Will Democrats join the 21st century already?

I've been watching a lot of the John Roberts hearings. He seems like a fundamentally decent (and smart) man. Even Democrats who have worked with him praise his fairness lack of ideology. I'm impressed by how much he's tethered his conclusions to the law's application to specific cases and circumstances. He seems to get that judges today shouldn't merely interpret the constitution by what it meant in 1787. His speaking and decision-making always seems to be very, very specific, and always put into a larger legal context. I like him, even if he's going to vote conservatively most of the time.

Why would Democrats vote against him? It would be a disaster. If a large number of Democrats vote against him, they will confirm their party as a shrill voice that's stuck perpetually in the sixties. Time and again this week, Democrats have asked questions about women's rights and civil rights, and of course abortion. As a pro-choice liberal, I want a pro-choice Chief Justice, too. But it's not the only issue.

Where are questions about property rights? The increasingly muddy law governing cyberspace? What will the constitution have to say about equal access in the age of digital voting? Part of the problem, of course, is that Roberts is so reserved about talking hypothetically.

If Democrats oppose this man, who seems about as good of a candidate as we can expect from George Bush, then what happens when a Scalia clone is nominated to replace O'Conner? It's the party who cried wolf.

In an e-mail to Democrats today, Howard Dean compared Roberts to Tom Delay and Karl Rove. I felt betrayed. If Democrats can't separate partisan end-running Machiavellis like Delay and Rove from a philosophically conservative modest man like Roberts, there will be no hope for the Democratic Party ever gaining ground in the Red States.