I realize that people will from time to time write incendiary articles to try and sell newspapers. But there's sensationalizing and then there's just plainly being a little bit dishonest, and I'm afraid this story in the Washington Post on changes at the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals falls into the latter category. This is the lead:
A growing list of vacancies on the federal appeals court in Richmond is heightening concern among Republicans that one of the nation's most conservative and influential courts could soon come under moderate or even liberal control, Republicans and legal scholars say.
Oh please.
George W. Bush is going to be president, and thereby in charge of who's nominated to this bench, for two more years, and the Court still features some of the most "conservative" circuit judges in the country: Karen Williams, J. Harvie Wilkinson and Paul Niemeyer, to name only three. Might the court become marginally less conservative and perhaps be replaced by the 5th Circuit or the DC Circuit as arguably the most aggressively "conservative" in the country? Sure. But the notion that it's going to suddenly turn liberal is a fantasy, and journalists employed at the Washington Post should know better than to put that kind of (ridiculous) assertion in their lead. The only people they quote in the article saying such a thing are Jan LaRue and Jay Sekulow, and why their wild-eyed fears should be the basis of the lead in this story is beyond me.
Posted by armand at December 18, 2006 11:51 AM | TrackBack | Posted to Law and the Courts