(HT: Howard Bashman)
How Appealing has a link I thought I'd share, especially with my classmates since we've had the pleasure of having Judge Bork as a professor. Judge Bork was interviewed by CNN's Daryn Kagan, here is the transcript.
Link: How Appealing.
UPDATE below the fold.
UPDATE: I should've read the interivew before I linked it so that I could've given it a more appropriate title. As it happens, only a small portion of the interview was about Justice O'Connor. It's still worth reading though, and it's short.
This portion reveals the impoverished debate on the judiciary that takes place. I alluded to this here. But of course I don't take issue with Judge Bork, with whom I already agree. I take issue with the interviewers use of 'moderate' and such.
JUDGE ROBERT BORK, FMR. SUPREME COURT NOMINEE: Well, she's a very nice person, but she is -- as a justice, she has been -- they call her the swing vote. That's true. But that means that she didn't have any reaffirmed judicial philosophy.
However, on the crucial cultural question, she has lined up with the liberal side on abortion, on affirmative action, homosexual normalization and so forth.
KAGAN: Excuse me. Judge Bork, do you think it's fair to say she didn't have an judicial philosophy? Perhaps that she didn't have the same judicial philosophy that you share. But she probably -- she possibly had a more moderate philosophy and was expressing that as a swing vote on the high court.
BORK: I think that referring to a moderate philosophy and a conservative philosophy and so forth is quite wrong. The question is, those judges who depart from the actual Constitution, and those who try to stick to the actual Constitution.
She departed from it frequently. So that I wouldn't call that moderate. I would call it unfortunate. But she is -- she is -- as a result, she often determined the outcome by swinging from one side to the other.
KAGAN: OK. Instead of looking back on Judge O'Connor, let's look forward.
Whatever nominee, whoever is picked, whoever President Bush picks, they use your nomination process as an example of what they don't want to happen. A lot of people -- a lot of conservatives do wish that you had been confirmed and serving on the high court. Instead, it's been Justice Kennedy, who has been more moderate than a lot of people think.
BORK: I wish you would stop using the word "moderate." But go ahead.
KAGAN: Well, no. What would you use? How would you compare what Justice Kennedy has done instead of perhaps what you have done if you had been on the court. BORK: I would call it activist.
KAGAN: OK. So you would like to see -- actually, you bring up a good point. This is a time in U.S. history that's not just talking about who is going to be the next person on the U.S. Supreme Court, but when the whole topic of what the judicial system and how it operates in this country is up for debate.