Sowell speaks TRUTH to power

Economist Thomas Sowell nails the whole discussion around Obama's Supreme Court nomination perfectly, in his editorial "Supreme Hypocrisy". He calls out both sides on the stalling tactic which the Republicans are currently using.

Giving one example he uses:

None of this is new. It was already well-known 40 years ago, when President Gerald Ford nominated me to become one of the commissioners of the Federal Trade Commission during the 1976 Presidential election year. 

After months passed without any hearings being held, I went to see the chief legislative aide of the committee that was responsible for confirming or denying. When the two of us were alone, he said to me, quite frankly, "We've gone over your record with a fine tooth comb and can find nothing to object to. So we are simply not going to hold hearings at all." 

"If this were not an election year," he said, "your nomination would have sailed right through. But we think our man is going to win the Presidential election this year, and we want him to nominate someone in tune with our thinking."

Sowell even manages to lay some blame for this stalling tactic at the feet of the judges themselves:

If judges confined themselves to acting like judges, instead of legislating from the bench, creating new "rights" out of thin air that are nowhere to be found in the Constitution, maybe Senate confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominees would not be such bitter and ugly ideological battles.

As a rule of thumb, when you hear politicians scream "OUTRAGE!" against the other party, just check the history books. I am sure you'll find the shoe in the other mouth at some point.