Yes, and that is how partisan the SCOTUS process has become, post Bork and Thomas. And it is largely the Democrats that have led us down that road. Do I wish we still operated in the times when Clinton could pick up the phone and tell Hatch that he was going to nominate Ginsburg and get a basic blessing -- despite her edgy liberalism -- is the way I would prefer things to exist. Sure. But that was changed first with Bork and then with Thomas. And then again with Kavanaugh. It's almost a Democratic game to destroy a judges reputation, mount their heads on a stake and plant it on the Senate Floor as if to say "You too, and your families, will be destroyed if you dare forward." I think you have to be trying pretty hard to view what was done to those men as just bellyaching.
I still remember Schumer, with Leaky Leahy by his side being questioned by Russert one Sunday morning, probably before the Ginsburg hearings, when Russert asked him about Ginsburg views on abortion with the "You've said before that it was wrong for a President to have a litmus test for a nominee on abortion." And Schumer corrected him, with a cheshire smile on his face and said. "No, no I didn't. I said it was wrong for a Republican President to have a litmus test for a nominee on abortion." Leahy had a good chuckle. McConnell didn't change or break any Senate rules. A rather unique situation presented itself and he took advantage of it, probably with a cheshire smile on his face.
As to the partisan hack, that's a bogus assertion repeated over and over at his hearing in the hopes that it might stick. Let's let the people who were in the room opine on what happened. As to judicial temperament, I don't by that and, as an attorney, neither should you. First, I'll put forth a definition that works for me from a nice, liberal NE group that was partial to Judge Garland.
"Judicial temperament, at its best, is a form of restraint that appears as an even-handedness of vision, a thorough-going fairness that eschews anger in favor of reason and clings to respect of all parties as an essential ingredient for the operation of justice. And yet, it is notable that such civility is not ordinary; thus its presence in Judge Garland is notable."
DOAR.com
It's not whether you have a scraggly beard or, as Mr Ruckleshaus would say, whether he can be hoist on his own petard with provocative language, God knows Ginsburg does that often enough. But it is the sense that when in court you will get an honest hearing of your case and a fair chance to argue your case -- and then most of all -- a fair effort to apply the law as the judge sees it to your facts. I keep remember what I thought was Bork's best calling card for his nomination -- in something like 35 cases when he voted with the majority in the appellate and circuit courts and the case went to SCOTUS (a generally liberal court those years), he was never overturned. But more importantly, in every case where he dissented (about nine, I believe) and those cases were heard by SCOTUS, in 100% of them the Supreme Court reversed the opinion --and in something like 5 of the nine his argument formed the basis for the courts opinion. He was literally 100% "ratified" by SCOTUS when appealed, on what are by nature usually difficult decisions.
I'm a numbers guy and when SCOTUS backs you 100%, you're not making your own law as you go -- you are applying what is the law to the case and issues at hand -- and that reflects proper judicial temperament IMO.
