Samuel Alito - All the right friends, all the right enemies

Perhaps the worst thing about the Miers debacle was Harry Reid's enthusiasm for her nomination. Now that the President has nominated New Jersey jurist Samuel Alito for the Court, the world will return to rights. As James Taranto says today in his Best of the Web:

Conservatives are delighted, and as Human Events notes, even Sen. Frank Lautenberg, a very liberal Democrat, described his fellow New Jerseyite as "the kind of judge the public deserves--one who is impartial, thoughtful, and fair," and added, "I urge the Senate to confirm his nomination." Lautenberg was prescient; he said this on the floor of the Senate in April 1990, more than 15 years ago.

From the Miami Herald:

Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee and one of 22 Democrats who voted for Chief Justice John Roberts’ confirmation, called Alito a “needlessly provocative nomination.” [Boo hoo hoo. Perhaps he would prefer Miguel Estrada? Janice Rodgers Brown? . . .]

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, who had urged Bush to nominate Miers, said Alito’s confirmation “would leave the Supreme Court looking less like America and more like an old boys club.” Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., a staunch abortion opponent and one of the leading Senate skeptics toward Miers, commended Bush for nominating Alito. He said the confirmation hearings will provide “a robust and, I hope, civil dialogue with the nominee about the meaning of the Constitution and the role of the courts in American life.”

Harry Reid's wrong of course, the Supreme Court's going to look like a Knights of Columbus hall with a mini-Sons of Italy lodge attached. Not that that's a bad thing, considering the way things were 100 or even 50 years ago.

(The nytimes.com has the genius headline, "Nomination Likely to Please GOP, but Not Some Democrats". No, really? You guys are so smart. I'm sure you have to take headline writing at Columbia Journalism School twice to write a head like that.)