Alito Cattivoi

The Washington Post reports that

Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito wrote in 1985 that he was proud of his Reagan-era work helping the government argue that "the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion," documents showed Monday.

Alito, who was applying in 1985 to become deputy assistant attorney general in the Reagan administration, boasted in a document that he helped "to advance legal positions in which I personally believe very strongly."

The memo was released by the Reagan library. This should make it much more difficult for Judge Alito to get his supreme robe for three reasons. First it proves that, despitethe fact that "Alito, 55, has told senators in private meetings that he had "great respect" for the precedent set by the 1973 Supreme Court ruling, Roe v. Wade," he also strongly believes in overturning the precedent and is proud of his efforts to achieve that aim. Since most Americans oppose overturning Roe vs Wade this should lose him votes in the senate, not because senators didn't know his declarations of "respect" are worthless but because they can't claim they were deceived. Second, and very important for a possible filibuster, this shows how vital it is to have access to Alito's writings. The Bush administration will argue executive priviledge and Democrats should argue the point ad infinitum.

Finally the unsurprising revelation shows that Alito is dishonest and his word is worthless. His utter contempt for his solemn (sworn ?) promise to recuse himself from cases involving Vanguard, Smith Barney or his sister's law firm already showed this, but the link between dishonesty and Roe should make the issue critical.

Oddly the Washington Post does not cite the Washington Times which seems to have scooped them (via Atrios)