ConfirmThem

but I am dying laughing at Bashman's post on Judge Posner and the raccoon underneath the Hardiman post

bwahahaha!!!

sigh. following the links I came to http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/today/s_481652.htmlthis in which (former 3rd circuit judge) Timothy Lewis claims Hardiman is "a perfect candidate for both parties" which sounds an awful lot like the "consensus" label which means Democrats will be happy and Republicans will not.

Lewis is also quoted as saying, ""There is absolutely no way anyone is going to find a more moderate candidate who is completely noncontroversial."

of course, Lewis did go to bat for Alito too, so there's that, and Santorum seemed enthusiastic about Hardiman as well.

here we go

Well, Randy Smith was our February confirmation and now it looks like Thomas Hardiman will be our March confirmation. It sure appears as if Leahy is trying to avoid dealing with Keisler, who was nominated before Hardiman. I wouldn't be surprised if Livingston and Southwick are also leap-frogged over Keisler for confirmation.

Supposedly the ONLY problem with Smith was that he was named to a CA seat rather than an ID seat. Once that changed, he was a done deal. Then we read that he was held hostage for a cloture vote on another bill, so the price will only go up on everyone else won't it?

pardon my ignorance, what is a raccoon?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raccoon

In general, I think Leahy and the Dems have decided on one COA confirmation a month. That allows them to string along the Republicans. Every month, they will examine which legislation they need Republican help on, and then they will offer up a COA confirmation as an incentive for the Republicans to make the passage of the desired legislation easier.

jtp7 wants to know why Posner is even talking about racoons in the first place. What is the context of the reference?

We went through this before when he was first nominated. He is a solid conservative. He has worked with many Democrats in private practice and on the court, so he is well respected by them. He also has Dem political ties through his wife's family, so he has their support as well. He is not a judicial moderate. Check the threads from the early fall 2006, I believe.

March hare deal going to be for the vote of the month?

You are probably right about the pace of COA judges, and it may be the best we can do, because there is a price for losing elections. However, Leahy and crew are probably more amenable to passing out district court nominations, so fill the pipeline and at least address all of those vacancies. If my count is right, there are now 37 open DC seats, every one needs a nominee in the next two months.

And be willing to make deals - for example, there are now 5 DC seats in Michigan. Give Levin a second seat in return for releasing all the nominees. And be ready to trade 2 for 1 on COA openings, that's still a winning play.

Bush has to get off his ass and nominate someone for every one of the District Court openings. The Dems are likelier to let those go through, and we should take what we can get ASAP and continue re-shaping the judiciary.

District-court nominations certainly aren't as important as Circuit, but they're not trivial either. For one thing, most district-court rulings are not appealed. Moreover, the district judges are the most logical place to look for Circuit nominees in the future - our "farm team", so to speak.

I agree with you about Michigan, but only if the 2d Democrat goes to the district bench. No way should we give the Dems a 6th Circuit seat -- that's the price THEY pay for losing the presidential election. But 2 Dem District Judges (Janet Neff + 1) might be an acceptable price to get Ray Kethledge & Stephen Murphy on the 6th Circuit, and the excellent Paul Maloney on the W.D. Mich.

Posner and the raccoon is in this post from Howard Bashman, underneath the post Andrew linked to about Hardiman in the main post here. apparently Judge Posner engaged in some sort of virtual network in which one of the attendees had a raccoon avatar. its hilarious. there are links to pictures in the post I linked to (here's the second Bashman only links to 2 photos, but I think there is a 3rd (perhaps without Posner's character) in the full writeup he links to)

and more waste of bandwidth talking about the raccoon: Bashman links to 2 photos, both of Posner and the Raccoon. he also links to another site that has the whole write up of the event, including those 2 photos as well as many others, 1 more of which also depicts the raccoon, I believe, without Posner in the screenshot.

sorry Andrew, no more posts about raccoons, I promise.

I think it is reasonable to expect 8-10 confirmed this year (which probably means 2 in at least one month, possibly March), and 4-6 next year, unless there's a SCOTUS vacancy, in which case the total between the 2 years is likely to drop by about 3. this is how things have shaped up in the past:

01: 5
02: 11
(total 16 with 51 Dems)
03: 13
04: 5
(total 18 with 51 Repubs)
05: 7 (plus Roberts to SCOTUS)
06: 9 (plus Alito to SCOTUS)
(total 16 (+2) with 55 Repubs)

a reverse 01-02 seems the likely model here (or perhaps 03-04, but with at least 3-5 fewer confirmations, and with 51 Dems instead of 51 Repubs)

But Bush needs to put a few more nominations out there by the end of the month (by late March at the latest) so things can keep moving. So I expect we'll soon see nominees at least for the NC and SC seats. Since there's only one more vacancy on the 5th until the summer, a nominee for one of the TX seats may wait a little while, so too 1 of the 2 remaining 3rd circuit seats until after Hardiman gets confirmed. I think there will also shortly be some sort of resoultion to the impasse on the 6th, though possibly only for the district courts.

thanks for the encouragement on Hardiman. somehow I missed the previous discussions on him (I think I've asked a similar question once before, but I can't remember what the answer was, if I got one).

Anyone want to weigh in on where he ranks with respect to Bush's other judges? is he a potential SCOTUS candidate in 10 years or so?

That's a good question. I think he's got the academic and professional background, he just needs to prove himself on the circuit court. He may not be a Roberts, Brown, Sutton, McConnell, Gorsuch, etc., but he looks pretty solid.

But why is he coming up sooner than Livingston, who was nominated well before him? We need as many conservatives on the 2d Circuit as possible, to counterbalance the Calabresis, Levals and Sotomayors.

Hardiman is probably coming up before Livingston because he seems to have Specter's enthusiastic backing. Specter specifically arranged for Hardiman to have a hearing during the lame duck session of the 109th Congress in order to accelerate his confirmation. In the meantime, Livingston probably only has lukewarm support from Schumer and Clinton. That's why she hasn't had a hearing yet. Schumer isn't pushing her as hard as Specter is pushing Hardiman. It will probably take a week or two after her hearing before Leahy schedules a committee vote on her.