WSJ Suggests GOP Should Filibuster Obama Nominee Goodwin Liu But Ignores Bipartisan Support For Him

Written by Media Matters Staff

Published

In a May 19 editorial, The Wall Street Journal suggested that Senate Republicans should filibuster the confirmation of Obama judicial nominee Goodwin Liu, writing: “We dislike judicial filibusters, but Democrats can hardly protest because Republicans are imitating the practice they pioneered when George W. Bush was President. ... Turnabout is unfair play, but nobody would be more deserving than Goodwin Liu.” The Journal further stated, “Good luck trying to explain a vote for Mr. Liu to social conservatives, or for that matter to anyone outside the liberal legal academy, where the law is what professors say it is.”

However, as Media Matters has noted, Liu has a large number of conservative and Republican supporters, including former Bush Justice Department official John Yoo and law professor Richard Painter, who served as the chief White House ethics lawyer during the Bush administration.

From the Journal editorial, headlined, “Goodwin Liu's Precedents; The Senate votes on perhaps the most left-wing judge ever”:

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals is already the nation's most liberal, and Senate Democrats want to make it even wackier by voting as early as today to send Berkeley law professor Goodwin Liu to that federal court. If Republicans invoke Mr. Liu's own confirmation standards, they'll block his path.

Before his own nomination to the bench, Professor Liu led the opposition to Supreme Court Justices John Roberts and Samuel Alito. Of the now-Chief Justice, Mr. Liu wrote that regardless of Mr. Roberts's qualifications, “a Supreme Court nominee must be evaluated on more than legal intellect.”

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With 53 Senate Democrats, Majority Leader Harry Reid would need every vote plus seven Republicans to get 60 to end debate. That won't be happy news for Democrats like Joe Manchin (West Virginia), Jon Tester (Montana) and Claire McCaskill (Missouri) who are up for re-election in 2012. Good luck trying to explain a vote for Mr. Liu to social conservatives, or for that matter to anyone outside the liberal legal academy, where the law is what professors say it is.

We dislike judicial filibusters, but Democrats can hardly protest because Republicans are imitating the practice they pioneered when George W. Bush was President. Democrats filibustered several nominees until the GOP gained control of the Senate in 2002. Turnabout is unfair play, but nobody would be more deserving than Goodwin Liu.