Estrada is the first circuit or district judicial nominee ever to be defeated by filibuster. Or put another way, he is the first nominee to be forced to gain the support of 60 senators rather than a majority. He has been investigated and grilled for over two years and nothing of substance was discovered to disqualify his nomination. All that the Democrats could discover is that Estrada has served with distinction in and out of government. He served honorably in the Office of the Solicitor General during the Clinton administration and in the Justice Department as a superb prosecutor. Now he has left public service, and he is making a bundle.
The reason that a man of such normative views as Estrada has been opposed by the Democrats is that they see themselves as the party of the ethnic minorities. Estrada is a Latino. When I claimed he was a Japanese-American, I was just trying to get a little rise out of his Democratic tormentors. That the Republicans would raise him to one of the highest courts in the country proves that Latinos are welcome in the Republican Party, too. They do not have to be beholden to Democrats. Moreover, Estrada is so manifestly qualified for the court that, were he confirmed, he might very well be nominated by the Bush administration to the Supreme Court. That would badly impair the Democrats' claim to be the party of Latinos. Thus the soi-disant party of Latinos comes down hard on a successful Latino.
The Senate Republicans are increasingly angered about the Democrats' obstructionism. They are laying plans to thwart the Democrats' unprincipled filibusters. Some are also considering plans to urge the White House to nominate Estrada again a couple of years down the road, but this time to a higher court, the Supreme Court.
By then, if the Democrats continue to play the role of the bully, there will be even fewer of them in the Senate, and Estrada's Supreme Court nomination will sail through. He will have his house in the country and life-long employment in a job where he can wear a comfortable loose-fitting robe rather than a three-piece suit.