Sen. Sam Brownback is blocking federal court nominee Janet T. Neff. Why? Has she committed an ethical violation? Has she been involved ina conflict of interest? Has she committed a crime? No! No! No! She merely attended a commitment ceremony for a lesbian couple. Brownback says he only "wants to assure himself that she did not preside over an illegal marriage ceremony." He claims that it speaks to her "judicial activism." Republicans have criticized Democrats for blocking nominees of Mr. Bush and now a Republican is doing so on very little more than a personal decision to attend the ceremony.
This is the type of block that the Committee for Justice judicial oath would eliminate, which is a bad idea because it would also disallow blocks for legitimate reasons. However, there are other ways to alleviate this problem. Brownback is grasping at straws in order to play to the religious conservatives. He stretches his own credibility by doing this and it is only occurring because it is an election year and he wants to run for President in 2008.
(hat tip: TheAgitator.com)
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