OPINION:
So Tani Cantil-Sakauye, the chief justice of the Supreme Court of California, has left the Republican Party, in part, because of the backlash from all the sexual allegations that swirled about Brett Kavanaugh, newly confirmed U.S. Supreme Court justice.
Well, goodbye and good riddance. Cue Queen’s “Another One Bites the Dust.”
Siding with liars — as these Kavanaugh accusers have turned out to be — over truth-tellers, as Kavanaugh and his supporters have turned out to be, does not a good judge make.
In fact, the ability to discern truth from deception would seem to be a key characteristic of a successful judge. A core characteristic, some might say.
“Kavanaugh Accuser Admits She Fabricated Rape Allegations,” rang on National Review headline in November.
” ’I was angry and I sent it’ Another Kavanaugh accuser referred to FBI after recanting,” another USA Today headline blasted, in the same time frame.
Cantil-Sakauye, what’s up with that?
“Cantil-Sakauye has quietly given up her Republican registration and re-registered as a no-party-preference voter, saying Thursday she had become increasingly uncomfortable with the GOP’s direction nationally and in the state,” CALmatters.org reported. “In a phone interview … [she] said she made the final decision to change her registration after watching the U.S. Senate confirmation hearings of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. ’You can draw your own conclusions,’ she said.”
It’s one thing for a Republican to leave the party based on some sort of moral outrage, change-of-heart, principled calling, political differences, or what have you. But to suggest the Kavanaugh hearings as a final straw?
To suggest the circus act the Democrats put on — the fabricated accusations the left slung — the scandals the progressives created to slander and slur and tarnish and taint a man with a long-standing reputable character — to suggest all these things were Republican badges of dishonor rather than deceptive, despicable designs of the left?
That shows a serious misjudge of character.
That shows a rather shocking inability to tell truth from fiction.
“I felt compelled to make a choice now,” said Canti-Sakauye, in CALmatters.org. “It better suits what I do and how I approach issues.”
Given she’s done it on the heels of Kavanaugh’s confirmation, floating ghosts of debunked sexual misdeed pasts, the manner in which she approaches issues, though, would seem more rooted in politics than truth.
And if she’s leaving the GOP over Kavanaugh, in part or in whole, then she never really held fast to Republican principles in the first place. The more RINOs leave, the merrier for the true conservatives.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley.
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