UNSOLICITED PREDICTION

Now that we have the first SCOTUS vacancy in over a decade, it's fightin' time in the District of Columbia. Not to mention, it's the first vacancy in the current era of hyper-partisanship as well as the first vacancy in the era of blogs (whether the two are related, I leave to you).

We don't know what President Bush is going to do, but we think we know a few things: He's said to want to nominate the first Hispanic justice, and the most frequently mentioned candidate would be Alberto Gonzales. But the right won't have it because they're pretty sure he's pro-Roe v. Wade, and the left won't have it because they're pretty sure he's pro-torture.

My semi-educated/completely-uninformed guess is that Bush will go with a Hispanic judge who is also from Texas and is presumed to be more conservative (particularly on abortion) than Gonzales: Emilo Garza.

Of course, I only give him a 5-to-1^* shot at best. Michael Luttig, Harvie Wilkinson and John Roberts are all experienced judges who have the conservative credentials of Nino Scalia but none of the nuttiness of Bob Bork.

I'm not sure whether Bush puts ethnicity or ideology higher on his check-list (I'd prefer ideology) but we may well know by the end of next week.

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*I've been telling people for awhile that I think Hillary "HRC" Clinton has the best shot of being the next POTUS^† of all presumed candidates, but that prediction is no better than 5-to-1 as well.

†I love the terms SCOTUS and POTUS, but my favorite is definitely FLOTUS.

P.S. I guess I'm leaving out Michael McConnell, who's been on the short-list as well. Conservative, not Hispanic, but known to be a strong candidate. If Bush eschews racial considerations entirely (and frankly, I think he should) then McConnell would probably be a good choice, too.

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posted by WWB at 6:33 PM |