The 'nuclear option'

According to the Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/18/AR2005061800566_pf.html) the spin from the mouth of the leader of the group called People for the American Way, Ralph Neas, recently commented on President Bush's potential nominations to the Supreme Court - should a vacancy come into being, ""Regrettably, the most often mentioned names certainly seem to be individuals in the mode of Justices Thomas and Scalia... If you look at the last four and half years, the president's always chosen confrontation over collaboration. I hope he surprises me."
According to that pesky document known as the Constitution, (Article II, Section 2) "... he shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers of the United States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by law..."
The part that raises so many questions is where Article I, Section 5 (only relevant portion cited) says, "Each House may determine the rules of its proceedings, punish its members for disorderly behavior, and, with the concurrence of two thirds, expel a member."
This is where the term 'nuclear' gets thrown around. Some people have called it the constitutional option - and that it exactly what it is, too.
The Senate has set up rules for dealing with the large amount of issues and subjects that might be brought to its attention so to 'arrange' all of them in order of importance and to determine if those items should be brought to the floor of the Senate for debate and / or vote.
The United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary (http://judiciary.senate.gov/information.cfm) oversees many items including determining if Presidential nominations should get a vote on the floor of the Senate.
Now, enter the fillabuster. The idea goes like this: Before a bill (or anything else - including nominations) gets a vote, the floor can be opened for debate and discussion. The slightly troubling part about this is that there is no rule for the discussion to be on topic, or even near topic. According to Senate rules, it takes a two-thirds majority to stop a fillabuster and get on with the vote. This was done not to create a stalling tactic per se, but to make it so the minority could have time to make its case before the majority in an effort to possibly win them over. This, in itself, is not a bad idea at all and DOES in fact add to the level of democracy in the Senate. However, the idea that someone like Strom Thurmond can stand on the floor for 24 hours and 18 minutes and say nothing of any worth (that is the record - est. 1957) is not in anyone's interest at all.
This is what the liberals wish to do to the President's nominations when they come to the floor and this is something that has never been done before in the history of the Senate.
Some conservatives say that since a fillabuster needs two-thirds majority to be stopped, but a yes or no vote for a nomination, according the Constitution, only requires a simple majority that attempting a fillabuster is unconstitutional.
Initially this argument looks reasonable, but the Constitution also only calls for a simple majority for standard votes on bills, but fillabusters have been used there for over a century.
The 'nuclear' option is nothing more than the constitutional option: opting to change the rules of the Senate. The Constitution does not say that once a rule is established it cannot be changed, nor does it say that rules cannot be changed during a Congressional Session. This is not a nuclear option; it is simply the Constitutional option and is the correct way to handle the situation.
When Neas says that the President chooses confrontation, he is mistaken, the President simply wants the Senate to vote on consent regarding his nominations to the courts which is what is required of the Senate on this matter.

A glance at Roe v. Wade

Taking another moment on the issue of Life, humanity, and the lack of desire to define such a concept we should take a look at the decision that took away the right of The States to decide the matter, and handed it to the Federal level: Roe v. Wade.

Without boring all who read this, http://laws.findlaw.com/us/410/113.html is the full text, but I'll only cite partially but I offer that link for the sake of confirming context and validity. Findlaw is wonderful site by the way... if you like that kind of stuff as much as I do.

Blackmun writes the opinion, and early on states, "We forthwith acknowledge our awareness of the sensitive and emotional nature of the abortion controversy, of the vigorous opposing views, even among physicians, and of the deep and seemingly absolute convictions that the subject inspires. One's philosophy, one's experiences, one's exposure to the raw edges of human existence, one's religious training, one's attitudes toward life and family and their values, and the moral standards one establishes and seeks to observe, are all likely to influence and to color one's thinking and conclusions about abortion.
In addition, population growth, pollution, poverty, and racial overtones tend to complicate and not to simplify the problem."
This should boggle the mind. How does pollution make any difference in the nature of whether or not a state can ban abortion? It is very telling when looking into the mind of a leftist, though. To so many one issue is nothing more than a manifestation of another issue and cannot be looked upon with any clarity individually. This is why when the temperature rises it must be pollution, population growth, and so forth at fault. This is why when terrorists blow up our buildings it must be poverty, racial overtones, and so on at fault.
After making such a bold statement, he then declares, "Our task, of course, is to resolve the issue by constitutional measurement, free of emotion and of predilection. "
Somehow we're to believe that this means the last paragraph was put in there as nothing more than a college student typing to fill space? We should think that it is void of meaning, and in fact, predilection?
The following paragraph is particularly disturbing, "This right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the District Court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy. The detriment that the State would impose upon the pregnant woman by denying this choice altogether is apparent. Specific and direct harm medically diagnosable even in early pregnancy may be involved. Maternity, or additional offspring, may force upon the woman a distressful life and future. Psychological harm may be imminent. Mental and physical health may be taxed by child care. There is also the distress, for all concerned, associated with the unwanted child, and there is the problem of bringing a child into a family already unable, psychologically and otherwise, to care for it. In other cases, as in this one, the additional difficulties and continuing stigma of unwed motherhood may be involved. All these are factors the woman and her responsible physician necessarily will consider in consultation."

Taking a closer look, the destruction of a viable baby is permitted if 1) She is likely to suffer irreparable and debilitating physical harm (Something I must say could warrant an abortion - to me), but let's look at the other 'reasons':
2) Being pregnant might cause stress to a woman, thus the complete termination of a viable baby is OK rather than cause this.
3) The woman may become mentally defective of pregnant (rather vague?), and thus the complete termination of a viable baby is OK rather than cause this.
4) Raising the child may take its toll on the mother, both physically and mentally, and thus the complete termination of a viable baby is OK rather than cause this.
5) 'Distress for all' if the unwanted child costs money and time to raise. Thus the complete termination of a viable baby is OK rather than cause this.

Don't worry though, the court is not consistent, and thus also decides to tell the nation when an abortion may be done since the states should not be granted such consideration.

"On the basis of elements such as these, appellant and some amici argue that the woman's right is absolute and that she is entitled to terminate her pregnancy at whatever time, in whatever way, and for whatever reason she alone chooses. With this we do not agree. Appellant's arguments that Texas either has no valid interest at all in regulating the abortion decision, or no interest strong enough to support any limitation upon the woman's sole determination, are unpersuasive. The [410 U.S. 113, 154] Court's decisions recognizing a right of privacy also acknowledge that some state regulation in areas protected by that right is appropriate"

This is the paragraph that follows the one previously cited. What it does say is that States can not decide the issue, but Texas has a point... sort of, but not really... maybe.
They then follow that up with, "We, therefore, conclude that the right of personal privacy includes the abortion decision, but that this right is not unqualified and must be considered against important state interests in regulation."

What magically makes a fetus an 'important state interest', or perhaps the question is actually 'when'? Well, it goes something like this: "A loose consensus evolved in early English law that these events occurred at some point between conception and live birth. 22 This was "mediate animation." Although [410 U.S. 113, 134] Christian theology and the canon law came to fix the point of animation at 40 days for a male and 80 days for a female, a view that persisted until the 19th century, there was otherwise little agreement about the precise time of formation or animation. There was agreement, however, that prior to this point the fetus was to be regarded as part of the mother, and its destruction, therefore, was not homicide. Due to continued uncertainty about the precise time when animation occurred, to the lack of any empirical basis for the 40-80-day view, and perhaps to Aquinas' definition of movement as one of the two first principles of life, Bracton focused upon quickening as the critical point."
Yes, that's right the Dark Age concept of The Quickening from Catholic and other religious people is used as evidence by a Liberal court to determine law. Just a friendly warning: Don't be Conservative and try this!
Strangely enough, I previously used scientific FACT for my basic of argument, and they used unsupported ideas from the Dark Ages for theirs.
The decision is a horror story of judicial activism, the highest degrees of selfishness and narcissism (to think a child better off to never exist than to live in a poor family!), and a mad scramble for anything that might support the decision they wish to see happen.
It is this same narcissism mixed with the need to keep the extremist feminist leftists in the Democrats' pocket that make abortion a litmus test for judges these days.