Surprise! It's a Conservative.

So, as you may have heard, President Bush has nominated John G. Roberts (whom Bostonist wishes were known as John "O.G." Roberts, but oh well) to the Supreme Court. (The G., by the way, is for Glover, but we suspect no relation to Savion or Danny.) We think this neither surprising nor especially exciting, but it is newsworthy enough that we would be remiss if we didn't offer at least some perfunctory commentary. While we are disappointed that Mitt didn't get the call, we can hardly get worked into too much of a froth over Roberts. He seems to be a plain vanilla conservative, having worked for Bush Sr. and Reagan, and judging by the complete lack of firebrand ideology he's ever displayed in his whole career, he must have been gunning for a Supreme Court seat from way back. He has a Boston connection, but it is the sort that, if heeded, would force Bostonist to provide detailed coverage of everything the federal judiciary does: he went to Harvard for undergrad and law school (during which time he was quite the stylish individual, as the photo above demonstrates).

Bostonist expects Roberts will be confirmed, since right now even the staunchest Bush opponents are only saying, "Um, gimme a second, I'll figure something out." Expect Ted Kennedy to interrupt Roberts during the confirmation hearing to say, "What I'm asking you, sir, is whether you support a woman's constitutional right to choose." Expect Roberts to dodge that question deftly. If you are conservative, congratulate your chief for a job well done. If you are liberal, remember that Bush Sr. appointed Souter and Nixon appointed Blackmun, and hope for the best. In the mean time, consider this fact, which is creeping Bostonist out a little bit: everyone in Roberts's immediate family has a name beginning with J: He is John, His wife is Jane, his son is John (Jr., presumably) (CORRECTION: The judge himself is Jr., his dad Jack is Sr., and the littlest Roberts is III), and his daughter is Josephine. Weird.