It's the politicization, stupid!

President Bush has offered a new plan for nominating and confirming judges. Pat Leahy accuses the White House of politicizing "the judicial selection process to 'create a partisan campaign issue.' " Pretty clever. Attack your opponent for doing exactly what you're doing and act outraged.

I don't think this proposal will go anywhere. The only way to solve the problem is to take away the Senate Judiciary Committee's power to prevent nominees from getting a vote in the whole senate. Senate rules have delegated the advise and consent power to a small group of senators, which, IMHO, violates the Constitution which gives that power to the whole Senate, not a clique of 11 senators.

Update: If you want evidence of the desirability of balance in government read this. Apparently the destruction of Russia's stockpiles of gas weapons is stalled in a Congressional conference committee.