You don't get out of it that easily, Joe

Joe Biden thinks the confirmation hearing process is broken and should be deep-sixed:

WASHINGTON - Supreme Court nominees are so mum about the major legal issues at their Senate confirmation hearings that the hearings serve little purpose and should probably be abandoned, Democratic Sen. Joe Biden said Thursday.

"The system's kind of broken," said Biden, a member of the Judiciary Committee considering the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito.

"Nominees now, Democrat and Republican nominees, come before the United States Congress and resolve not to let the people know what they think about the important issues," such as a president's authority to go to war, said Biden.

As the committee headed into its fourth day of hearings on the Alito nomination, Biden told NBC's "Today" show that a better solution might be to skip hearings and send nominations straight to the Senate floor for a vote.

"Just go to the Senate floor and debate the nominee's statements," the Delaware senator said, "instead of this game."

I'm sure that many would agree. Personally, I hope we keep the confirmation process intact so that the public can see what an embarrassment the Dems have made of it. But what evades Sen Biden is that it's the questions and those doing the asking that are the problem, not the nominee's answers:

Biden defended Democratic senators' questions about Alito's membership in a university group, Concerned Alumni of Princeton, known for its opposition to opening the school to women and bringing in more minorities. Alito's wife, Martha-Ann Bomgardner, was moved to tears during the hearing Wednesday because of questions concerning whether her husband held any bias against women or minorities.

"I take him at his word that he didn't know what the group stood for, but I'm required to ask him," Biden said. He said membership in the group raised questions about "how sensitive he is to the plight of women."

And ask him again, and again... but you take him at his word. Nice that he gives such a good example of what's really broken in the same interview, yet he refuses to see it for what it is. Major legal issues, indeed. Crazy Politico nails it on the head:

"With over 4000 cases before the 3rd District Court, the opposition party has spent 3 days worrying about his time at Princeton 15 years before that, and not going over problems with his opinions in those cases. The reason is there are no problems with them. Even liberal judges and lawyers have sent in letters praising his conduct on the bench."

Crazy Politico has more as well. I'll add to his list the questions asked solely to give the Democrat Senators yet another opportunity to bash the President. Totally inappropriate and off-topic. And a shameful lack of respect toward Judge Alito and the American public whose interests are supposed to be represented here.