The Boston Globe's good call and bad call

The Boston Globe editorial board today made a surprising good call and a disappointing bad call.

The good call:

Barring the revelation of an outrageous scandal, Judge John Roberts is about to become the next chief justice of the United States, and based on his testimony last week, he deserves to be confirmed. In the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings, Roberts called himself a ''modest judge" and appeared smart and even-tempered.

Roberts "deserves to be confirmed." Quite a statement from a very liberal paper owned by The New York Times Company. A hat tip to The Globe on that.

Now the bad call:

As Roberts approaches the high court, there is also a job for Congress. Senator Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican, virtually wept about the nation's divisiveness, but he and some of his colleagues have been the source of intemperate rhetoric that could weaken the independence of the judiciary. Once Roberts is confirmed, Coburn and other conservatives need to cool their rhetoric and let the chief justice do his job

So The Globe feels "conservatives need to cool their (intemperate) rhetoric."

And what about liberals? For example:

Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) who said of Judge Priscilla Owen: "This is not a person to put on the bench for a lifetime appointment. This person is wacko! She's wacko!"

Harkin made his remarks shortly after the American Bar Association, by unanimous vote of its committee on federal judicial nominations, had given Owen its highest recommendation:Highly Qualified.

And there's Senator Chuck Schumer (D- NY) who said: "For years, the federal courts served as the shield protecting basic civil rights in this country. This administration wants the courts to become the sword that destroys those rights. And don't think this stops with Judge Pickering. He's just the tip of the iceberg."

Judge Charles Pickering,like Owen, received the ABA's Highly Qualified rating.

And then there's The Globe's own home state Senator, Ted Kennedy (D-Mass). Remember what Kennedy called a group of President Bush's judicial nominees, all of whom the ABA had rated Qualified or Highly Qualified? He called them "Neanderthals."

Clearly, liberals have engaged in a great deal of intemperate rhetoric concerning judges and the judiciary. For The Globe to ignore that while singling out conservatives for intemperate rhetoric is a bad call. It suggests partisan favoritism and will lead liberals to reasonably conclude they can engage in such rhetoric with no fear of criticism by The Globe.

I hope we soon see a Globe editorial reminding liberals they too need to cool their intemperate rhetoric. That would be a good call.