Ruth Marcus's Supreme Ambition: Brett Kavanaugh and the Conservative Takeover

"Robert Bork's America is a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizen's doors in midnight raids, schoolchildren could not be taught about evolution."
--Ted Kennedy

Yet for all the wonky focus on regulatory considerations, what won the day with Trump, the ultimate decision-maker, were Gorsuch's good looks -- his strong jaw and silver hair -- and his academic pedigree, which included not just Columbia University and Harvard Law School but also a stint at Oxford on a Marshall scholarship.
--Ruth Marcus, Supreme Ambition (Simon and Schuster, 2019)

Whatever happened to the Burkean ideal that we elected and appointed public officials because of their integrity and ability to make decisions based on the facts and their own moral compass, not because they thought they should do it because they wanted to make their constituents happy and enhance their own position?  Of course Burke's ideal was probably more honored in the breach than the observance, but it continued to be often seen as an ideal.

Ruth Marcus's book is a fascinating and detailed story about Brett Kavanaugh and politics in an increasing polarized environment.  I was working at "The Nation" in 1987 and we published "Justice Watch," one of a number of publications that thoroughly investigated Bork's judicial history and philosophy; for those who don't remember or weren't around, he even thought that constitutionally-guaranteed freedom of speech applied only to "political" speech!  It is clear from Marcus's book that there were many reasons to object to Kavanaugh based on his record and his decisions and that the emphasis on Christine Blasey Ford's testimony -- even it hadn't been bungled by Dianne Feinstein -- was a distracting issue.  Unfortunately we no longer have a senator who can summarize a Supreme Court nominee's record as eloquently as Ted Kennedy and we no longer can count on nominees to be honest about their views and inclinations without first --at least in the current administration --consulting with Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society.