Fare thee well, Justice Stevens

After nearly 35 years on the Supreme Court and 90 years on the earth, Supreme Court Justice and former Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Stevens is retiring.

Associate Justice John Paul Stevens, the leader of the liberals on the Supreme Court, announced on Friday that he will retire at the end of this term, setting up a confirmation battle over his replacement that could dominate the political scene this summer.

In a brief letter to President Obama, whom he addressed as “my dear Mr. President,” Justice Stevens said he was announcing his retirement now because he had “concluded that it would be in the best interests of the Court to have my successor appointed and confirmed well in advance of the commencement of the Court’s next term” in October.

Is he going to molest children with David Souter, tour with Them Crooked Vultures, or is he just retiring so he can vie for a prestigious nomination to Judge Judy's seat on the TV Court? Who knows. All we do know is that this will invariably set off some apocalyptic struggle over his replacement. I think we all remember how classy the Sotomayor confirmation was... well that was when the Democrats had some limited measure of control over confirming her. Now?

Maybe I'm overreacting. It's not like GOP leaders talking about filibustering the next Obama Supreme Court nominee a few days before Stevens retired, is it?

The second-ranking Republican in the Senate suggested on Sunday that the party would filibuster the next appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court, if that nominee were deemed to be outside of the judicial mainstream.

"It will all depend on what kind of a person it is," Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) declared during an appearance on "Fox News Sunday." "I think the president should nominate a qualified person. I hope, however, he does not nominate an overly ideological person."

And what is an overly ideological person? Anyone the President nominates. Even though anyone he nominates will probably be considerably less liberal than Stevens is/was.

Still, Kyl is at least a damn sight better than the Bachmann types who will be livid that this Obama fellow thinks he has some Constitutional power to appoint people of his choosing to vacant Supreme Court positions. The nerve! He's shoving judicial nominees down people's throats! This all sounds Maoist... or Stalinist! Tyranny!

So, just in case you thought there was a possibility that American politics would get... we won't say smarter... but.... less.... monstrously stupid, well, I hate to break it to you, but those hopes got shanked in a prison shower. In any event, this will be great fodder for Sean and myself. We eagerly await meeting the new liberal Satan who will invariably wish to bring about the destruction of this country and replace democracy with some sort of communist fiefdom where abortion is the only currency. Good times!