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[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

I'm not sure what you're referring to with the "first time I felt that way" but I would consider the Souter appointment (by Bush I) and subsequent confirmation (with 90 votes) one of the cases where the process worked pretty well.

Sure, he was formally opposed by a lot of key liberal constituencies, but when you get 90 votes in the Senate you know they didn't push opposition to him as a top priority. The reason it worked that time was Republicans didn't appoint a lunatic like Bork or someone like Kavanaugh who had pretty much been groomed by the Federalists from his days carrying Ken Starr's bag. Souter had a big political friend in Sununu, who was Bush's chief of Staff and the former Gov. of NH, but otherwise he really came from outside the world of DC. I don't remember grandstanding jackassery during his process, but I mostly remember the nomination as a foregone conclusion so not sure I paid that much attention.

I think Ty's point that we'd all be better off if the average age in the Senate were a few years younger (indeed, 30 years younger wouldn't be hard) may not be accurate. If you look at some of the "younger" Senators, like Cruz or Hawley, you get different flaws from the DiFis and Grassleys of the world. The Senate has always has geriatric basket cases, but they are just one of the motley crew we get, and swapping an old codger for a youthful asshat isn't necessarily going to help.

A lot of conservatives were pissed off that Souter didn't give them the kind of rulings they wanted, and the lesson they took was that they needed to exert pressure on the nomination process to make sure they got the kind of judge they wanted. When another Bush tried to nominate another Souter, W. and Harriet Miers, conservatives revolted and prevented that from happening, and got Alito instead, and we all can see how that turned out.