Three reasons why Roberts is a bad pick?

It's odd to mew that he has such little experience, but honestly, he seems more of a centrist than right-winger. And I think everybody can agree he's a sharp legal mind.

He's clearly not a Scalia, Thomas, or Rogers-Brown type. I think ther choice could have been much worse. I mean, imagine a right winger like Scalia or nitwit like Rogers-Brown being Chief Justice. Shudder.

So, what are the top 3 downsides?

Personally, I agree with you.

However, he has little experience as a Judge... and his work as an attorney lacks the same centrist appeal that he's portraying now. However, corporate lawyers typically take positions that they may not agree with themselves. It's their job.

That's your job. Everyone deserves a defense. You have to pay law school debts. And some people stay beyond that because the money and the security and the colleagues and the politics in the law firm ad the law itself are just so great, so fascinating, so rewarding. He may turn out OK. Hard to tell. Who would ever have thought that Warren would make the decisions he did?

Obviously conservative but is a centrist. Democrats should wait for the next appointment and get dirty

how is that "centrist?"

... I concede taking a job with the Reagan Admin is a black mark, but these were legal arguments made on behalf of his employer.

you don't litigate for extremists and theocratic-driven clients if you don't share at least some of their views.

Roberts' litigation record is a sea of support for majoritarianism, discrimination, corporate pandering, and "states' rights."

His litigation record is all we have to judge. Is this the record of a centrist?

When supporting Reagan policy, I suppose it would have been more noble to resign, but I don't think that's grounds for declining his nomination.

http://www.aclu.org/court/court.cfm?ID=18987&c=316

Americans United has a similar dossier on Roberts' philosophy:

www.au.org

Read through it, and then consider if you're comfortable with him residing as chief justice for 40+ years.

And of course, there's the info below on his support for the detainment policy and military tribunals (on the bench), and animosity on environmental protections, and 4th/5th amendments.

He's no O'connor or Anthony Kennedy.

Thank-you.

All the positions he defended on behalf of an employer certainly give cause for concern.

But it comes back to his lack of experience/history as a judge.

Given what we know of him, I still believe4 lack of experience/history is the only reasonable justification for declining his nomination. I may be wrong, but I sense that relative to other potential appointments, he's as best as one could expect from any Republican pr*sident.

By their deeds we shall know them.

Anyone can talk trash...

But his choice of plaid pants in his youth speaks to his poor decision making skills, IMHO. Talk about a bad fashion choice!

lots of people have to answer for bad fashion choices back then - me included!

that protects women's rights, LGBT rights, privacy, affirmitive action, separation of church/state, and environmental safeguards.

You don't realize how important these precedents are until they're taken away by conservative ideologues like Roberts.

The campaign against Rogers-Brown highlighted specific things that allowed me to decide "Yup, she's horrid and not too smart".

But I haven't heard any specific criticisms other than on opinions he wrote for the Reagan Administration, which don't reflect on what kind of SC judge he would be.

I think he will stand up for the Court as a co-equal branch of government, which is fortunately uncharacteristic of judges the righrt-wing likes.

So, anyway, i f you could point to something specific for me to ponder. Thanks.

and does not believe the 4th and 5th amendment apply to minors (that almost certainly means he would enforce parental consent laws for abortion).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_G._Roberts_Jr.

Fourth and Fifth Amendments
The D.C. Circuit case Hedgepeth v. Washington Metro Authority, 386 F.3d 1148, involved a twelve-year-old girl who was invited to incriminate herself as an illegal drug user, taken into custody, handcuffed, driven to police headquarters, booked, and fingerprinted because she violated a publicly-advertised zero tolerance "no eating" policy in a Washington D.C. metro station by eating a single french fry. Roberts wrote for a 3-0 panel affirming a district court decision that dismissed the girl's complaint, which was predicated on the Fourth and Fifth Amendments, specifically the claim that an adult would have only received a citation for the same offense, while children must be detained until parents are notified.

Roberts began his opinion by noting, "No one is very happy about the events that led to this litigation," and pointing out that the policies under which the girl was apprehended had since been changed. Because age discrimination is allowed under previous jurisprudence if there is any rational basis for it, only weak state interests were required to justify the policy. "Because parents and guardians play an essential role in that rehabilitative process, it is reasonable for the District to seek to ensure their participation, and the method chosen — detention until the parent is notified and retrieves the child — certainly does that, in a way issuing a citation might not." Roberts concluded that the age discrimination and detention in this case were constitutional, noting that "the question before us... is not whether these policies were a bad idea, but whether they violated the Fourth and Fifth Amendments to the Constitution.", language reminiscent of Justice Potter Stewart's dissent in Griswold v. Connecticut, in which Justice Stewart wrote, "We are not asked in this case to say whether we think this law is unwise, or even asinine. We are asked to hold that it violates the United States Constitution. And that, I cannot do."


Military tribunals
In Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, Roberts was part of a unanimous panel overturning the district court ruling and upholding military tribunals set up by the Bush administration for trying terrorism suspects known as enemy combatants. Circuit Judge A. Raymond Randolph, writing for the court, ruled that Hamdan, a driver for al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden <27>, could be tried by a military court because

the military commission had the approval of Congress;
the Third Geneva Convention is a treaty between nations and as such it does not confer individual rights and remedies enforceable in U.S. courts;
even if the Convention could be enforced in U.S. courts, it would not be of assistance to Hamdan at the time because, for a conflict such as the war against al-Qaeda (considered by the court as a separate war from that against Afghanistan itself) that is not between two countries, it guarantees only a certain standard of judicial procedure without speaking to the jurisdiction in which the prisoner must be tried.
The court held open the possibility of judicial review of the results of the military commission after the current proceedings have ended.<28>


Environmental regulation
On the U.S. Court of Appeals, Roberts wrote a dissenting opinion regarding Rancho Viejo, LLC v. Norton, 323 F.3d 1062, a case involving the protection of a rare Californian toad under the Endangered Species Act. When the court denied a rehearing en banc, 334 F.3d 1158 (D.C. Cir. 2003), Roberts dissented, arguing that the original opinion was wrongly decided because he found it inconsistent with United States v. Lopez and United States v. Morrison in that it focused on the effects of the regulation, rather than the taking of the toads themselves, on interstate commerce. In Roberts's view, the Commerce Clause of the Constitution did not permit the government to regulate activity affecting what he called "a hapless toad" that "for reasons of its own lives its entire life in California." He said that reviewing the case could allow the court "alternative grounds for sustaining application of the Act that may be more consistent with Supreme Court precedent."

I suppose my reaction to these items shows I'm not uniformly far-left.

I have no problem with parental consent laws as long as they are not absolute. The item that disgusted me most about Rogers-Brown was her dissenting opinion in a case where a minor successfully petitioned for an exception because her father was a physically abusive alcoholic.

I disagree with him on Hamdi v Rumsfeld.

The toad thing, he seemed to want to give a different opinion, but rejected the argument which was actually presented.

For me, one decision I clearly and strongly disagree with is pretty good for a Bush nomination, in my opinion.

Lack of emotional equilibrium:
-- Played his smarmy charm well until on the defensive-- turned petulant and condescending. THAT is NOT a chief justice of the Supreme Court.

Lurk of insanity behind those cockeyed eyes.

1.Bu$h picked him.
2.He's a friend of Bu$h
3.Repukes approve him

Given that we have 5 years of experience
with the type of people whom Bush "likes, trusts, and NOMINATES",
what more do we need to know?

Bush is not simply a bad president;
he is not just an incompetent fratboy
who stumbled into the Oval Office...

He is the official face of EVIL.
He was placed in office by a group of people
who's only complaint about SLAVERY was its INEFFICIENCY.

The fact that Bush nominated him is enough reason
for any SANE human to want him imprisoned for life.

Clarke was on Bush's staff and I think he's awesome.

not a favored son picked to head the court.

In the Dubya admin, association IS guilt at this point.

Roberts worked very hard, and was successful at exploiting the "judicial system" he is now going to be Chief of to STEAL MY VOTE in 2000.

He sees the Judaical System as his own killing fields. Is that "downside" enough for ya?

I know it's a typo, but that means Jewish.

Peace.

The last thing you want is a stealth federalist writing the law.

and then suddenly, they all succumb to collective selective amnesia. Strange disease, collective selective amnesia. It only strikes when something is trying to be shoved under a rug.

The man backed *bush both financially and legally. It may be closed-minded of me. If so, so be it.

--

Link to a couple of recent threads questioning his role:

Did we ever find out more about Roberts role in the 2000 Selection?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=4765582

Only One Question for Roberts: "How would you vote in Bush v Gore"?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=4762452#4764669

of the repug party, reagan, and bush 2. i want more info on the role he has played in the criminal aspects of these adm. not getting the answer on this. i see reward for his participation, and i hate to see someone being rewarded for being unamerican, unpatriotic and dishonest

He's a LIAR.

1. Involvement in Bush v. Gore.

2. Numerous conflicts of interest.

3. Related to the second reason is his wife is/was an anti-abortion activist, which by rights should force Roberts to recuse himself from any case involving abortion.