To the Editor:
Re “Kagan
Follows Precedent by Offering Few Opinions” (front page, June 30):
No one should be surprised at Elena Kagan’s abrupt about-face before the
Senate Judiciary Committee from her previous stance on how specific
Supreme Court nominees should be in answering questions from committee
members concerning their views on legal issues.
However repellent his thoughts, Robert Bork was the last candid Supreme
Court aspirant to go before that committee, and ever since his
nomination went down in flames, nominees of presidents of both parties
have been careful to mouth mere platitudes at most throughout their
confirmation hearings.
Let’s stop this pointless charade and cease wasting scarce taxpayer
resources on a useless exercise in calculated evasion, accompanied by
silly senatorial pontificating.
Along with the nominee’s past writings, every senator should receive the
full F.B.I. investigative report on a Supreme Court nominee, and if the
F.B.I. report includes credible allegations raising a serious question
as to the nominee’s character and/or fitness, the committee should
thoroughly question the nominee as to those in open session.
Richard G. Liskov
Bronx, June 30, 2010
Note from KBJ: Repellency, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 