We were on the road much of yesterday and missed this one (which we discovered via Instapundit).
Senator Cornyn seemingly retracted..or did he?…his comments that seemed to rationalize violence aimed at judges. Well, he clarified them..or did he? Or, rather, he apologized…or did he?
Here are the remarks with our observations:
As a former judge myself for 13 years, who has a number of close personal friends who still serve on the bench today, I am outraged by recent acts of courthouse violence. I certainly hope that no one will construe my remarks on Monday otherwise. Considered in context, I don’t think a reasonable listener or reader could.
SORRY. QUITE A FEW “reasonable” people read what you said and watched it on video. And unless they were social conservatives who are clamoring figuratively though not quite yet literally for the scalps of judges deemed “activist” because they don’t agree with their rulings (they want other “activist” judges who aren’t called “activist” when they rule in their favor), many people who are Democrats, Centrists, independents and libertarian GOPers thought you went over the line.
Read Howard Kurtz here. ALL of these people were not “reasonable” listeners or readers?
So at the very least YOU need to brush up on your communications skills. We live in an era when there are nuts on the right AND on the left who will take cues from subtextual suggestions from politicos about what is acceptable and not — and act on them. More of what you said:
As I said on Monday, there’s no possible justification for courthouse violence.
That’s not quite what came across as your main message on the floor of the Congress or on the videos. You did NOT communicate that if that was your intent. And that was NOT the main message of your speech, even though you’re trying to claim it was right now.
Indeed, I met with a federal judge, a friend of mine, in Texas just this past week, to make sure that we’re doing everything we can to protect our judges and courthouse personnel against further acts of violence. And like my colleague from Illinois, I personally know judges and their families who have been victims of violence and have grieved with those families.
But I want to make one thing clear: I’m not aware of any evidence whatsoever linking recent acts of courthouse violence to the various controversial rulings that have captured the nation’s attention in recent years.
My point was, and is, simply this: We should all be concerned that the judiciary is losing the respect that it needs to serve the American people well. We should all want judges to interpret the law fairly – not impose their own personal views on the nation. We should all want to fix our broken judicial confirmation process. And we should all be disturbed by overheated rhetoric about the judiciary, from both sides of the aisle. I regret it that my remarks have been taken out of context to create a wrong impression about my position, and possibly be construed to contribute to the problem rather than to a solution.
Your remarks weren’t taken out of context. Anyone reading this site can do a search and find them and the videos and judge for themselves. Clearly, you were upset and didn’t measure your words or consider the potential impact.
Our judiciary must not be politicized. Rhetoric about the judiciary and about judicial nominees must be toned down. And our broken judicial confirmation process must be fixed, once and for all.
And for THAT comment we salute you.
We’re sure the Democrats, Republicans, independents who’ve emailed us salute you. But the degree of the salute depends on what you mean by “fixing” the judicial confirmation process. If that means both parties sitting down and avoiding yet another polarizing political event, bravo. If that means it boils down to sheer power politics on both sides, the judiciary will remain mired in politics — and NOT because of solution-seeking judges, but because of vote-seeking politicians on both sides who should know better.
BUT THERE ARE OTHER VOICES…and we offer these two:
Glenn Reynolds (a law professor besides his incarnation as InstaPundit):”So there. Though if there are no links, why did he raise the subject?”
Ann Althouse notes Cornyn’s comments about toning down rhetoric about judicial nominees:”I’ll hold him to that and keep an eye on what he does next. It seems to me that with his bill about judges citing foreign law, he’s deeply involved in advancing his career by overstating problems with the judiciary.”
PS: Even if they are human and not perfect, our Founding Fathers felt judges were the ones who were needed stand back and at least attempt to stay above the political fray. Clearly, at times throughout history this was not always possible. But allowing politicians to poke their hands into the judiciary because they don’t like judges’ rulings on some issues and essentially rig the courts with rubber stamp thinkers while claiming it’s to make the judiciary more detatched should be strongly resisted by voters of all parties and independents.
If your elected rep is involved in it, unelect him.
UPDATE: Cornyn was still doing a MAJOR CYA on Wednesday, lashing out at those who dared criticize him:
“The lesson I learned is that Washington is a very tough political environment and if people can take what you say out of context and use it against you, they will,” the first-term Republican said in an interview with the Houston Chronicle.
Cornyn said the speech gave Democrats a weapon to attack him and other Republicans who want to change Senate rules to limit the Democrats’ ability to block President Bush’s judicial nominees.
He clearly has not read the Republican (notably libertarian) commentators who thought he went way over the line, statements from some of his colleagues that put distance between them and his comments etc. In other words, HE is a victim. (Hopefully Texas voters will make him a political one come election time…)
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.