The Bush administration, as we know, has an honesty problem. From the
war in Iraq to
Hurricane Katrina to the president's
illegal spying, it hasn't been able to come clean with America.
Knowing that Bush wants a Supreme Court justice who embodies his guiding principles, should it surprise anyone that his latest nominee, Samuel Alito, is the exact dishonest, rubber-stamping partisan America least needs at this crucial moment? Misleading about abortion, the Concerned Alumni of Princeton and the Vanguard case, Alito is painting the picture of a nominee more interested in spin than the facts, his career than the Constitution.
Though the most-quoted soundbite from yesterday's hearings came when Alito
told Sen. Arlen Specter that, if faced with an abortion case as a justice, he "would approach the question with an open mind," his actions yesterday and in the past suggest otherwise. Alito, as all Republican nominees do, agreed that the Constitution protects the right to privacy, but he failed to extend that right to a woman's right to choose. He did nothing to make inoperative his 1985 statements, in which Alito
claimed to "personally believe very strongly" in his view that "the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion."
No one exposed Alito's dishonesty on abortion more yesterday than Sen. Chuck Schumer. When passing his statements off as those of his employer at the time - the Reagan administration - Schumer pointed to Alito's personal belief in that philosophy. When Alito hid behind the I-might-have-to-rule-on-it defense, Schumer rightfully pointed out that his previous on-the-record statements on the issue then made it his obligation to comment now. When Alito shielded himself with his respect for precedent, Schumer pointed to numerous instances where the judge's colleagues criticized him for abandoning stare decisis. In the end, one can reach no other conclusion than Alito still stands behind his previous, strongly-held belief that the Constitution doesn't protect the right to an abortion.
Don't believe me? Believe the right wing, who crowed over Alito's testimony, especially as it related to abortion, which they are fighting to outlaw. Focus on the Family's Bruce Hausknecht called Alito's rejection of the "super-precedent" as "a further blow to Roe." Human Events's David Limbaugh wrote that, if confirmed, Alito's presence on the Supreme Court made it "actually conceivable" the body would overturn the case. Said the American Life League, "Since the Constitution of the United States does not afford any 'right' to abortion, it is crucial to our nation's future to confirm a justice who will strictly interpret the document as it was written." Do any of these statements from Alito's supporters describe a judge willing to keep an open mind?
Another key example of Alito's dishonesty came yesterday and today, when the nominee failed to recall his membership in the right-wing Concerned Alumni of Princeton (CAP), a group known for supporting restrictions on the admission of women and minorities to his alma mater. Though Alito included CAP as one of only two groups mentioned in his 1985 application for a job in the Reagan Justice Department, calling it "a conservative alumni group," he changed his tune yesterday. "Well, Senator," Alito said Tuesday, "I have wracked my memory about this issue, and I really have no specific recollection of that organization." He later elaborated, claiming his interest in CAP stemmed from his anger over the ROTC program being kicked off of Princeton's campus. Funny, isn't it, that Alito doesn't remember being a member of CAP, but he does remember why he joined?
When Sen. John Kyl cited a newspaper article intended to bolster Alito's ROTC story, it instead strengthened the Democratic criticism. According to the People For the American Way, "It mentions ROTC only in passing, in a long article about the controversial nature of the organization, and its demands for doing away with Women's Studies, complaints about a gay student group, the admission of more minority students, the campus Third World Center, and more." What's more, the ROTC issue was settled shortly after CAP was formed. In fact, later issues of Prospect, CAP's publication, discussed the renewed popularity of the group, poking holes in Alito's recollections. What is more likely? That the nominee's memory failure stems from the mists of time? Or that it stems from from CAP's extremist philosophies, which Alito's supporters would no doubt hate to see discussed - and from the fact that his rulings often exhibit such extreme views?
Alito's credibility took another hit when Democratic Senators further exposed his conflict of interest in the Vanguard case. Though Alito claimed to be an ethical jurist, even "to go beyond the letter of the ethics rules and to avoid any situation where there might be an ethical question raised," he failed to cite his broken 1990 promise to recuse himself from any case involving Vanguard Group Inc. or Smith Barney Inc., as well as the First Federal Savings & Loan of Rochester, New York. When Alito ruled in favor of Vanguard in 2002, he had $390,000 in the company's mutual funds (perhaps as much as $815,000), only later stepping aside to allow different judges to rehear the case after a complaint. Earlier, he ruled in favor of Smith Barney, his brokerage firm, also participating in his court's refusal to rehear a case in which his sister was a partner for one of the firms representing one of the parties.
With the Republican culture of corruption at its absolute worst in Washington, should we really consider a nominee like Alito, who suffers from the same symptoms as his supporters? In Alito we're seeing a craven opportunist who is not only extreme in his philosophy, but also is willing to lie about it to get a job. He's been dishonest about his views on abortion, his membership in a bigoted organization and his refusal to recuse himself from cases in which he had a vested interest.
So, apart from his partisanship, Alito's main qualifications are his abilities to be dodgy, to be dishonest and to be a rubber stamp for whoever is employing him. Given this president's track record of misleading America and populating the government with talentless yes-men and cronies, it appears Alito is the perfect Bush nominee. But this isn't Bush's America, it's our America. And the last thing we need right now is another Brownie.
The bottom line of the Alito nomination is this: Ideal Supreme Court justices must adhere to the highest standards of honesty and credibility. To be sure, this confirmation means many things to many people, not the least of which include battles over privacy and presidential power. If Alito, however, displays such a remarkable lack of honesty and credibility on nearly every issue, doesn't that in itself disqualify his candidacy?