 |
          
  |
|
|
Today the
Senate Judiciary Committee voted Judge Leslie Southwick’s nomination to the 5th
Circuit out of committee 10-9. Now the full Senate must decide whether
or not to confirm his nomination. Thusly, the McConnell
amendment is now unnecessary as Southwick will finally get his fair
up-or-down vote in the full Senate (assuming there is no judicial filibuster).
For more
information on Judge Southwick’s nomination check the AdvanceUSA home page
or pro-justice page.
Republican
Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell made the following statements after Judge Southwick
was approved by the Judiciary Committee:
UPDATE: Call
both
your senators today and urge them
to vote “yes” on Sen. McConnell’s amendment to express the sense of the Senate
that Judge Southwick should receive a fair up or down
vote!
“It Is The Sense Of The Senate That The Nomination Of
Judge Leslie Southwick To The United
States Court Of Appeals For The Fifth
Circuit Should Receive A Vote By The Full Senate.”
So reads
the amendment
proposed today by Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell. It is
very important that Judge Leslie Southwick receive a fair up-or-down vote by
the full Senate on his nomination to the 5th Circuit Court of
Appeals, and this amendment is a strategic tool in the process. Since
liberal interest groups have fought a simple confirmation vote using a variety
of smear tactics and political bullying, this unusual measure will be a telling
indicator.
Senator
McConnell’s staff has highlighted some important quotes regarding Judge
Southwick which are reproduced below.
 As mentioned in previous blog posts, the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) reauthorization bills in the House and Senate are dangerous steps toward socialized medicine AND a problem for pro-lifers. In 2002 the Bush administration allowed states to cover “unborn children” under SCHIP. Liberals in Congress, apparently not wanting to allow any provisions that suggest the humanity of the unborn, have intentionally left out this provision and substituted language that does not allow states to cover costs for the unborn. The liberals are proposing that “pregnant women” rather than “unborn children” be eligible under SCHIP, and there are grave concerns that this substitute language could, in some cases, lead to taxpayer funding for abortions.
Thankfully, members of the House and Senate have proposed amendments to the SCHIP bills which would codify the 2002 guidelines and protect the unborn while highlighting their humanity.
- Congressman Joe Pitts (R-PA) offered an amendment in the House which would have codified the Bush regulation and protected both unborn children and pregnant women. Rep. Pitts’ amendment was disallowed in the Energy & Commerce committee, and the House Rules Committee refused to allow it to be considered by the full House. The House is expected to vote on the SCHIP bill (H.R. 3162) today without this important amendment.
- Senator Wayne Allard (R-CO) has proposed an amendment in the Senate which would codify the important regulation protecting the unborn under SCHIP. This amendment could be voted on by Thursday.
If not fixed through amendments, the underlying SCHIP bills should be opposed because they minimize the humanity of the unborn and are a dangerous step toward socialized medicine.
For more information on SCHIP check the AdvanceUSA home page or pro-life page.
Despite
the long-standing practice of giving deference to home-state many senators are
refusing to give Judge Leslie Southwick a fair up-or-down vote in the full
Senate even though both senators from Mississippi
(Trent Lott and Thad Cochran) strongly support his nomination. The Senate
Republican Leader Mitch McConnell spoke out against the apparent “double
standard” in video posted below.
Below are
some relevant quotes helpfully provided by Senator McConnell’s staff:
On Monday
Senator Orin Hatch (R-UT) took to the Senate floor to defend the nomination of
Judge Leslie Southwick for the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals (full
transcript in Congressional Record) which is currently stalled in the
Senate Judiciary Committee. Southwick had been the victim of outrageous
liberal attack but he is a sterling nominee for the federal bench and deserves
a fair up-or-down vote in the full Senate.
Below are excerpts of Sen. Hatch’s remarks.
Stuart Taylor Jr., at the National Journal provides great background on the nomination of Judge Leslie Southwick and explains how liberals are opposing his nomination because he is conservative. Below are some excerpts.
“A Mississippi judge is the latest victim of a judicial confirmation process that has steadily become more degraded by partisan warfare.”
“Of course, liberal groups and Senate Democrats don't admit to opposing Southwick simply for being conservative. But their detailed complaints boil down to just that, as do scurrilous insinuations that Southwick is a bigot -- insinuations denounced by, among others, his former law clerk La'Verne Edney, an African-American. ‘It is unfortunate,’ she has written, that ‘there are some that have made him the chosen sacrifice to promote their agenda.’”
This WSJ article discusses the recent absurd statements by certain senators seeking greater “control” over judicial nominees and exposes the faultiness of their logic. The role of the Senate under the Constitution is to give “advise and consent” to the President regarding judicial nominees, not to “interrogate and control” them. This article shatters the recent myth that all legal precedents must be upheld all the time. If this were the case, such cases as Dread Scott (“the black man has no rights…”) and Plessy v. Ferguson (“separate but equal”) would still be enforced. The role of a judge is to uphold the Constitution and not to slavishly follow wrongly-decided precedent.
Washington Post-ABC News poll
results (scroll down to #44), July 23, 2007
LifeNews.com reports:
“A new
Washington Post-ABC News poll finds that a majority of Americans backed the
Supreme Court's decision earlier this year to uphold a national ban on
partial-birth abortions. The poll is consistent with other surveys showing
Americans strongly opposing the gruesome abortion
procedure.”
For more information on
partial-birth abortion visit the AdvanceUSA pro-life
page.
Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) made an astonishing comment on Friday saying that the Senate should not confirm another Bush nominee for the Supreme Court “except in extraordinary circumstances.” This is a stunning admission of liberal obstruction of judicial nominees by a powerful member of the Senate Democrat leadership. The words of White House spokeswoman Dana Perino, quoted in The Politico, show conservative frustration with the statement:
"This is the kind of blind obstruction that people have come to expect from Sen. Schumer," Perino said. "He has an alarming habit of attacking people whose character and position make them unwilling or unable to respond. That is the sign of a bully.”
Appointing qualified, originalist judges to the bench should be a top priority, and this blatant obstructionism should be a wake-up call to conservatives. For more information on judicial confirmations check the AdvanceUSA pro-justice page.
Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY)
UPDATE: Information from C-SPAN linked by Instapundit examines the historical precedent for making recess appointments to the Supreme Court.
 AdvanceUSA and a number of conservative groups held a press conference yesterday led by Sen. Specter (R-PA) to correct the record about the sterling record and qualifications of Judge Leslie Southwick and to demand he receive a fair up-or-down vote in the full Senate. Judge Southwick was nominated by President Bush to sit on the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, was unanimously rated "well qualified" by the ABA, and volunteered for active duty in Iraq. However, liberal interest groups, determined to prohibit qualified, originalist judges from reaching the federal bench, have sought to derail his nomination through character assassination and blatantly misleading allegations.
Appointing qualified, originalist judges to the federal bench is one of the most important issues facing our nation and should be a high priority for conservatives in Congress and conservative citizens contemplating presidential candidates.
AdvanceUSA has more information on Judge Southwick on its home page and pro-justice page. Also, there are a number of past blog posts about Southwick's nomination, the support for Southwick from Sen. McConnell and from Sen. Specter (transcript here), the broken promises by some senators, and the shameless attempts by some liberals to use Southwick's race against him.
UPDATE: This article from Investors Business Daily adds more helpful perspective on why liberals oppose Judge Southwick so strenuously.
UPDATE: CWA has provided video clips of the press conference in support of Judge Southwick.
A press conference yesterday in the nation’s capital highlighted the amazing success stories of patients who have been treated with their own adult stem cells and the doctors who are on the cutting edge of this exciting and ethical field of research. AdvanceUSA had the pleasure to attend this press conference (see photos below) at the National Press Club sponsored by our friends at FRC and Do No Harm.
Dr. David Prentice led the discussion in which doctors and patients explained the benefits of using adult stem cell treatments. One of the main purposes of the event was to show that there are indeed ethical and effective alternatives to research that destroys human embryos. The U.S. Senate will soon vote on whether to override or sustain President Bush’s veto of an unethical stem cell funding bill so this information is critically important. Another purpose was to raise awareness of a new bill (H.R. 2807) proposed by Rep. Randy Forbes (R-VA) and Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-IL) which intensifies support for the ethical kinds of stem cell research already showing great promise for treatments and cures. The bill has been called “The Patients First Act," focusing attention on the fact that ethical research is already treating real people right now.
To hear a recording of the event click here. For more information on adult stem cell research click here.
See the photos and captions below to learn more about this important press conference.
Can you see the difference? Dr. Amit N. Patel, MD, MS, shows before and after pictures of heart muscle tissue that had received bone marrow stem cells from the patient’s own body in his presentation aptly named “Mending a Broken Heart.” The increased blood vessel growth is obvious. Later, Dr. Patel had the audience in rapt attention when he showed actual footage of heart surgery in which a patient received adult stem cell injections.
At the
recent YouTube Democrat debate the 2008 presidential candidates were asked
whether or not they support the right of same-sex couples to “marry.”
Here is what the candidates (except Sen. Hillary Clinton whose comments on the
federal marriage amendment are included below) had to say…
Below is
video of a Hillary Clinton campaign speech in which she gives her views on the
federal marriage amendment which defines marriage as the union of one man and
one woman only. She also mentions ENDA, a bill in Congress which would
grant special “rights” and privileges to homosexuals regarding employment
matters.
At a
press conference on July 20 Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) lauded Judge Leslie
Southwick and called the attempts to stall and defeat his nomination to the 5th
Circuit Court of Appeals a "manufactured" controversy. Below is a video of Sen. McConnell's
statements followed by an excerpt from the transcript of his remarks.
“I know it won't surprise any of
you to know that we think that whatever controversy
there is about Judge Southwick is manufactured. I mean, it
doesn't exist. An extraordinarily accomplished individual with a
unanimous well-qualified from the American Bar Association. The
Democratic leadership of the Judiciary Committee has said that's the gold
standard.”
“…Southwick should move
forward. I haven't given up hope that he may. And he's
important.”
-Sen. Mitch McConnell, Press
Conference, July 20, 2007 (emphasis
ours)
The State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) was originally created to help provide health insurance for children in low-income families who did not fall below the poverty line (eligible for Medicaid) but whose incomes were less than $40,000 a year.
Not surprisingly, the program has expanded to include more than just children and more than just the very poor. There is great fear that this year's reauthorization of SCHIP could drastically expand the number of people eligible to receive funds which would increase government dependency among America's families. Many feel this proposed SCHIP expansion is a dangerous step toward government-controlled universal health care (similar to 1990's Hillarycare). If implemented, this expansion would make as many as 71% of American children eligible for this entitlement which would no doubt draw many away from successful private-sector insurers. In fact some families considered wealthy enough to qualify for the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) would also be eligible for "low-income" SCHIP health care for their children - that means a family earning $80,000 is considered too "poor" for private health care but too "rich" for regular tax rates. Read more ...
Fox News
reports that 29,000 registered sex offenders
were discovered and removed from the popular social networking site
MySpace. This should be a warning for parents to be sure their children
know about the dangers of the internet and to monitor carefully their
children’s internet use.
Some
pro-lifers have been rather pessimistic about the benefits of the recent
Supreme Court decision upholding the federal partial-birth abortion ban.
This article at the Center Blog (which links to other helpful resources) should
bring great encouragement to pro-lifers. Even using conservative
estimates, it seems that since the Court’s decision there have been “582
averted partial-birth abortions and NO women harmed.” Not only are unborn
children being saved from a grizzly death, but because the ban highlights the
humanity of the unborn the pro-abortion cause is also losing ground.
The WSJ
yesterday reported on the dire vacancy crisis on the federal bench and explained
how Senate
Democrats seem to be stalling all the nominees (NOTE: subscription required),
holding out for a Democrat president. Particularly disgraceful is that
the liberal strategy for stalling Judge Leslie Southwick’s nomination for the 5th
Circuit Court claims he is a racist and that Bush should have nominated an
African-American for the seat. One of Southwick’s former clerks (a black
woman) has spoken in support of Southwick seeking to dispel the fabricated myth
of his supposed bigotry. Fortunately Senators like Arlen Specter appear
willing to do battle over this important issue.
|
|
| | |