The "deeply polarized confirmation process in the Senate" has "undercut
Obama's effort to significantly infuse the federal courts with more
women and minorities," USA Today's Joan Biskupic fretted in a Wednesday front page article in which she refused to identify Obama's
nominees as liberals as she attached the positive "diversity" patina to
Obama's agenda without any regard for the irony such "diversity" is
ideologically uniform.
She led her June 16 story, "Push for court diversity hits snag: Partisan rancor
ties up action on Obama nominees [1]," however, by noting the ideology
supposedly pushed by President George W. Bush: "President Obama came
into office determined to stop the rightward shift of the federal courts
- after eight years of appointments by President Bush - and to add
more diversity to the bench." She then outlined Obama's achievement:
So far he is setting records for the number of women and minorities nominated to lifetime appointments. Nearly half of the 73 candidates he has tapped for the bench have been women. In all, 25% have been African Americans, 10% Hispanics and 11% Asian Americans.
But, his noble quest has been thwarted:
Yet as Obama tries to make gains in diversity among judges, he faces a deeply polarized confirmation process in the Senate. During his first 18 months in office, his administration has been thwarted by unprecedented delays. The situation, which has received little notice against the backdrop of a pending Supreme Court nomination and the administration's complex legislative agenda, could undercut Obama's effort to significantly infuse the federal courts with more women and minorities.
Deep in her article, Biskupic at least acknowledged how Democrats had
blocked a "diverse" nominee who happened to be conservative:
This is a long-building situation. Senators on both sides recall old grievances and try to settle scores. The senior Judiciary Committee Republican, Jeff Sessions of Alabama, often invokes President George W. Bush's nominee Miguel Estrada, whose nomination to the influential Washington, D.C.-based appeals court was filibustered by Democrats. Estrada, who would have been the first Hispanic on that court, withdrew in 2003, after two years of delays.
From April: "USA
Today's Biskupic Sees SCOTUS of 'Ideological...Conservatives' and
'Pragmatic Liberals [2]'"
-Brent Baker is Vice President for Research and Publications at
the Media Research Center. Click
here [3] to follow him on Twitter.