Posted by
NOTLEGALROADKILLYET on Friday, September 15, 2006 1:51:49 PM
I agree with Hugh that anything that
reminds the electorate of
Kelo is a good thing. I'm going further.
If I were running a campaign, nationally or statewide, I'd be running hard against the lawyers and judges. To me, they have made themselves a very easy
target that the Democrats would have to defend.
When I sit down to make political phone calls each day, I set two personal goals, and I usually meet both. I try to convert two voters a day from either undecided or opposed to the point where they will vote for my candidate. I also try to recruit two volunteers a day. I actually consider myself to have failed for the day if I haven't done at least that well. If I were better at what I do, or didn't work bankers hours, I'd have higher goals.
Modesty aside, I have a pretty good record at converting voters. The tool I have found most effective is to share my moral outrage at the courts. I don't even have to go into detail. I tell them that I drove 60 miles that day to make phone calls because I think the courts are messed up. Invariably, they agree. This strategy works whether I am talking to a social liberal about why he/she should vote for a social conservative, or whether I am talking to a conservative Republican or Independent who is mad enough at the national party not to vote at all.
I admit that I discovered this by accident early this summer when I was searching for common ground with a voter I didn't want to lose to the Democratic Candidate. It worked so well that I have continued to use it.
Because I am a volunteer, I can't and won't give advice to my campaign.
However I think what I have learned applies across the board to all statewide and national candidates. Republican candidates should talk about the "fouled up court system" and what they can do to fix it. Congressional candidates should be talking about doing "legal ethics reform", not tort reform, a very tired term. If we had a legal ethics system that worked, ethics reform would keep strange tort cases from ever being filed.
The term "activist judges." is worn out. Candidates should talk about "unethical judges" and "unethical trial lawyers." There are many examples. More appear in the news daily. When an opponent's 527 hangs an untruthful commercial on a candidate and the candidate must discuss it, he should talk about the attorney who approved it and observe that if the legal ethics rules actually protected the public, he would be disbarred, as
I did.
The public needs to know that the liberals think precedent should apply to conservatives but not to themselves. Imagine the Hue and Cry that would be raised if Roe were overturned. Sadly, the folks raising the Hue and Cry would be the same folks who celebrated
Hamdan but conveniently ignored the
stare decisis implications. Congress gave
exclusive jurisdiction to the D.C. Court of appeals, as the Constitution empowers it to do.
Borrowing from NRO: In a case which has been reported as the Court’s rebuke to the nation’s commander-in-chief for acting “above the law,” the
Court’s own lawlessness should not go unnoticed.
Just as Clinton is famous for saying "It depends on what the meaning of is is" Justice Stevens probably joked as he wrote the opinion "it depends on what the meaning of 'exclusive' is." Pure arrogance.
This blog is based on the observation that "Lawyers protect Judges, and Judges protect Lawyers, but no one protects the public." That lays out the crux of the problem in 13 words, and appears to be a powerful political theme.
I think it is still possible, and even easy to win elections that might otherwise be lost. Go after the courts. They've earned the attention.
Beauprez Campaign
Disclaimer.