The CNN headline is chilling: “Democrats’ best chance to bring down Kavanaugh: Bork him.”

The author is not recommending that Democrats “Bork” Judge Kavanaugh. His point is that Kavanaugh is so respected that if he’s going to be kept off the Supreme Court, his opponents will have to savage him personally as Democrats did to Judge Robert Bork in 1987. As the author of the article puts it, their “best chance to sabotage the nomination is by making Kavanaugh disliked.”

The Left Wants to Transform America

This is tragic. Judge Kavanaugh is an outstanding selection for the nation’s highest court. Yet he is a constitutionalist. He is a jurist with the principle and courage to interpret the Constitution according to what it actually says.

That’s why the Left is panicking. Its program of “transforming America,” to quote Barack Obama, depends on a judiciary that backs its radical social agenda and will misuse the Constitution to force it on the country.

So, given that Judge Kavanaugh is above reproach personally and as a judge, liberal activists will have to smear him to stop him. They will portray the innocent as sinister, the honorable as evil, and the unimportant as grave. 

Religious Bigotry

The Left will keep raising the judge’s Catholic faith, saying that because he is faithful to his church he has a secret plan to impose its teachings on all Americans. As Dianne Feinstein infamously said to federal Judge Amy Coney Barrett during the latter’s confirmation hearing, “The dogma lives loudly within you.”

No one’s deepest convictions are stuffed into a little closet as he or she leaves home in the morning. Senator Feinstein’s motivate her. Judge Kavanaugh’s motivate him.

But to suggest that specific theological beliefs will prevent an honest reading of the Constitution is nothing less than religious bigotry.

The Left’s Fear-Mongering

Then there are all the dog whistles that accompany the Left’s fear-mongering. Anti-choice, women’s reproductive rights, right to privacy, anti-feminist: In other words, if someone believes science and reason show the personhood of an unborn child, he is to be scorned and smeared.

But wait, there’s more. Bigot, anti-marriage equality, anti-gay, hater, and — well, you can provide your own favorite insults. All because an honest reader of the Constitution can’t find or even infer in it, no matter how hard he tries, a “right” for two same-sex partners to marry.

And lest we forget the one-two punch: Judge Kavanaugh is not only (assumed to be) against Roe but (horrors!) he’s a man — and we all know how anti-women they are! Take it from that Senator Patty Murray, my home state of Washington’s gift to American public life: “With Judge Kavanaugh on the bench, five men will most likely vote to overturn Roe v. Wade.” No respectable, lucid, true woman would vote that way, right, Senator?

“All our values are at stake here,” said Senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii. This surely will go down as one of the most absurd statements ever made by an American politician. “All our values” — really? Is Judge Kavanaugh a Marxist axe murderer who pulls the wings off of flies for fun?

If by “our values” Senator Schatz means the legality of destroying unborn lives, redefining marriage, and curtailing religious liberty, I would agree that a constitutional jurist might not find them appealing.

Senator Schatz would probably prefer a justice who adopts the Humpty Dumpty philosophy of constitutional interpretation. “When I use a word,” said the giant egg in Through the Looking Glass, “it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.” 

Borking Judge Kavanaugh

On a more cheerful note, Democrats will have a hard time “Borking” Judge Kavanaugh. He is personable, smiles broadly, and is clearly a very decent and likeable human being. Robert Bork, brilliant as he was, had a bad haircut, a Brillo pad beard, and was answered Senators with a bluntness that made him seem testy.

Judge Kavanaugh is much shrewder. His calm judicial demeanor will be all the more obvious when contrasted with the hostility of his Democratic accusers. 

His Senate hearings will display a first-class mind and a disciplined tongue. I look forward to watching the Senate Democrats go from fuming to frustration as they realize the judge is more than capable of parrying their most vicious thrusts.

To again quote Lewis Carroll, “Sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” When I read what the Left is trying to do to Brett Kavanaugh, six seems like a tiny number.