The Judiciary Committee is expected to vote on the Supreme Court nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor today. In underwhelming news, Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) announced that he will be voting no. In an op/ed penned to USA Today, he writes:
I don’t believe that Judge Sotomayor has the deep-rooted convictions necessary to resist the siren call of judicial activism. She has evoked its mantra too often. As someone who cares deeply about our great heritage of law, I must withhold my consent.
Translation: “Maria/Sonia/WhateverHerNameIs doesn’t have the deep-rooted convictions necessary to be a conservative judicial activist.”
What are your predictions for GOP crossover votes during final confirmation? So far Senators Graham, Collins, Snowe, Lugar, and Martinez have announced their support.
Which ConservaDems will the media label as moderate by voting no?
I think almost all of the Dems will vote for her. I could see Bayh going against just because he’s a jerk like that.
I doubt that Bayh would do that – it would net him nothing.
Nelson perhaps, but I’ll be really surprised if Bayh decides for some reason to vote against her.
Neither Bayh, nor Nelson. Too many Hispanics in their states for them to ignore. Specter? To prove his “independence”?
Specter? Are you kidding? At this point he’s trying to not give Sestak any ammo for the primary battle. Specter’s not going to waste his “independence” bit on a meaningless bit of nothing – voting against Sotomayor is only a way to try to shore up support amongst crazy conservatives, and Specter has already burned those bridges. Specter will save his “independence” vote for something that will give him a net positive – like making sure health care gets hobbled before it can cost his donors money.
I can’t think of any Dems who would join a filibuster on this, and these days voting for cloture and against in the final vote doesn’t fool anyone anymore.
(The only reason I float Nelson out there is because while he does have to worry about Hispanics in his state, Nelson always seems to worry more about what the conservative voters in his state want than anything else. So he may well be spooked into voting against Sotomayor – or at least being “regrettably absent” on the day of the vote.)
I’d go with “regrettably absent” on the “people’s business.
Spector was just a shot in the dark. I don’t know anything about Pennsylvania politics. I figured that with White House opposition, Sestak is just a nuisance, and that the same Appalachians that hated Obama’s skin would hate Sotomayor’s as well.
57-39
A few Dem defections, Kennedy and Byrd too incapacitated to vote.
none of the conservadems have to vote no on sotomayor to get their moderate cred. we have them doing that job as they fuck up health care reform.
You know I watched “Nixon -Frost” last night and I was struck by how little the Republicans have changed over the past thirty-forty years. Why do they hate ordinary people so? Are they so addicted to money and power and pleasure of all kinds that they have become some kind of insectoid monsters from the lower regions?
And, their baboon followers with a gun in one hand and a bible in the other with a flag draped around their shoulders. My God, America is becoming an absolute farce in the world of health care. But, there is so much needless suffering among those who have no health coverage. What a pity it really is.
Its kinda of amazing a group of people have voted against their own interest for years. Too worried about affirmative action and abortion to watch the Republican party steal from them in the form of tax cuts.
I think the vote of the Judiciary committee is going to map well to the full-Chamber vote. Every Democrat voted to confirm, as well as some of the Republicans.
Here’s the list of Republicans:
Sessions — No
Hatch — No
Grassley — No
Kyl — No
Graham — Aye
Cornyn — No
Coburn — No
One single Republican vote in favor, the rest NO!
I suspect that this is mostly theater – because they only needed one Republican vote to get it out of the Committee, the rest of them voted no. Kyl, Cornyn and Coburn all voted by proxy so that they didn’t have to be there when the cameras were recording votes too – maybe they think it’s harder to make campaign commercials when they actually haven’t been caught on tape.
But I think this is what we can expect on the final vote – Graham, Collins, Snowe, Lugar and Martinez will vote yes and the rest will vote NO! Democrats will lose 2 votes to health issues and may lose up to 2 more if there are two Dem Senators that need to pander to racists in their states. But that’ll be about it – she’ll pass somewhere around 60 votes, with somewhere around 38 voting NO! Republicans don’t necessarily want this to fail, but they want to at least make it look like they put up a good fight (and the “moderates” can put in a vote here that “proves” that they’re not far-right whackos – funny how those “Sistah Souljah” dynamics have suddenly shifted…)
l expect the democrats to vote aye en masse . l would also expect kennedy and byrd to vote as well if it’s at all possible. this is, after all, an historic appointment, and they are…as all the senate is…very aware of their legacies.
additionally, with a contentious vote[s] on health care rapidly approaching, none of the conservadems need further provoke the administration over this.
add in the 5 RATs, per your listing, and l project the final vote 65 – 35. [62 – 35 w/o kennedy and byrd]
Will be the saddest day in the civil rights and social justice history of the Obama administration.