“This vote today in committee means that Judge Roberts will be voted on on the Senate floor next week, possibly on Thursday, and he is all but certain to be approved by a majority larger than 60 votes,”
“Oh, you bet they are, Bob. I mean, they understand that this is a real negative for them and that this also really very much plays into the Democrats' charges that Republicans are abusing their power. Republicans control both the House and the Senate. But what they're more worried about, Bob, are those presidential approval ratings which keep heading South. I had one Republican say to me, we're less worried about Tom DeLay right now than we are about the President. And we think that about 70 seats could really be up for grabs in those mid-term elections. That's twice as many as they had originally thought.”
“They don't want to think that, Bob. And they know that that would be a real uphill fight for the Democrats, but they're beginning to believe that this smells really, really badly for them, and they're very, very worried about it now because they know they cannot depend on this president and his coattails any longer.”
“They wanted a symbol. They wanted someone who openly supported their views of the Supreme Court. But they know nothing about her judicial philosophy.”
“There are very conservative libertarian Republicans who agree with liberal Democrats that you have to pay attention to civil liberties and balance that with national security. That's very tough to do.”
