Transparency Please

I am all for transparency with the sole exception of military and espionage stuff.

This blog, my delicious posts, my flickr posts, our podcasts, etc are all about opening up my world, my views, and who I am to everyone so they can make a judgment about me, whether they want to be my friend, share music with me, or show us the opportunity to invest in their company.

I dislike people who hide their views, dodge questions, and are not open.

It is for this reason that I oppose the nomination of John Roberts to be the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.

He actually seems like a decent guy.  He is easy to like.  He's got a nice family.

He could have been honest, told us what he thinks about the right to privacy, Roe vs Wade, etc.

But instead he said something like "I do not believe I should address issues that could come before the court".

Well what the hell should he address?

His favorite basketball team?

I have had enough of obfuscation, of trying to hide stuff from the american public.

And I have had enough of John Roberts.

I hope and pray his nomination goes down in smoke and teaches judges to be honest about their views before asking for a lifetime nomination to the top court in the land.

Comments

[Martin Zacarias]

Not what I read this blog for. But he was no more or less forthcoming about this stance than Ginsberg. Reads like more tiresome rhetoric.

[charlie crystle]

This blog isn't any one thing--take it or leave it, Martin.

Nothing about this process has been transparent. We deserve more information about someone getting a lifetime appointment, and Roberts deserves to be characterized more by what he says his perspectives are than what the press patches together out of his occasionally public writing and testimony. From what I can see--which is just about everything presented so far--he's very much political and not someone we could trust to make honest judgments, unaffected by the interests that appointed him. To me he reads more like a Scalia than a Rehnquist or O'Connor. And that's probably unfair, but what else do we or the Senate have to go on? Not much. Neither democracy nor the American people have been served by this process. And that may have been true of Ginsberg as well--I don't know, I didn't follow it as closely.

[JB]

Blah, blah, blah.

Elections have consequences. The majority of elections were won by the GOP (house, senate, president), so they get to set the policies. Roberts (and the next nominee) is the result of that. The Dems are scrambling to save face, despite the fact that they have failed in national elections for the past 8 years.
After the Bork and Thomas witch hunts all nominees are leery of saying too much. So this is the end result.

[ZF]

Thanks for the great illustrating so well how you can be a great VC and yet know little or nothing about the constitution. It's a sad reflection on the performance of the US education system, though.

[Raj Bala]

The Framers of the Constitution intended for government to be transparent in every way.

[steve]

Gee, Fred, if ZF thinks your views reflect poorly on our country's education system and you went to MIT (correct?) what hope do the rest of us have? I agree with what you said, by the way, and I suspect people like Martin wouldn't sniff this is "not what I read this blog for" if you said Roberts was a swell guy. I'm a pretty liberal guy, but there are liberal tendancies (sometimes elitist, sometimes out of touch, sometimes too equivocating) that make me understand why some people have a problem with this school of thought. Unfortunately, people like JB, who belong to the "we won everything so stop moaning" school of conservatism don't understand how that rubs people the wrong way. Beleive it or not, guys, it's not a political thing. We, as Americans, all deserve transparency from any nominee of any president. That's why they're nominees. If it was as simple as JB and ZF make it out to be, they would simpley be appointment with no advise and consent built in.

[steve]

Gee, Fred. If ZF thinks your views reflect poorly on our country's education system and you went to MIT (correct?) what hope do the rest of us have? I agree with what you said, by the way. I suspect people like Martin wouldn't sniff this is "not what I read this blog for" if you said Roberts was a swell guy. I'm a pretty liberal guy, but there are liberal tendancies (sometimes elitist, sometimes out of touch, sometimes equivocating) that make me understand why some people have a problem with this school of thought. Unfortunately, people like JB, who belong to the "we won everything so stop moaning" school of conservatism don't understand how that rubs people the wrong way. Beleive it or not, guys, it's not a political thing. We all deserve transarency from any nominee of any president. That's why they're nominees. If it was as simple as JB and ZF make it out to be, they would simpley be appointment with no advise and consent built in.

[charlie crystle]

Fred's right--we deserve to know more about the nominee. It's not a political statement, it's a statement about democracy. The democratic process is not served by less information, it is served by more.

If you had known how badly the Bush administration would manage domestic disasters by gutting and politicizing FEMA, replacing experts with unqualified political supporters with distorted resumes, would you have still voted for him?

Politics aside, policy differences aside--these guys can't manage their way out of a wet paper bag. The quagmire in Iraq, the lack of food and water drops to tens of thousands in Louisiana for 5 DAYS, the resources held back by FEMA or redrected for "sensitivity training", the trade deficit, the federal deficit and mounting debt owed to China, Japan, South Korea, and other countries, the bloated cost of healthcare to businesses, families...the increased taxes at the state and local level because of tax cuts at the federal...these are the people we want nominating a judge for a lifetime appointment?

[greg]

If this is "Not what I read this blog for," I'd suggest that Mr. Zacarias take advantage of that "technology and VC posts only" feed button in the upper left of the page.

[Tony Alva]

Wow, even Tom Watson says vote'em in...

The little I watched of the hearings I though I heard Roberts strongly defend citizens right to privacy. He's going to get the votes, he won't overturn RvW, and we ought to be more concerned about the next nom will be.

I like transparency too, but no matter who the senate is grilling, you cannot ask a judge to decide a case before one is presented and that's what is being expected of this guy and many others prior. Senate: "Sir, how will you rule on this case involving women wanting an abortion etc...?" Roberts: "I don't know, I'd have to hear the case...". I'd be disapponted in any nom who didn't answer this way. In a court of law decisions are made on the cases presented, at least that's how it's supposed to work.

I think the expectation you have about what you're going to pin a judge down on at one of these hearings is unrealistic. I don't know if this guy will end freedom as we know it, but so far I've heard nothing that eliminates him from getting the nod.

On to the next one...

[Abby]

Fred, that was the lesson of Bork. Transparency means that they have something with which to attack you.

Unfortunately he will get confirmed, because the Democrats don't have enough votes to filibuster.

Leahy of VT and Baucus of MT have already said that they will vote to confirm, and every Republican including Arlen, Roe's a a super-duper precedent, Specter will vote to confirm.

My Senators, Ted and Kerry, have already come out against him. I'm thinking of asking them simply to abstain. Roberts and the Bush administratin refused to provide memos from his time at the Solicitor General's Office, so Democrats should refuse to participate in this sham process which is what they would be doing by voting. That's the way the retionale works. I'm not completely convinced, but it's a thought.

Call Schumer and Clinton though.

[charlie crystle]

Bork was a good nominee?

[Rex]

Did you listen to or read the testimony?

Most of the judiciary committee agreed that he's one of the most forthcoming witnesses they've ever seen. (Ginsberg didn't answer anywhere near the questions Roberts did, nor with anywhere near the candor.)

The problem with a judge stating his/her positions during confirmation process is that that's tantamount to saying what you'd do without having all the facts. We don't need judges who've got their minds made up before hearing all the facts.

Once potential justices start saying how they will or won't vote (in the abstract), it's now a campaign... with the attendant campaign promises. "If you confirm me, I promise that I will vote to affirm this or that."

Roberts seems to be one of the most honest, straightforward and accountable people I've seen in a while, so I suppose we shouldn't be surprised when liberals trash him.

[charlie crystle]

That's not what we are asking. We're not asking him to rule on cases he hasn't seen. And I'm not trashing Roberts; you are trashing liberals.

The White House is blocking access to Roberts past work. We want to see it. Don't you?

[Tony Snow]

Fred et al.,
Ginsberg didn't expose her stance on what her views were. Why is it any different when Roberts doesn't? Just b/c he is a conservative?

And saying that "I didn't follow that story when it happened is a really, really lame excuse."

[Jason Chervokas]

Fred-

I think this issue is a phony one. Supreme Court candidates can't specifically comment on issues upon which they are likely to rule because it may force them to recuse themselves from any case where such an issue comes before them.

It's also bullshit for people on the right to say Roberts was more forthcoming than Ginsburg. He wasn't. But as Roberts himself pointed out, Ginsburg spoke openly and in detail about issues on which she had published a number writings, so the question of recusal was not going to be further affected by her comments before the Senate.

As I wrote today, Roberts may still be a Trojan horse candidate, but if he's being honest about who he is and what he believes, I think he'll be a very good chief justice, although I suspect I will disagree with him pretty strongly on church and state decisions.

What will happen on Roe is a mystery....I think it is inconceivable that after Casey so recently reaffirmed that Roberts will lead a charge to overturn. I DO think it's possible that given a couple of more vacancies on the court we might get a situation where the court could say the Fed gov't can't ban abortion, but can't force the states to offer it either. But right now we're not there. At the moment I think there are only 2 votes on the court to overturn Roe.

I also have a weird suspicion that Roberts is a vote for gay marriage, or at least a vote that social descrimination based on sexual orientation is unconstitutional.

Most of all, as I wrote today, Roberts seems to me to be a technocrat--a guy who as chief will drive consensus by forcing the court to decided every issue as narrowly as possible. Which is a great think in a chief justice. My guess is the guy he will bump heads w/ most on the court is Scalia, because he's going to be coming in over the more senior justice, and he's going to be consistently narrowing the focus where Scalia is continually trying to broaden every decision into a landmark, precendent setting social one.

My guess now is that Bush nominates Alberto Gonzales. This is Bush's shot to nominate his boy. He may not get another chance. If he's gonna nominate Gonzales it has to happen now. My worry w/ Roberts and Gonzales on the court relates to Presidential power. These guys have a fairly--and in Gonzales' case a frighteningly--broad sense of Presidential power. The problem is that the Congress gave the president almost blank check powers to fight terrorism in it's declaration a few years back. That was the worst wartime Congressional act since the Gulf of Tonkin resolution and we're never going to stop paying for it unless Congress recinds it and gets back to it's appropriate role of providing oversight. Still, Gonzales is certainly not the social conservative that would start unwinding Roe and Title IX.

[Rex]

"...you are trashing liberals."

Yes, that is correct.

"The White House is blocking access to Roberts' past work."

Well, that's one way to put it. Another is that the White House is following the laws of the US, and not disclosing documents that haven't been authorized for publication.

Corzine, Clinton, Kerry, et al knows there's nothing germane in those documents, but by framing it as a "coverup", they get to make
political hay.

[charlie crystle]

Tony, saying "I didn't follow that story when it happened" isn't lame, it's accurate and honest. If accuracy and honesty are lame, I'll take lame.

[Brouhaha]

I agree with Chervokas and Watson on this one, Fred. Can't see how Roberts could have been more transparent given the inappropriateness of commenting on issues likely to come up before the court. In addition, although I don't agree with all of his legal views he seems to be a *principled* conservative rather than a right-wing activist, which is better than most of us hoped to get from the Bush Administration.

[mike]

Supreme court nominations have become politicized. As such, nominees are rewarded for dodging questions, because taking a stance alienates certain constituencies. Ruth Bader Ginsburg did the exact same thing, she dodged any question that might involve taking a stance. Listen to her quotes, it is almost word-for-word what Roberts id doing now. It worked for her and it will work for Roberts. By definition we do not have transparency in politics and we never will. Look what happened with Bork, when he spoke his mind...gong! Next. To wish for transparency in politics is like wishing for world peace and the end of hunger. We all agree that it would be nice, but don't hold your breath.

[Abby]

charlie--No, Bork would have been awful. I'm really afraid that Roberts is Bork with a smile. His vote in Hamdan, which held that individuals do not have a private right of action to enforce the Geneva Conventions is eerily similar to Bork's views on the Alien Tort Claims Act.

What the right wing learned is that you have to sneek the crazies in under the radar screen.

[Tony Alva]

Double WOW! Watson AND Chervokas weighing in with guarded approval. My faith that centricity will occur in my lifetime has been fully restored. I think I need a drink.

All kidding aside, You two guys keep dummies like me educated in the finer points of these things and I sincerely thank you for that. Love to see you over at Balloon Juice every now and again. J. Cole would make a worthy sparing partner.

Maybe we can get another music related dialog going here, or perhaps some baseball discussion before W nominates the next one. I’ll throw one out there… My Braves will surprise all by sweeping the Yankees in this years series

[Jason Chervokas]

Tony, if the Yankees even get to the playoffs with a pitching rotation of randy johnson, aaron small, shawn chacon, and chien ming wang....and a middle relief corp of tanyon sturtze, al leiter, alan embree, and scott proctor, it will be an amazing victory in and of itself, never mind getting to the series. But with their offense, if they do get to the playoffs they'll have a puncher's chance in any series.

But back to weightier matters...of course the supreme court nomination process is politicized...it hasn't BECOME politicized, it's been politicized since the 1790s. It is a political process, plain and simple. And there's nothing wrong with that. Our system was designed to work through adversarial advocacy. That's the way the Congress works, that's the way the courts work. Everyone should just stop carping about it and start enjoying it and participating in it.

Bork would have been a disasterously bad choice, much as Scalia and Thomas have been. Talk about outside the judicial mainstream--I wonder how many people actually have read Scalia's outrageous and over reaching writings as an associate justice. Bork's nomination went down in flames because Bork was a bad nominee; not because he was tactically poor. The poor tactics just made obvious how bad a nominee he was.

And the White House DID block access to Roberts' memos from his days in the solicitor general's office and that blockade WAS inappropriate. The solicitor general is not the white house council...that's a separate job. White House council's deliberations w/ the president can be argued to be privledged. As ass't solicitor general, Roberts "client" was the people, not the president. That work product belongs to us, it should have been released, and the failure to release it does make one wonder if Roberts is in fact a Trojan horse. I certainly hope not and I, like Pat Leahy, am willing to take Roberts at his word.

[steve]

Rex, are you willing to consider that people's concerns have to do with how little record there is on this guy? I did listen to a lot of the hearings. I didn't listen to the Ginsberg hearing but having headed the ACLU's women's project and had a had lengthy career on the bench, there were few unknowns about her. Yes Roberts is a really smart, really nice guy. But that's all we know about him. Are you satisified that's enough? I'm not and I don't care who the president or nominee is. I'll try to convince people that my point (and I beleive Fred's too) is not political, but some people will never believe that. So be it.

[Rockwell]

"Tony, saying "I didn't follow that story when it happened" isn't lame, it's accurate and honest. If accuracy and honesty are lame, I'll take lame."

Well, then you should educate yourself on the relevant facts of the situation before making willfully ignorant statements about how Roberts shouldn't be confirmed because he didn't answer specific questions about cases that may come before the court. I second what someone earlier said about the pathetic state of otherwise well-educated people's understanding of the Constitution.

Fred's a liberal, so he doesn't like Roberts. It's as simple as that. Please just don't lie about your motivations - it's exceedingly transparent.