Now this is an injustice

U.S. Magistrate Lawrence J. O'Neill's elevation to a federal court judge in Fresno has been held up by congressional politics. That not only isn't fair to O'Neill, who has all the qualities to make a great federal court judge, it also isn't fair to U.S. District Judges Oliver W. Wanger and Anthony Ishii, who carry the biggest federal caseloads in the country. They need O'Neill's help.

O'Neill's confirmation was supposed to be easy. This is how it was described in a Political Notebook item in today's Bee:

Wanger said O'Neill was one of 14 "totally noncontroversial, bipartisan judicial nominations" who are now unlikely to get a confirmation vote before the end of the current Congress. Part of the gridlock centers on Sen. Sam Brownback, a Kansas Republican who is holding up the nomination of a Michigan judge because she attended a 2002 lesbian commitment ceremony. In response, Michigan's Democratic senators placed holds on the nominations of two conservative federal judges in the state. Now, while Fresno's two federal judges -- Wanger and fellow U.S. District Judge Anthony W. Ishii -- struggle with the highest federal caseload in the nation, all judicial appointments in the nation's capital are in limbo.

This is just plain wrong. But doing the right thing in Congress is seldom what motivates the politicians. The delay in O'Neill's confirmation will hurt the administration of justice in the Eastern District of California. But that doesn't seem to matter to the people who represent us.