ONE LEAKS, THE OTHER BAILS:

Democrats Feel Heat From Left On Roberts (Charles Babington and Dan Balz, August 17, 2005, Washington Post)

Major liberal groups accused Democratic senators yesterday of showing too little stomach for opposing John G. Roberts Jr.'s Supreme Court nomination, saying newly released documents indicate he is much more conservative than many people first thought.

The response was quick and pointed, as two key senators unleashed their sharpest criticisms yet of Roberts and sought to assure activists that the battle is far from over.

Sen. Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, the Judiciary Committee's ranking Democrat, said in a statement: "Those papers that we have received paint a picture of John Roberts as an eager and aggressive advocate of policies that are deeply tinged with the ideology of the far right wing of his party then, and now. In influential White House and Department of Justice positions, John Roberts expressed views that were among the most radical being offered by a cadre intent on reversing decades of policies on civil rights, voting rights, women's rights, privacy, and access to justice." [...]

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), the committee's senior member, also took his criticisms of Roberts to new heights yesterday in a letter to colleagues.

So much for the Democratic strategy of not being defined by their far Left--Ted Kennedy inside the Beltway and Ms Sheehan outside.

MORE:
Sheehan Feeling the Glare of the Spotlight: Some Are Focusing Anger on Protester (Michael A. Fletcher, August 17, 2005, Washington Post)

Cindy Sheehan rode into town 10 days ago, a forlorn mother with a question for her president: Why did my son die in Iraq?

But now the same wave of publicity and political anger that she rode to become a nationally known symbol of the antiwar movement threatens to crash down on Sheehan herself.

Posted by Orrin Judd at August 17, 2005 7:05 AM