SUCKERED BY SPECTER. While this certainly doesn't let Dianne Feinstein off the hook for casting the decisive vote to let Southern-Fried Alito Leslie Southwick onto the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, Christy Hardin Smith argues that Judiciary Committee Chair Pat Leahy could have preempted the nomination from coming to a vote. He failed to do so as part of a gentleman's agreement with Arlen Specter and then let the Republicans browbeat Feinstein into focusing on Southwick's personal qualities rather than his judicial record (also, you'll remember, the strategy with Alito: "He likes baseball! He's nice to his grandmother! He doesn't raise his voice! How could he be the doctrinaire conservative that his judicial record makes clear that he is?") Depressing stuff. --Scott Lemieux
