Rehnquist passes away

Earlier this evening Chief Justice Rehnquist passed away after battling thyroid cancer for quite some time. It is my suspicion that he was going to step down from the court AFTER the Roberts confirmation, but that is moot now.

Rehnquist was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1971 by President Nixon and took his seat on Jan. 7, 1982. He was promoted to chief justice by President Reagan in 1986 at the same time Antonin Scalia was appointed to the Supreme Court.

A sad day that will also complicate the appointment process. My prediction: the left-leaning blogs over the next 2 days will have more dancing on his grave than anything nice to say. I should just remind them the amount of respect and genuine decency that the people on the right showed for Paul Wellstone...something NEVER afforded to any death of a conservative by the "compassionate" liberals.