Most Americans probably don’t realize it, but the retirement of Justice John Paul Stevens is a good day in our country. He has been the most liberal judge on the Supreme Court for the last 20 years and one of the most liberal judges ever on the Court. He often finds himself as a lone ranger on the Court offering very liberal dissenting opinions even finding it difficult at times to get some of the other liberal Justices to concur with those opinions. He is the epitome of judges who interject their own feelings and personal political biases into their judgements which is exactly what judges are not supposed to do. He frequently ignores the plain text of the Constitution on clearly stated rights such as the right to bear arms while completely inventing “rights” out of thin air that are not in the Constitution such as the “right” to an abortion. While Conservatives certainly would prefer to replace him under a Republican President, the fact of the matter is that Obama will find it hard to replace him with someone as liberal as Justice Stevens is even with 59 Democrat Senators. Conservatives have made a lot of ground in demonizing liberal judicial philosophies in the public arena of ideas even forcing Obama’s last pick for the Court to public denounce the concept of judges having “empathy” in their opinions. Obama’s best approach would probably be to try to sneak a very liberal judge in disguise but even that might prove difficult in an election year. In all likelihood, even with a judge like Steven Breyer appointed as Stevens’ replacement, the Supreme Court will move, if ever so slightly, to the right. And the politics of this could not be worse for the Democrats in this political environment. Who knows, maybe Obama can nominate someone who gets defeated in the long run and this drags into next year with a dramatically more conservative Congress. But the more likely scenario is that he is forced to appoint someone who is not as liberal as Justice Stevens and that is a good thing for our country.