In many ways, an Alito confirmation is both "check" AND "mate"

i was glad to read the previous post by skadi... she's a real scrapper and after the post i made just prior to hers, "I'm discouraged," reading it was a pick-me-up... part of what i find so terribly discouraging is that my fellow citizens generally don't seem to be aware of just how high the stakes are in the deadly game of politics and power that's going on right now in the united states and i don't think i'm overstating when i say i think the game is a deadly one... i am convinced that nothing less than our values, our foundation, our declaration of independence, our bill of rights and our constitution themselves are in jeopardy... i simply don't understand why the media and the citizens of the united states can't see that... once again, robert parry spells it out...

A friend, who’s an astute observer of American journalism, told me recently that there are two real priorities for reporters holding down mainstream media jobs: get the basic facts right (names, ages and such) and never let anyone pin the “liberal” label on you.

That gritty perception was on display in the lead story of the New York Times on Jan. 25 as reporter David D. Kirkpatrick crafted an article about Samuel Alito’s nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court that bought wholeheartedly into the Republican spin that Democratic opposition to Alito is just politics.

The story is devoid of the constitutional concerns about Alito, such as his role as a chief architect of the radical theory that the President possesses nearly unrestrained power as the “unitary executive” and – in time of war – as Commander in Chief.

Instead of those weighty constitutional issues, New York Times readers got a heavy dose of the Republican view that the Democrats were just trying to score political points with liberal interest groups, even if the Democrats' opportunism threatened congressional comity and non-partisan evaluation of judges.

“Senators turned the occasion (of the Senate Judiciary Committee’s vote on Alito) into a broader and sometimes heated debate over the rancorous and partisan nature of the confirmation process,” Kirkpatrick wrote. Republicans “said the Democratic opposition to Judge Alito could alter the judicial confirmation process for years to come.”

Power Grab

Jumping from Page One to the story’s continuation on A16, a reader still found nothing about Alito’s controversial views on the “unitary executive,” which would grant George W. Bush extraordinary discretion over enforcing laws and regulations, or on Bush’s “plenary” – or unlimited – powers as Commander in Chief.

This Executive power grab has raised alarm among rank-and-file Democrats as well as among some conservatives who fear that Alito could tip the balance of the U.S. Supreme Court in favor of an all-powerful Executive and thus shatter the Founding Fathers’ unique system of checks and balances.

Indeed, if Alito’s theories are followed to their logical conclusion, the American people no longer possess the “unalienable rights” guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights, but rather their liberties exist only at the forbearance of Bush or a successor, at least as long as the ill-defined War on Terror continues.

this is HUGE, my friends... HUGE... we have the family jewels on the table...

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