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Politics : Al Gore vs George Bush: the moderate's perspective -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Mephisto who wrote (9293)	1/13/2001 10:50:04 AM
From: Mephisto	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 10042

GIVE JOHN ASHCROFT THE GRILLING HE GAVE OTHERS From The Chicago Tribune January 7, 2001 WASHINGTON Now that George W. Bush has nominated Sen. John Ashcroft (R-Mo.) to be U.S. attorney general, it would not be inappropriate for his fellow senators to treat him as fairly as he treated Judge Ronnie White. In other words, will they tar him as an extremist? Will they roast him, not for his personal qualifications, which is what confirmation hearings are supposed to be about, but for his personal beliefs? Will they paint him as an extremist and distort his record without giving him an opportunity to respond? That was how Ashcroft handled President Clinton's nomination of Judge Ronnie White to the federal bench. Civil-rights groups are particularly angry that Ashcroft led the successful party-line fight to defeat White. Ashcroft painted White's opinions as "the most anti-death-penalty judge on the Missouri Supreme Court" and that his record was "outside the court's mainstream." White can hardly be called "pro-criminal or outside the mainstream." Court records show White actually voted to uphold death sentences in 41 out of 59 capital cases that came before him on the Missouri Supreme Court. In most of the other cases he voted with the majority of his fellow justices, including those appointed by Ashcroft when Ashcroft was governor. In fact, three Ashcroft appointees voted to REVERSE the death penalty more times than White did. <b? On the Senate floor, Ashcroft singled out two of the three death-penalty cases in which White was the sole dissenter. In one of them, White questioned whether the defendant's right to effective counsel had been violated. You don't have to be "pro-criminal" to value the rights of the accused, especially in a death-penalty case. In the other, White questioned whether the lower court judge, Earl L. Blackwell, of Jefferson County, was biased and should have recused himself from a trial that began the morning after Blackwell issued a controversial campaign statement. The judge, (BLACKWELL) explaining in a press release why he had switched to the Republican Party, said "The truth is that I have noticed in recent years that the Democrat Party places far too much emphasis on representing minorities, such as homosexuals, people who don't want to work and people with a skin that's any color, but white." Again, the judge has the right to express his views but you don't have to be an extremist to understand why White, the first African-American to sit on the Missouri Supreme Court, might question that judge's evenhandedness. Ashcroft delayed and opposed other nominations he did not like to the judicial and the executive branches. Most prominent was Bill Lann Lee, who was named to his post as assistant U.S. attorney general for civil rights by President Clinton as a recess appointment, avoiding the need for Senate confirmation. Ashcroft did not like Lee's support of affirmative action (this sentence as published has been corrected in this text). Ashcroft also was not satisfied with Dr. David Satcher's pledge to avoid using his office of surgeon general to promote his pro-choice views on abortion. Earlier Ashcroft helped block Dr. Henry Foster's nomination to the same post on the same issue. Ashcroft, along with Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) successfully blocked a floor vote to confirm James Hormel to be ambassador to Luxembourg, after he was approved 16-2 in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Neither Helms nor Ashcroft approved of the fact Hormel was gay and a prominent advocate of gay rights. To charge that Ashcroft is a bigot, as some have done, misses the point. He has a right to express strong views without being called names. He has a right to oppose affirmative action and gay rights. He has a right to favor a "right to life" until someone has been sentenced to death. But he does not have a right to be U.S. attorney general. Therefore, it is not surprising that the four pillars of the liberal establishment--civil rights, abortion rights, organized labor and environmental protection--have begun to rally opposition to Ashcroft's confirmation. Why, they ask, should this country have an attorney general who opposes sensitive laws he is supposed to enforce? Ashcroft will have a chance to answer that question in his confirmation hearings. The Senate will let him offer his side of the story. That's more than Ashcroft gave Ronnie White. chicagotribune.com