Stop Judicial Hearings? No Way.

Sen. Slow Joe Biden, probably reflecting on his abysmal performance in the Alito hearings, suggested in an interview that perhaps we no longer need hearings but should just have a floor debate and vote. The nominees will not give up their positions on pending cases, and the Senators just end up looking silly. My response to that suggestion? No way.

The televised hearings are just about the only way a nominee can fight back against the slander and character assassination that has become the regular playbook of the Dems. By putting the nominee on camera and allowing him to respond to the blathering of the Senators, it quickly becomes obvious that the dire warnings offered by the Dems about every conservative nominee are nothing more than demagoguery and cheap political stunts. The nominee can fight back against that nonsense by simply being himself and showing that he doesn't have fangs, horns, or other demonic accoutrements.

It's become ever more clear that the old Dem playbook just doesn't work anymore. When Teddy *hiccup* Kennedy ran to the floor of the Senate in 1987 and denounced Robert Bork's America as some kind of hellhole, people paid attention, and that speech, combined with the nominees mannerisms, probably killed his nomination.

But just as in the classic fable of the "Boy Who Cried Wolf", Dems can't cry "Bork" with every conservative nominee and expect folks to keep listening. Pretty soon the voters figure out that the Dems are full of crap and stop listening. At this point, and after the embarrassing performance by the Dems in the Alito hearing, I almost think Bush could nominate Robert Bork himself and the Dems wouldn't be able to stop him. Nobody would listen to them.

Keep the hearings, and if the Dems wish to continue their politics of personal destruction, it's better that we all get to see it.