“Senate Republican leaders,” reports Alexander Bolton for The Hill, “were due to meet [Wed. night] amid rising concern that they are being beaten on the ‘nuclear option’ by Sen. Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) public-relations war room“… cartoon, poll, and more below … but see the UPDATE explaining “Justice Sunday” below the cartoon + the Family Research Council’s flier for the simulcast …
“I think there’s a realization that this particular [Democratic] effort has to be countered and they’re in full-scale attack mode,” a GOP aide said, adding, “I think that people know that we’ve got a serious problem here.
Just what did that rascal Harry do?
The team is headed by Jim Manley, whom Reid hired in December from the office of Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.). Stephanie Cutter, who was campaign spokeswoman for Sen. John Kerry’s (D-Mass.) presidential campaign, joined Reid’s team last week to coordinate outside liberal groups and Senate Democratic policy and communications staff in the fight over the nuclear option. Reid’s war room currently employs eight staff members and is part of a nearly 20-person communications team.
Oh! He brought in some big guns. WTG, Harry! And, it’s paying off:
At a closed-door luncheon Tuesday, members of the Democratic caucus were presented a stack of more than 260 press editorials from 41 states and the District of Columbia arguing against changing Senate rules to prohibit judicial filibusters. That’s quite a change from a year and a half ago, when many editorial boards criticized Democrats for blocking confirmation votes on President Bush’s judicial nominees.
The turnaround has flummoxed Senate Republicans and conservatives. They say it is incredible that Democrats who have “undone 200-plus years of precedent” by filibustering nominees have managed to portray Republicans as “overreaching.” Republicans say eliminating the filibuster of nominees would merely restore Senate tradition.
“They turned it around,” the aide said, and “one can suggest that it’s because of our lack of organized countermessaging.”
Sweet.
In his radio address last Saturday and in yesterday’s hit-’em-hard press conference with Nancy Pelosi, Harry has been stepping up to the plate and knockin’ ’em outta the park.
……
Update [2005-4-14 20:58:3 by susanhbu]: Uh-oh:
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK, NY Times
WASHINGTON, April 14 – As the Senate heads toward a showdown over the rules governing judicial confirmations, Senator Bill Frist, the majority leader, has agreed to join a handful of prominent Christian conservatives in a telecast portraying Democrats as “against people of faith” for blocking President Bush’s nominees.
Fliers for the telecast, organized by the Family Research Council and scheduled to originate at a Kentucky megachurch the evening of April 24, call the day “Justice Sunday” and depict a young man holding a Bible in one hand and a gavel in the other. The flier does not name participants, but under the heading “the filibuster against people of faith,” it reads: “The filibuster was once abused to protect racial bias, and it is now being used against people of faith.”
Organizers say they hope to reach more than a million people by distributing the telecast to churches around the country, over the Internet and over Christian television and radio networks and stations.
Dr. Frist’s spokesman said the senator’s speech in the telecast would reflect his previous remarks on judicial appointments. …
Update [2005-4-14 21:20:17 by susanhbu]:
From Family Research Council and Free Republic:
A day of decision is upon us. Whether it was the legalization of abortion, the banning of school prayer, the expulsion of the 10 Commandments from public spaces, or the starvation of Terri Schiavo, decisions by the courts have not only changed our nation’s course, but even led to the taking of human lives. As the liberal, anti-Christian dogma of the left has been repudiated in almost every recent election, the courts have become the last great bastion for liberalism.
For years activist courts, aided by liberal interest groups like the ACLU, have been quietly working under the veil of the judiciary, like thieves in the night, to rob us of our Christian heritage and our religious freedoms. Federal judges have systematically grabbed power, usurping the constitutional authority that resides in the other two branches of government and, ultimately, in the American people.
We now have a President who is committed to nominate judicial candidates who are not activists, but strict constructionists — judges who will simply interpret the Constitution as it was written. We now have a majority in the U.S. Senate that will confirm these nominees. However, there is a radical minority that has launched an unprecedented filibuster against these outstanding men and women.
Many of these nominees to the all-important appellate court level are being blocked, not because they haven’t paid their taxes or because they have used drugs or because they have criminal records or for any other reason that would disqualify them from public service; rather, they are being blocked because they are people of faith and moral conviction. These are people whose only offense is to say that abortion is wrong or that marriage should be between one man and one woman.
Only 51 votes are needed to approve these nominees and most of these candidates, if not all, would receive more then 51 votes if a vote were held on the Senate floor. But a radical minority in the Senate is using the filibuster to block an up or down vote on the Senate floor. They are requiring a super majority, 60 votes, to proceed on these nominees. This liberal minority does not respect the will of the people: they want judge-made law because our elected officials will not give them the social anarchy they demand.
The Senate Majority Leader, Bill Frist of Tennessee, is committed to returning Constitutional order to the Senate by requiring an up-or-down vote on these nominees. To do this, he urgently needs the help of every “values voter.” Without doubt, this will be the most important vote cast in the United States Senate in this term. If this effort fails, the best we can hope for are likely to be mediocre judges who meet the approval of Ted Kennedy, Charles Schumer and Hillary Rodham Clinton.
We must stop this unprecedented filibuster of people of faith. Join us on Sunday, April 24, as we observe Justice Sunday. On that date, just around the corner, FRC will host a nationwide, live simulcast to engage values voters in this all-important issue of reining in our out-of-control courts.
The simulcast will originate from Highview Baptist Church in Louisville, Ky. Participants joining me include Dr. James Dobson, Dr. Al Mohler, Chuck Colson, and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist.
For more information on how your church can participate or how you can find a venue to participate in this critically important simulcast, click the links on website below. This is an event you won’t want to miss, an historic debate we can’t afford to lose!
http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=LH05D02
Sincerely,
Tony Perkins
President, FRC Action
Progress. WTG, Harry. You’re making us smile.
I’m really happy with his performance, putting the repubs on the defense on any issue seems nearly impossible with today’s SCLM.
Getting our butts handed to us last year is looking more and more like it will be a good thing for our party in the long run. Our elected officials (Lieberman excluded) seem to have figured out that repub lite gets us nowhere. For now, we just need to keep the repubs from completly destroying our country before we regain power.
And there’s something special about him .. a true goodness that shows through and that contrasts rather sharply with the cold, calculating Frist, Lott, DeLay and others.
from the NYT — more above in the UPDATE in the story:
“Senator Frist is doing everything he can to ensure judicial nominees are treated fairly and that every senator has the opportunity to give the president their advice and consent through an up or down vote,” Mr. Stevenson said, adding, “He has spoken to groups all across the nation to press that point, and as long as a minority of Democrats continue to block a vote, he will continue to do so.”
Some of the nation’s most influential evangelical Protestants are participating in the teleconference in Louisville, including Dr. James C. Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family; Chuck Colson, the born-again Watergate figure and founder of Prison Fellowship Ministries; and Dr. Al Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. …
[………..]
The telecast also signals an escalation of the campaign for the rule change by Christian conservatives who see the current court battle as the climax of a 30-year culture war, a chance to reverse decades of legal decisions about abortion, religion in public life, gay rights and marriage.
“As the liberal, anti-Christian dogma of the left has been repudiated in almost every recent election, the courts have become the last great bastion for liberalism,” Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council and organizer of the telecast, wrote in a message on the group’s Web site. “For years activist courts, aided by liberal interest groups like the A.C.L.U., have been quietly working under the veil of the judiciary, like thieves in the night, to rob us of our Christian heritage and our religious freedoms.”
Democrats accused Dr. Frist of exploiting religious faith for political ends by joining the telecast. “No party has a monopoly on faith, and for Senator Frist to participate in this kind of telecast just throws more oil on the partisan flames,” said Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York.
But Mr. Perkins stood by the characterization of Democrats as hostile to faith. “What they have done is, they have targeted people for reasons of their faith or moral position,” he said, referring to Democratic criticisms of nominees over their views of cases about abortion rights or public religious expressions. …
What an abuse of the Christian faith.
This is like the good news/bad news story, susan. Reid is shaping up pretty well as the right choice as minority leader. About damn time the democrats figured out that fighting back is a good thing.
This whole deal with Frist/churches and Dobson is just one more scary coming together of trying to get a real theocracy going. Dobson is one of the main movers and shakers behind all this-I find him one scary dude. How do we go about reaching that many people in one fell swoop?
I think he was just ranting about a week ago about judges being out of control and comparing them I believe to the KKK…crazy whackjob.
Step up the fight!
Apparently one of the Religious right’s thrusts will be to paint Texas Supreme Court Associate Justice Priscilla Owen as a persecuted Sunday School teacher. I believe they are really going to overplay their hand with this, like they did with Shiavo. We have to ready for them.
I do not think most Americans want to be compelled to attend Sunday School, and we need to be ready to show all our friends that this is exactly where we are headed if the Christian Nation people get their way. There will be more government intervention in more areas of your life. They will be in your hospital room, your bedroom, your child’s school and your workplace.
Control, control, control.
It is not about their Freedom of Religion, it is about their ability to make everyone conform to their religion, and to embrace their puny, static, impotent version of a god small enough to be subject to their control. I am a moderate Baptist, and I am not willing to exchange my dynamic and living God for their dead one.
Priscilla Owen is the Church Lady, and if she is on the Fifth Circuit she will be teaching Sunday School in the French Quarter with unmitigated zeal, backed by the full force of the federal government. The Puritans are coming, and the Church Lady is planning to be the new Grand Marshall, riding on the only float allowed in the parade.