Swing the Wood

An article in today's NYT has essentially sold me on one name supposedly on President Obama's short-list of nominees to replace retiring Justice Stevens.  And that potential nominee is Judge Diane Wood.  Now, I haven't  done any extensive research into her decisions.  From what I read, she's liberal enough.  And really in my mind that goes without saying, [the reader's] opinion of Justice Sotomayor not withstanding.

(For the record, I was absolutely fine with the choice of Justice Sotomayor, and while their may have been more Liberal choices available, she has so far been on the side of freedom and liberty in the only 5-4 decision thus far, and I'm willing to bet that she'll never be to the Right of Justice Kennedy nor join the Facist wing in any 6-3 decisions.  In any case I don't see any reason to believe that Justice Wood would VOTE any farther to the Right than Justive Stevens did, and that's good enough for me.

What the 'Times article highlights is what I see as the single most important attribute for the nomonee to posses: The ability to influence those who might disagree with her.  She has a record of being able to influnce and win over the two conservatives she worked with on the appeals court, and by extension, should be able to pursuade Justice Kennedy.  That fact that she does not alienate her opponents (I'm talking on the BENCH now, not in congress or in the public!) is critical, because Justice Kennedy is, for better or worse, the most powerful man in the free world right now, and in any contentious case involving civil liberty, it will be HIS VOTE ALONE that decides the fate of those freedoms and liberties.  And we cannot allow the Right wing to take anything else away from us!  We are already well beyond the point at which I say, "THIS FAR, NO FARTHER!"

The President's choice must not be chosen as a 'consensus builder' in Congress, or even in the public's eye.  But they should absolutely be a 'consesus builder' in the COURT.  (Although admittedly by 'consensus,' I mean the four liberals, plus Kennedy.) So from that POV, at this point I'll go out on a limb and name Judge Wood as my front running pick as well.