The said Constitution shall be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press, or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms.

Nonetheless, I'm enthralled with Franken's show. I usually flip back and forth between Franken on Sundance and Fox and Friends for my daily dose of humor (the former unintentional). The Al Franken Show, seemingly dedicated to mocking patriotism, offers that same sort of pre-Fahrenheit 9/11 Michael Moore humor. The only greater possibility for humor is if Michael Moore were to do a documentary of the Al Franken show…in Flint, Michigan. But I digress.

[I wonder if anyone has thought yet to have a conservative/liberal show in the spirit of Hannity and Colmes that features Al Franken on the left? The right's representative? Ben Stein of course. Working name: "Franken Stein". It'd be a monster show. That's copyright, 2005, by the way. Contact me, Sundance Channel, if you're interested in buying the rights. I want to produce.]

Al Franken and his co-host, the very forgettable Katherine Lanpher, called Janice Rogers Brown a "psychopath" this week. Now, I know that this can be dismissed as humor, but even other political humorists such as Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter have a granule of truth behind their parodies and caricaturing. I could understand Franken using humorous epithets for Brown like 'scary' or 'dangerous,' because, indeed, these are two words that are accurate from their perspective. Janice Rogers Brown is scary and dangerous for all those who seek to rewrite the Constitution for a more progressive age.

Maybe I just fail to see the intrinsic humor value behind the word 'psychopath.' Here is one definition of psychopath:

A person with an antisocial personality disorder, manifested in aggressive, perverted, criminal, or amoral behavior without empathy or remorse.

Certainly an argument can be made, especially when focusing on 'amoral behavior without remorse,' that the word could be used to define Bill Clinton in his waning presidential years. And yet, I'd be hard-pressed to think of a time that a conservative called Bill Clinton a psychopath, although I wouldn't put it past Ann Coulter to have done so.

Nonetheless, Al Franken and what's-her-face have called Janice Rogers Brown a psychopath. Anyone who has read Brown's "A Whiter Shade of Pale" speech given in 2000 will certainly understand why the left fears her, and considers her dangerous. But I'm curious as to what has exalted her to this psychopathic status usually only reserved for the most heinous, like former Halliburton CEOs for instance.

I decided to do a little research on what makes her so reviled. So I went straight to the deepest cavern of the moonbat cave - the Alliance For Justice - and read their official press release for their strong opposition to the nomination of Janice Rogers Brown to the DC Circuit. The equally forgettable but somehow ubiquitous president of Alliance for Justice, Nan Aron said,

"After a thorough review of Justice Brown's record, we have profound concerns about her ability and willingness to put aside her extreme, anachronistic views of the law and decide cases as statute and precedent require."

Note that their concerns are not simply concerns, but profound concerns. Concerns with deep meanings attached. Sticking with the comedic theme, however, their use of the word "anachronistic" as it relates to Constitutional interpretation is laughable. As if, somehow, the meaning of our twenty-two decade-old Constitution changes in nuance with every passing year. Somehow, the Constitution has slightly different meaning today than it did, in, say, 2004.

Most of the Alliance for Justice's articles are simply attacking statements made by Brown in the infamous speech noted above. But this line is a keeper: "[Brown] repeatedly misconstrues precedent and brazenly criticizes U.S. Supreme Court rulings." [GASP!] You mean to tell me that someone has the audacity to criticize the rulings of the holiest of holy institutions? Are not they beyond reproach? And to do so in such a brazen manner! Perhaps it is this brazen quality - her outright disrespect for Supreme Court legislating - that has caused her, a black woman, to be shunned by the NAACP and NOW.

In fact, according to People for the American Way (founded by Superman, apparently), Janice Rogers Brown has been denounced by a virtual who's who list of leftist/socialist organizations from the AFL-CIO, Alliance for Retired Americans, Americans for Democratic Action, Feminist Majority, NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, Inc., NARAL Pro-Choice America, National Bar Association, National Council of Jewish Women, National Organization for Women, National Senior Citizens Law Center, National Women's Law Center, Natural Resources Defense Council, Planned Parenthood, Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, Sierra Club, and perhaps most tellingly, the NY Times and the Washington Post.

In the Washington Post condemnation of her, they say "[...] Brown's activism comes from the right, not the left; the rights she would write into the Constitution are economic, not social. Suddenly, all but a few conservatives seem to have lost their qualms about judicial activism." Well, this is predictable, if nothing else. Any attempts to halt the slippery slope of leftist judicial activism is labeled as "conservative activism," instead of what it is, originalism or constructionism. Janice Rogers Brown is a judicial activist, according to the Post, by sheer virtue of the fact that she's not a Socialist judicial activist.

I doubt Al Franken and the Sundance Channel would find humor in one aspect of Janice Rogers Brown that has already been pointed out by several conservative talk show hosts. It's that all of Brown's opponents list her rulings, speeches, and views as negative qualities. When what is really happening is that conservatives and originalists alike are resoundingly agreeing with her. For instance, back to the People for the American Way, they lament:

Economic Regulation and Environmental Protection: One key case [of Brown's] concerned an ordinance requiring hotel owners seeking to convert residential units to tourist hotels to help replace the lost rental units in the city, which suffered from a severe shortage of affordable rental housing. The majority easily upheld the ordinance, but Brown dissented, arguing that such regulations are not allowed unless property owners agree they would benefit them economically. Such a radical philosophy would preclude almost any economic or environmental regulation. The majority severely criticized her for attempting to use her own political and economic views to redo the democratic decision in the case.

You mean to tell me that she found it unconstitutional for the government to force private businesses into a line of work that was not profitable to them? [Gasp!] What a "radical" philosophy! Doesn’t she know that this goes against California's socialistic agenda? And what, exactly, would cause businesses to convert residential units to tourist hotels anyway? Certainly not San Francisco's heavy residential regulation and rent control. No wonder Janice Rogers Brown has made so many enemies with these radical and extremist views she peddles.

Anyone this despised by so many leftist organizations has no business being appointed to the Supreme Court. Rather, this psychopath should run for President.