Evan Bayh Is Smarter than This

Evan Bayh has decided to oppose John Roberts's nomination. Okay, that's fine. But Bayh also decided to tell us why:

So much essential to reaching a considered judgment about this nominee remains unknown," Bayh said in a statement. "And that is not enough for a lifetime appointment to our nation's highest court, a court from which there is no appeal, a court that is the ultimate arbiter of our most basic rights and freedoms."

The problem for Bayh is that the Supreme Court is neither "a court from which there is no appeal," nor "the ultimate arbiter of our most basic rights and freedoms." Those powers have always been, are now, and, barring calamity, will continue to be vested exclusively in the people of the United States. If the Supreme Court gets something wrong, there is a ready avenue of redress -- the amendment process.

The necessary implication of Bayh's statement is that our rights are, for better or worse, wholly subject to the whim of a 9-person oligarachy/aristocracy. And that is, well, just plain silly. How does a Senator's staff allow a Senator to say such foolish things in public? (Note the implication that a Senator, on his own, could not otherwise help himself . . . )