White House Prepares for Possible Vacancy as Court Nears Summer Break?!

EXCLUSIVE: Women, Minorities Top Bush's Supreme Court Short List
White House Prepares for Possible Vacancy as Court Nears Summer Break
By JAN CRAWFORD GREENBURG

The White House is developing a short list of possible Supreme Court nominees so President Bush can move swiftly if a justice retires at the end of June, when the Court breaks for its summer recess, according to sources involved in the selection process.

Bush met with top advisers last month, and they discussed possible nominees if a Supreme Court vacancy occurs.

He told White House Counsel Fred Fielding and other administration lawyers that he wanted to nominate a woman or a minority to the Court, and his legal team has narrowed its focus to a half-dozen contenders, sources said.

Most of the potential nominees have been well-vetted by the White House, which conducted extensive background checks and interviews in 2005, when it was searching for replacements for Chief Justice William Rehnquist and Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.

The White House is not expecting a retirement, but it wants to be ready if a surprise announcement occurs, sources said.

It's widely considered that the most likely candidates for retirement are liberal Justices John Paul Stevens and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, although both have said emphatically that they do not plan to step down.

The White House typically prepares an informal list of possible replacements every spring in case justices announce they are retiring at the end of the Court's term. But there's more urgency now.

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http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/SupremeCourt/story?id=3235598&page=1

And I should include Souter, since he has been a very pleasant surprise on this Court.

I HOPE that with our new majority in the Senate, that any wackjobs the White House will send for nomination will be defeated.

Stevens and Ginsburg stay right where they are for just a little bit longer.

and save it for whenever you or someone else pulls out the "no difference, doesn't matter" card regarding the Dems.

'08 is a huge year for the republic.

look out.

i wouldn't be surprised