or any rational American. "I find it incredible that anyone would agree to put our soldiers now and in the future in danger by letting us engage in something as unproductive and in fact as counter-productive as torture. In short, it doesn’t work and makes things worse for our troops. Anyone who says that it does is wrong. Those who voted to sustain should be ashamed of themselves."

VA-11's incumbent, Tom Davis, is retiring, as his constituents turn more and more against the war and against the entire shameful and disastrous Bush agenda Davis has rubber stamped. Today Davis was still voting for torture. The woman Blue America has endorsed to win in that northern Virginia district is Leslie Byrne and she came straight to the point: "Torture is against our fundamental democratic ideals and our Constitution. We ask our military to defend these rights and principles with their lives. If we disregard these fundamental rights, we dishonor their commitments."

If you'd rather see people in Congress like Jim Himes, Leslie Byrne, Ron Shepston and Dennis Shulman, please show them a little love at Blue America.


UPDATE: THE MILITARY OPPOSES TORTURE

Eric Massa, the Democrat running against Randy Kuhl in upstate New York, is a highly decorated ex-military officer with more understanding about military matters than Bush and his 5 closest advisers combined. Like most military officers and retired military officers, he understands why going back to Spanish Inquisition forms of torture are damaging, first and foremost, to our own fighting men and women. Having never been one, Bush, Cheney and their gaggle of Neocons is completely clueles. Here's what Eric told DWT this evening after Kuhl voted, again, to rubber stamp Bush's torture policies: "I am terribly disappointed that the roadblocking rubber stamps in Congress have decided to stand with George Bush and against the Geneva Conventions. The topic of 'should we or shouldn't we condone torture' should not even be part of the public discussion. Torture is wrong on every level and I very much look forward to casting a vote against it when I am a part of the 111th Congress."

Alan Grayson is running for Congress in Orlando against reflexive rubber stamp Ric Keller, who, naturally voted in favor of torture again today. I asked Alan what the hell is going on with a vote like that. He was as outraged as I was: "We somehow managed to get through two World Wars without torture, but in those wars we were led by the 'Greatest Generation,' not their clueless, AWOL offspring. I'm wondering what else the current Republican leaders hope to revive? Witch-burning? Serfdom? Absolute monarchy?"

FORGET THE MORE AND BETTER-- WE JUST NEED BETTER DEMOCRATS-- SOUTHWICK CONFIRMED THANKS TO FEINSTEIN AND OTHER REACTIONARY DEMS

I felt sick this morning when I saw the Republican minority invoke cloture on the attempt by progressives to deny Bush's latest KKK judicial nominee confirmation. Yesterday I warned that Judas goat Ben Nelson was working with Trent Lott in rounding up the votes to thwart the progressive strategy. Thanks to Diane Feinstein (D-CA), he succeeded.

Judith Schaeffer, Legal Director of People For the American Way just summed up with the wretched and useless Senate Democrats just inflicted on the American people:

“Following the 2006 election, President Bush pledged to move ahead in a cooperative and bipartisan manner. But mere days after the new Congress was sworn in, he submitted the controversial nomination of Leslie Southwick.”
 
“Southwick’s disturbing legal recordand lack of commitment to equality before the law make him unfit for a powerful lifetime seat on the federal bench. We are deeply disappointed in the Senate Democrats who acquiesced to the President today on Southwick’s nomination.
 
“That’s not what Americans voted for when they gave Democrats a majority in the Senate. Senate Democrats must hold the President to his 2006 pledge of bipartisanship and cooperation by rejecting nominees who fail to interpret the law fairly for all Americans.”

The win today is being cheered by reactionaries, homophobes, Republican partisans, corporate interests, and racists as a huge victory. After the Republicans passed cloture to shut down debate 62-35, Southwick sailed to victory 59-38. So who were the Democrats who screwed us, Democrats who every progressive should do all they can to defeat?
Well, of course, first and foremost is the horrific and utterly corrupt and contemptible Dianne Feinstein, without whose connivance, Southwick would still be bottled up in committee hearings. And then of course, there's Bush's point man inside the Democratic caucus, Ben Nelson. The full list of Democrats who officially joined the GOP for the day:

Daniel Akaka (HI)
former KKK member (who could he abandon a brother in arms?), Robert Byrd (WV)
Tom Carper (DE)
Kent Conrad (ND)
Byron Dorgan (ND)
DiFi (CA)
Daniel Inouye (HI)
Tim Johnson (SD)- glad you were praying for him? did you send money too?
Blanche Lincoln (AR)
Ben Nelson (NE)
Mark Pryor (AR)
Ken Salazar (CO)

BIZARRE UPDATE D'JOUR: AND I ALWAYS THOUGHT COCHRAN WAS A HOMO

A reliable friend in Mississippi just wrote to me to give me a little context for DiFi's work on behalf of the new KKK judge. She did it for her ex-boy friend, Thad Cochran! Huh? Yeah, that's what I said-- DiFi and Cochran were actually an item at one time and she engineered a lifetime appointment for one of the worst judges imaginable, even from Bush, for her ex. As for the long-standing rumors about Cochran and the boys, he told me he didn't know anything about that but perhaps I was mixing him up with someone named Haley.


AND A NOT AT ALL BIZARRE UPDATE: REP. BARBARA LEE IS ASHAMED OF HER U.S. SENATOR-- WHO ISN'T?

Congresswoman Lee: "Let me also say that as a Californian and as an African American, I am incredibly disappointed that a Senator from my home state, Senator Feinstein, would not only vote for confirmation but would be the one to effectively bring this nomination to the floor by voting with the Republicans to approve the nomination in committee. It is particularly disappointing given California's diversity and our history of leadership on issues of civil rights, women's rights, worker's rights and the basic commitment to equality before the law, all areas where Judge Southwick's record is, quite frankly, sadly
lacking."

BEN NELSON UP TO HIS OLD TRICKS AGAIN-- AND BUSH'S

Without the efforts of Nelson, Alito wouldn't be on the Supreme Court

I don't recall any netroots or grassroots activists making a stink last year when the absolute worst and most reactionary Democrat in the Senate was up for re-election. No, I'm not talking about Joe Lieberman. First of all he's a member of the CFL (Connecticut For Lieberman Party, not the Democratic Party). And secondly, compared to Ben Nelson (D-NE), Lieberman almost looks... well... looks less reactionary. Nelson's lifetime voting score at Progressive Punch is a dismal 50.28, showing he votes as much with the Bush Regime on their toxic agenda as he does with Democrats. But no one said boo and he was re-elected with much less fuss than he's earned. We'll have another 6 years of this reactionary butthead undermining progressive values every step of the way.

Today he is scurrying around the Senate like a rat trying to gather the votes to close down a Democratic filibuster on Bush's Southwick nomination, a vote expected tomorrow. Today's Congressional Quarterly reports that he is "working behind the scenes to line up enough Democrats to force a confirmation vote on a contentious appellate court nominee, while winning concessions from Republicans in return." He's coordinating efforts with Trent Lott (R-MS) and two Democrats who are rumored to favor the KKK candidate, Ken Salazar (CO) and Robert Byrd (WV).

Nebraska Democrat Ben Nelson is trying to corral at least 11 Democrats and nine Republicans for a deal that would in some ways echo the “Gang of 14” effort that averted a Senate implosion over judicial nominations in 2005. This time, though, Nelson has broadened his effort.

Nelson is trying to persuade Democrats to vote against a filibuster of the nomination of Leslie Southwick to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit. But he also wants Republicans to agree, in return, that they will not stand in the way of Senate action on fiscal 2008 spending bills.

Another putative Democrat, Mark Pryor (AR), whose voting record is nearly as bad as Nelson's-- and who is up for re-election in 2008-- has already announced he will be voting to shut down the debate so Bush's latest and perhaps worst judicial nominee can be confirmed.

HOW MANY DEMOCRATS WILL VOTE TO SUPPORT BUSH'S LATEST KKK NOMINEE TO THE JUDICIAL BRANCH NEXT WEEK?

While the Democratic Senate Establishment gets ready to make common cause with the Bush Regime in invoking cloture of Chris Dodd's promise to filibuster the further erosion of our constitutional rights in terms of the fascistic FISA bill crafted by Regime hacks and bribe-happy Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), some treacherous Democrats are also lining up with GOP extremists to push forward Bush's latest radical right judicial nominee, Leslie Southwick.

Senate Republicans have assumed they would need to round up a filibuster-proof supermajority of 60 votes to win confirmation for Southwick. It’s unclear whether Southwick’s supporters have done so. A spokesman for Reid declined to say whether Democrats would filibuster the nomination. A Senate Republican aide said there is no agreement on a time limit for debating the nomination.

One big unknown is how conservative Dem, Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), who broke with her party on August 2 to insure that Bush's nominee would get out of committee, will vote. Other Democrats who could join the GOP is confirming another KKK judicial nominee are reflexive reactionaries like Ben Nelson (NE), Max Baucus (MT), Mary Landrieu (LA), Blanche Lincoln (AR), Tom Carper (DE), Mark Pryor (AR), Tim Johnson (SD), Evan Bayh (IN), Bill Nelson (FL) and Kent Conrad (ND), Byron Dorgan (ND), and Ken Salazar (CO).

The 49 Republicans eager to confirm one of Bush's worst ever nominees can also count on the support of Joe Lieberman, so they need 10 reactionary Democrats to shut down debate and get Southwick through.

LESLIE SOUTHWICK-- BUSH'S LATEST CORPORATE TOOL HEADED FOR THE FEDERAL JUDICIARY WHILE DEMOCRATS MUTTER IN THE BACKGROUND... OR CHEER

Bush's latest racist, gay-bashing corporatist nominee

Dianne Feinstein disgraced herself a couple of weeks ago by abandoning Democrats attempting to derail Bush latest hideous judicial appointment. Today's Washington Post carries a clear explanation of what Feinstein actually did and how wrong she was, in an Op-Ed by Alliance for Justice's Nan Aron, An Unjust Judge.

To understand the furor over President Bush's nomination of Leslie Southwick to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, one should start with the Goode family of Mississippi.

A propane heater exploded in their house, killing their granddaughter. The Goodes sued the manufacturer. After the trial, new evidence emerged demonstrating that the company had provided inaccurate information about servicing the heater. Yet, in a dissenting opinion, Southwick argued that the Goodes didn't deserve a new trial.

And that really is just the start. Toxic chemicals at the workplace causing workers' illness. Southwick says "Tough luck, commie bastard. Go die quietly." That Southwick is a vicious racist is something the Bush Regime expects the Senate to overlook because it's part of the "culture" of Mississippi. The only Democrat who seems to have bought into this was Feinstein.

Why are so many unions opposed to Southwick? Because Southwick voted against the interests of injured workers and consumers in divided decisions 89 percent of the time. Why are civil rights groups opposed? Because he also voted overwhelmingly -- 54 of 59 times -- against defendants alleging juror discrimination. That prompted his own colleagues on the Mississippi Court of Appeals
to accuse him of "establishing one level of obligation for the State, and a higher one for defendants on an identical issue." Southwick, they charged in a dissent, placed his "stamp of approval on the arbitrary and capricious selection of jurors."

...A nominee's record is the best predictor of what he or she will do on the bench. Southwick's record predicts that those in the 5th Circuit's jurisdiction have much to fear regarding their legal rights and protections. Moreover-- and overlooked by the Post-- the patterns in Southwick's record fit this administration's pattern of behavior. For with the assistance of conservative activists, allies in the Senate and in well-funded interest groups, and the amen chorus of commentators such as Will, George W. Bush has appointed a succession of appellate judges who will serve his administration's ideological agenda long after he has left office.

Will the new Democratic majority in the Senate continue the policy of the past several years of rubber stamping all of Bush's worst judicial nominations, packing the courts with virulent right-wing activists? With Democrats like Feinstein, Baucus, the 2 Nelsons and Landrieu, probably yes. That is why it is so crucial to defeat the fake moderate next year in Senate races from Maine to Oregon. Senate races in 2008 will highlight candidates' judicial nominations records. Rubber stamp Republicans like Susan Collins, Norm Coleman, John Cornyn, Gordon Smith, John Warner, Mitch McConnell, Larry Craig, James Inhofe, John Sununu, Lamar Alexander and Pete "Sneaky Pete" Domineci are exactly what we don't need in the U.S. Senate. Blue America has already endorsed two solutions to that problem-- Tim Allen (D-ME) and Rick Noriega (D-TX)-- two Democrats who will be nothing like Susan Collins, John Cornyn... or Dianne Feinstein.

DIANNE FEINSTEIN-- AN ENEMY OF PROGRESSIVE VALUES, PROGRESSIVE IDEAS AND... PROGRESSIVES

At least California has one decent U.S. Senator who doesn't have to hide her face in shame

For decades I wished I had worked harder when Jello Biafra ran for mayor of San Francisco against the most conservative member of the Board of Supervisors, Dianne Feinstein. (Well, actually the most conservative member, Dan White, had just shot Mayor Moscone and was in prison. Feinstein was the most conservative member who wasn't awaiting trial and hadn't been charged with murder.) She beat Biafra and launched a shameful political career marked by family corruption-- her husband is a war profiteer-- and reactionary politics. Today she stabbed Democrats in the back, as is her habit, and voted for Bush's latest nightmare scenario judge, Leslie Southwick. God only knows how much blood money her husband will get out of this one.

Southwick's record should earn Feinstein a recall by voters in California. But there is no recall for senators. We should remember though. She is a disgrace to the Democratic Party and a disgrace to California.


WILL THE KKK GET THEIR JUDGE CONFIRMED? ASK BEN NELSON AND MARK PRYOR

Although Harry Reid was unable to persuade DiFi not to betray anti-racist Democratic values, he says he still intends to oppose Southwick. The only chance he had to actually stop the nomination was in committee, not on the floor where reactionay Democrats will be happy to vote for a fellow reactionary. Ben Nelson (NE), who votes more frequently on substantive matters with Republicans than with Democrats, could barely wait to cast a vote in favor of the vicious homophobe and racist nominee. "Nelson said he 'met with him and went over the issues' and 'his responses were adequate for me.'" Adequate for Ben Nelson means that he doesn't expect Southwick to wear his white sheet and pillowcase to court and the he probably won't sentence gay people to burn at the stake.

CAN BUSH CONTINUE TO SHAPE THE DIRECTION OF THE FEDERAL JUDICIARY?

Right wingers can't seem to come to grips that there are consequences for bad behavior. They want Libby pardoned; they want Paris Hilton to serve her time at her party house with the stripper pole in the living room; they want to occupation of Iraq to escalate into a World War... and now they can't believe that the day has ended when George Bush and the Federalist Society could install any worthless Big Business hack into the federal judiciary who they want to. Today' Washington Post says rightists are "worried" and they seem to be blaming the Bush Regime's preoccupation with all sorts of distractions and their inattentiveness to a golden opportunity "to use his final months in office to continue putting his stamp on the federal judiciary."

If, as his office claims, Reid hasn't made a deal to allow the far right to slip Leslie Southwick into an Appellate Court judgeship, we will be hearing the squawking very loudly this week. Miss McConnell (R-KY) claims he will shut down the Senate if Southwick-- arguably the worst judge Bush has ever nominated (a nearly unfathomable standard)-- is not confirmed. [A little tangent: my pal Bob Geiger has an example of the childishness of these spoiled and tantrum-prone Republicans involving Oklahoma kook Tom Coburn who is threatening to amend a "No Confidence" in Alberto Gonzales motion tomorrow with some silliness about voting No Confidence in Congress.]

Bush has named only five nominees for 13 vacant seats on the nation's influential courts of appeals -- there will be more vacancies this summer -- and moved to fill only 21 of 37 district court openings. Lawmakers and activists on both sides of the aisle see the door to new nominees being slowly shut as the administration moves into lame-duck status.

Moves into? This is the most hated man in the world and the lamest duck to ever waddle quacking around the White House. He would have a far better chance of getting his nominees confirmed in Albania and inside the Green Zone than he should have in the U.S. Senate.

"The White House understands that it needs to nominate people for judicial vacancies, especially on the courts of appeals, as soon as possible," said Curt Levey, executive director of the Committee for Justice, which supports Bush's judicial efforts. "There's only about a year to play with, and it can easily take a year to confirm a nominee who Democratic senators or groups on the left decide to target."

...Levey said the groups "reflexively label any white male judicial nominee from the South as racist." He added that further delays will "destroy the 'peace treaty' on judges" that Democrats and Republicans had reached after years of filibusters and battles over Bush's nominees.

Southwick's record speaks for itself and it is an insult to white male southerners to be tarred with a brush as racist, bigoted and vile as the one Southwick has created for himself. He may be typical of a small circle of bigoted, neo-Confederate corporate pawns to which the Bush Regime turns to for nominations but for the regime and its allies to equate that with discrimination against normal southerners is typical of their divisive and narrow partisan tactics. Its how they have run this country into the place it finds itself-- a place where the vast majority of Americans think the nation is headed in the wrong direction.

Right now Republican senators, from Arlen Spector to Lindsey Graham to John Warner are critical of Bush's inability to find acceptable or even barely qualified nominees. But that's part of the problem. The Bush/Cheney style of governance only knows "my way or the highway" and they are still unwilling to share responsibilities of governance with the other branches of government.

"There has been a long-standing practice in Republican administrations that courts of appeals nominees are the president's prerogative, period," said one conservative who is close to the nominating process and would speak only on the condition of anonymity.

If Reid isn't cutting backroom deals with them, that attitude should come to an abrupt halt this week when the Senate Judiciary Committee takes up the matter of Mr. Southwick.

SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE-- ONE WIN, ONE... POSTPONEMENT

Hangin' around with Russ, gave Snarlin' Arlen a spine

This win is huge for our nation. They approved (by a party line vote + Arlen Specter) the Habeas Corpus Restoration Act. Russ Feingold, the only senator with the guts to have opposed this travesty from the beginning addressed the committee and congratulated Leahy and Specter for moving to correct this unspeakable symbol of Bushism. Ralph Neas of People For the American Way speaks for all decent and patriotic Americans when he commends the Senate Judiciary Committee on their action today:

The restoration of habeas is a moral and patriotic course of action that helps restore our constitutional system of checks and balances; it’s a shame that it apparently took a change in partisan control of the Senate to move this forward. It’s about time that the Senate took this action to check this blatant abuse of power by the Bush Administration.The attack on habeas corpus was an attack on the most basic right of citizens in a free society, and the most fundamental check on the governmental abuse of power.

President Bush has done his best to inflame fears and convince us that those held at Guantanamo present an imminent threat to our county. But there must be some fundamentally fair process to identify those who have been justly detained while protecting the rights of innocent people caught up in the conflict and confusion of war.”

Our nation is a nation of laws-- laws to protect the innocent and punish the guilty. When the government begins to ignore those laws, the rights of all citizens are in peril.

Both houses of Congress should immediately pass legislation to restore habeas corpus.

Less celebratory was the postponement of a vote on the Southwick Appeals Court nomination. Rumors have been flying that, outrageously, Majority Leader Harry Reid has made a deal with Miss McConnell to allow this through. Reid's office absolutely denies this is true and claims the Judiciary Committee will take up the issue next week. We'll be watching.


UPDATE: PRESSURE STARTS BUILDING ON REID TO LET DEMOCRATS DEFEAT SOUTHWICK

Obama is no longer the only Democratic candidate for president willing to stand up and talk out loud about Bush's bigoted nomination to the Appeals Court. Probably another reason the Inside the Beltway slime patrol hates Edwards. Here was his statement; I hope Reid is listening:

"President Bush's nominee, Judge Leslie Southwick, has an abysmal record of voting against the interests of workers, consumers and the civil rights of all Americans. We must demand that federal judges have demonstrated their commitment to Americans' full range of constitutional protections. Judge Southwick fails that standard. The stakes are too high for the Senate to wave through yet another hard-right Bush judicial nominee."

LEADERSHIP-- ON THE OCCUPATION OF IRAQ, ON THE NOMINATION OF LESLIE SOUTHWICK

Forget for a moment that "Leadership" is also the name of a scurrilous, self-promoting fiction by the Republican's most dishonest candidate, Rudy Giuliani. Last night it was a weapon John Edwards used-- with only mixed success-- to clobber Hillary and Obama. True, the voted against Bush' Iraq Occupation funding but... quietly, apologetically, tepidly, tiptoeing around the issue. Democrats' role in the Iraq fiasco is anything but heroic and while few are as craven and disgusting as Biden-- who is running (successfully as far as I can see) to be Hillary's Secretary of State-- few of them have exercised the real leadership progressives would like to expect from someone who will endeavor to right the wrongs of the catastrophic Bush years. Take a look:



And in the twilight months-- too many of them-- of the most toxic regime ever to be installed in the White House, there will be plenty of opportunities for plenty of leadership. Looking to would-be presidential candidates is always iffy... at best. The nature of leadership makes it "unsafe" for someone trying to forge a wide consensus. Forgery, however isn't what the American people need as an antidote to Bushism.


Last week DWT readers were warned about another Bush regime monstrosity they're preparing to foist on us: KKK-approved Leslie Southwick's nomination to the Court of Appeals. (Be sure and read the comment by Congressman Al Green below the post.) Southwick is a bigoted throwback and his nomination will be on the agenda of the Senate Judiciary Committee this Thursday. So far we have one clear, ringing voice of leadership opposing Southwick-- Barack Obama. I feel confident that Russ Feingold (D-WI), Ted Kennedy (D-MA), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), and Ben Cardin (D-MD), at the very least, will follow Obama's leadership on this. I'd like to hear Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), and the most corporate and untrustworthy of the committeemembers, Joe Biden (D-DE) speak up on this too. Don't expect leadership on this outrageous nomination from the rubber-stamping crew led by Snarlin' Arlen Specter (R-PA), John Cornyn (R-TX) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC, a girl who just can't say no-- to Bush). Let's hope we see it from Democrats.


UPDATE: UNACCEPTABLE NOMINEE

Today's NY Times calls Bush out for the divisive and racist Southwick nomination. The Times is saying what Democratic "leaders" should be saying LOUDLY AND CLEARLY: "President Bush’s latest appeals court nominee, Leslie Southwick, has a disturbing history of insensitivity to blacks and other minority groups. The Senate should reject this nomination and make clear to the White House that it will reject all future nominees who do not meet the high standards of fairness that are essential for such important posts."

A non-negotiable quality for judicial nominees is that they must be committed to equal justice. Judge Southwick, whom President Bush has nominated for a seat on the New Orleans-based United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, repeatedly failed this test as a Mississippi state court judge.
 
He clearly failed the test when he ruled for a social worker who was rightfully fired for calling a black colleague “a good ole nigger.” Judge Southwick is known for siding with employers over employees * but not in this case. In his ruling, he revealed a thorough lack of understanding of the odious impact of such language when he accepted the social worker’s claim that the use of the slur was “not motivated out of racial hatred or animosity directed toward her co-worker or toward blacks in general.” Judge Southwick did not even vote to direct the state to consider a penalty short of firing, as the Mississippi Supreme Court later did.
 
And he failed the test when he joined a majority opinion that denied a bisexual mother custody of her child. Adding insult to injury, he joined a concurring opinion that went on to berate the mother for her “decision to participate in a homosexual relationship” and reminded her that one of the consequences of her “exertion of her perceived right” was that she might lose her child.
 
The Magnolia Bar Association, an association of black Mississippi lawyers founded when the state bar was restricted to whites, has urged the Senate to reject the nomination, saying, “We question whether Judge Southwick will properly enforce the law when it comes to the rights of those who are unpopular and who are marginalized by the political process.” They are right. After his performance as a state court judge, it would be hard for a black person with a discrimination case, or a gay person with a family law issue, to have any confidence that Judge Southwick would treat them fairly.
 
Judge Southwick’s judicial record also shows the usual pattern of President Bush’s judicial nominees: insensitivity toward workers, consumers and people injured by corporations. The federal appeals courts are already overloaded with judges who hold these biases.
 
When the voters put Democrats in the majority in Congress last fall, they were sending a message that the era of extremism in Washington should come to an end. Senate Democrats can show that they understood this message by rejecting Judge Southwick and insisting on a more moderate nominee, who will respect the rights of all.

Still no word from Biden who has been, rather incongruously, trying to portray himself as some kind of a leader as he campaigns, furiously, for the Secretary of State job.

BUSH AS DETERMINED AS EVER TO APPOINT A KKK-APPROVED APPEALS COURT JUDGE TO THE FIFTH CIRCUIT-- MEET LESLIE SOUTHWICK

Bush has gotten some of the worst judges ever nominated for anything confimed and we'll be suffering the consequences for years to come, not just on the Supreme Court but throughout the judicial system. In terms of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, though, Bush's nominees have been so gratuitously unqualified and extremist that they have been unable to win confirmation. Even Republicans were choking on a radical right ideologue like Charles Pickering and when the Bush Regime moved to replace that dismal nomination with the even more bigoted Michael Wallace that flopped too. And it isn't getting any better. The latest nightrider nightmare that Bush is trying to foist on us is former Mississippi Court of Appeals Judge Leslie Southwick, a racist amd bigoted asshole every bit as unacceptable to normal Americans as Pickering and Wallace.

A couple weeks ago Judith Schaeffer sent up a warning flare at Huff Po, alerting the public to Southwick's homophobia and racism-- and the fact that he seems proud of both traits. Next week the Senate Judiciary Committee-- rushed into this by Miss McConnell's threats to tie up the Senate if some Bush appointees don't get confirmed fast-- takes up the case of Leslie Southwick and will decide whether or not to send this controversial nomination on to the full Senate, where he will be able to count on a handful of reactionary Democrats (and a reactionary ex-Democrat) to support Bush's goal of stuffing the courts full of pro-corporate, anti-civil rights judicial activists.

We can't let Democrats, now ostensibly in the majority, cave in and let us down on this one, the way they did on Alito and Roberts. As Ralph Neas of People For the American Way said today "regrettably, Southwick also has a troubling record and appears to be cut from the same cloth as [Pickering and Wallace]... Just like Pickering and Wallace before him, Southwick appears ready and willing to turn back the clock on fifty years of social justice progress in our nation. Southwick had an opportunity at his recent hearing to demonstrate a commitment to Americans’ individual rights and freedoms, but he proved that he still doesn’t get it. The Senate Judiciary Committee must reject Southwick’s confirmation.”

Two of the cases that best illustrate the danger of confirming a character like Southwick are these examples from the Mississippi Court of Appeals:

• In 1998, while on the Mississippi Court of Appeals, Southwick joined a ruling in an employment case that upheld the reinstatement, without any punishment whatsoever, of a white state employee who was fired for calling an African American co-worker a "good ole nigger." The court's decision effectively ratified a hearing officer's opinion that the slur was only "somewhat derogatory" and "was in effect calling the individual a 'teacher's pet.'" The Mississippi Supreme Court unanimously reversed the decision.

• In 2001, Southwick joined a ruling that upheld a chancellor's decision to take an eight-year-old girl away from her mother and award custody to the father, who had never married the mother, largely because the mother was living with another woman in a "lesbian home." Southwick went even further by joining a gratuitously anti-gay concurrence which extolled Mississippi's right under "the principles of Federalism" to treat "homosexual persons" as second-class citizens. The concurrence suggested that sexual orientation is a choice and stated that an adult is not "relieved of the consequences of his or her choice" -- e.g., losing custody of one's child.

The Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee are all partisan hacks and can all be depended on to support Southwick even if he shows up at the hearings in a white sheet and pillowcase over his head. No need to waste any time contacting the likes of Tom Coburn, Sam Brownback, Jon Kyl, Charles Grassley, Orrin Hatch, Arlen Specter-- or any of the guys who use the same sheet and pillow case tailor as Southwick, John Cornyn, Lindsey Graham, and Jeff Sessions. On the Democratic side, however, it is crucial that the squishy members be told in no uncertain terms that they must stop this bigot from getting onto the Appeals Court. The Democrats on the committee are Patrick Leahy (VT), Ted Kennedy MA), Russ Feingold (WI), Dick Durbin (IL), Sheldon Whitehouse (RI), Chuck Schumer (NY), and Ben Cardin (MD) who can all probably be counted on to oppose the nomination. And then there are the possible problems: Joe Biden (DE), Herb Kohl (WI), and Dianne Feinstein (CA).