Conservatives, Liberals, and Supreme Court Picks

Matthew Archbold asks "Dude, Where's My Judge?":

... now hardly anybody is talking about it in the Catholic or even conservative blogosphere. And there's a reason why. We have no doubt that whoever President Obama picks it'll be a stark raving pro-choice, anti gun, anti-constructionist, pro-eminent domain, anti-religious conscience liberal. Names? We don't need to know their names. Anyone who Obama picks is essentially the same to us. There might be some who are outside the bounds but for the most part we expect someone who is essentially the anti-Scalia in most things. Liberals are very unlikely to be disappointed in Obama's choice.

Now how come every time a Republican President gets a pick we're all on pins and needles wondering who it's going to be? It's like the scene in the movie where the hero has to decide whether to cut the blue wire or the red wire. It's because we don't trust Republicans to do the right thing by us. In fact, we're scared to death because so many times before, Republican Presidents have clipped the blue wire. AND KABOOM. Sandra Day O' Connor. Kaboom. Justice Souter. KA-FREAKING-BOOM. SO many times after a Republican picks a judges it leaves many of us saying, "Dude, where's my conservative judge?" In fact, the fact that Souter was a Supreme Court Justice at all is enough of a reason not to trust Republicans with judges.

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So that's why I'm jealous of liberals. They sleep soundly never fearing the ka-boom of disappointment in a judge's nomination.

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My Comments:
One additional thought: Not only do we on the right know that whoever Pres. Obama picks will be liberal, we don't really begrudge him that fact. He won the election, and elections have consequences. He is entitled to pick judges whose jurisprudence matches his own views of the law and the Constitution. We don't like it, but we recognize that that's his perogative.

What chafes me is that the left and the media don't believe conservative Presidents should have the same leeway in picking judges of their choosing. They apparently believe in "Heads I win, tails you lose", also known as the one-way ratchet view of constitutional jurisprudence whereby "conservative" precedents can and should be overturned, while decisions that embody liberal principles are sacrosanct. This view posits that when a Supreme Court Justice retires, the replacement cannot be anyone that is arguably to the "right" of the retiring Justice.