Skipping the advice part

Theocons and Bushists alike got what they wanted on the Supreme Court because of the Gang of 14, not despite it. It was a faux compromise in which the Democrats got taken for everything and the Republicans gave up nothing at all. Roberts and Alito are both on the Court, aren't they?

Yet that wasn't enough for the right-wing radicals. They wanted the nuclear option. They wanted to go to war against Democrats and the traditional, rule-based collegial way the Senate has deliberated about judicial appointments for decades.

The oddest thing is that the deal cut by Democrats will severely hinder the next Democratic President's appointment of more liberal judges. Witness what happened to Bill Clinton while the Republicans held the Senate. He got Steven Breyer and Ruth Ginsburg. Breyer especially is very centrist.

The avidly hypocritical Republicans will filibuster any Democrat's nominees without compunction. They will call moderates extreme, where for their part the Democrats have called Republican-appointed extremists moderate. Four of them sit on the Supreme Court.

It really doesn't make sense that James Dobson, Orrin Hatch, and Richard Land dislike McCain for the outcome of the Gang of 14 negotiation. They must dislike him for the disloyalty they perceive in it.

As ever, they simply want silent obedient consent.