Judge Garland seems to me to be a bright, fair-minded and decent man. He has experience at a high level in the Justice Department. Taking what might be called a neutral view, he is qualified for the Supreme Court in all the usual senses of that word.
The problem is that I don't take a neutral view, and -- let's be honest about it -- neither does anyone else. Certainly the President didn't when he nominated Judge Garland. Instead, the President knew what the New York Times (yes, that New York Times) now discloses (emphasis added): "If Judge Garland is confirmed, he could tip the ideological balance to create the most liberal Supreme Court in 50 years."
This is the Times' story, mind you. Note in particular its graph, showing that a Justice Garland would vote squarely in the middle of the liberal bloc, a tiny bit to the right of Ginsberg and a tiny bit to the left of Kagan.
What this means is that Republicans are not taking that much of a gamble in refusing to move him along the path to a vote. The likelihood is that, even if there is a Democratic President and Senate in 2017, the nominee to replace Garland (if he gets replaced, which is also unknown) would not be that much more liberal, if at all.
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