George Bush continues to nominate candidates for important government jobs who have truly remarkable records. One of the latest, Charles Pickering, nominated to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Quoth the Detroit Free Press:

As a Mississippi legislator, Pickering fought implementation of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, even co-sponsoring a resolution for its repeal. He supported the notorious and secretive Mississippi Sovereignty Commission, a state-funded agency established to oppose integration efforts after the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision. The commission had close ties to the racist White Citizens Council and spied on civil rights and labor activists.

As a District Court judge, Pickering consistently criticized and opposed the one-person-one-vote doctrine and majority black voting districts.

He wrote an article in the Mississippi Law Journal in 1959 calling for legislation -- enacted shortly thereafter -- strengthening a Mississippi law banning interracial marriages.

His career also is characterized by a relentless hostility toward abortion rights, as well as the rights of habeas corpus and due process.

That's George Bush --- defending American values. He's not like the last occupant of the White House, that's for sure...