Special to CalNews.com by
Bill Saracino

September 19, 2003
 

Will anyone who was surprised by the 9th Circuit Court’s intervention in the recall election on behalf of the Democrats please raise their hands.  No hands?  Good, I see you’ve been doing your reading assignments.  In the July issue of the California Political Review, I wrote; “And don’t forget the Democrat activists on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of appeals, led by the shamelessly partisan Stephen Reinhardt.  It would certainly be illogical for a federal court to intervene in what is purely a state matter, so expect them to do so if they can”. Reinhardt wasn’t actually one of the 3 judges who made this outrageous ruling, but the three black robbed tyrants who did are simply “mini-me” versions of the hyper partisan Reinhardt.  This is the same panel that decided the words “under God” were impermissible in the Pledge of Allegiance, so anything coming from their clearly demented pea-sized brains cannot be a surprise.  

One way presciently observed at this weekend’s GOP convention that the 9th Circuit has become “the enforcement arm of the ACLU”. So it has, which is the reason it is held in such widespread contempt by our citizens, and is the reason this latest spasm of leftist excess will be promptly overturned. 

We conservatives need to keep calm and keep our eyes on the big picture of recalling the Governor and electing a conservative replacement. If a full en banc hearing ( with 11 judges from the circuit ) doesn’t discard this judicial cowpie, the U.S. Supreme Court will. This circuit has been overturned by the U.S. Supremes more than any other circuit  Many of these reversals have been unanimous – meaning that even the liberal fever swamp minds of Justices Ginnsberg, Souter and Breyer often find the 9th’s rulings risible.  

The U.S. Supreme Court Justice assigned to review emergency matters from the 9th circuit is Sandra Day O’Connor.  But she is out of the country for the next two weeks.  The stand-in for her is none other than the brilliant Justice Antonin Scalia.  No doubt he has a special place in his heart for Reinhardt and the other nomadic leftist minds on the 9th circuit. But the political grapevine this evening (Monday)  is abuzz with word that the case won’t ever reach Washington, that the en banc review is likely to overturn the ruling, as even the liberal judges on the full 9th  get embarrassed at being slapped down by their Washington, D.C. overseers with such regularity.

There are two important lessons to take out of this court ruling. First, the GOP establishment in California and Washington should pounce on this and use it to illustrate the sorry excuses for judges that Democrats place on the bench.  All three of the judges who dropped this judicial excretion on the citizens of California were appointed by Democrats.  This ruling – like the ruling banning “under God” - takes no explanation to the average citizen.  They “get it” immediately, and instinctively understand what an abomination it is.  This should be used to rip the bark off the Democrats and their opposition to President Bush’s judicial nominees.  

It should also be used as an excuse to pull the “nuclear trigger” in the Senate, and overturn the filibuster rule as applied to confirming judges.  This is a win-win situation for the Republicans if they will take the dagger the 9th circuit has handed them, and, as George Patton might say, plunge it back into their living guts.

The second lesson is that it matters who makes judicial appointments.  Two of the three judges making this abominable ruling were appointed by Bill Clinton.  In 1992 Clinton, with 43% of the vote, won only because enough Republicans cast ballots for Ross Perot instead of President Bush the first.  Had those Republicans shown the maturity to realize that while George H.W. Bush was not perfect, he was preferable to Bill Clinton, these judges would not have been in a position to make this ruling.

Sometime in the next 2 weeks or so, the supporters of either Tom McClintock or Arnold Schwarzenegger are going to be facing that same choice.  And when the understandable urge to “go down with the ship” hits the supporters of these candidates, I hope they will think on this judicial outrage today, and how the same attitude among their Perot-voting kinfolks led in a straight line to this judicial atrocity.  I hope none of them want to repeat the role played by the Perot voters of 1992, and give Cruz Bustamante the chance to  place future liberal activists on California’s courts.