Why the Senate Should Reject Ogden

The Senate might seem to have a solid nominee for Deputy Attorney General in the well-credentialed and experienced David Ogden, but Matthew Schmitz of Public Discourse provides compelling reasons to think otherwise:

David Ogden graduated from Harvard Law School, clerked for Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun, and worked in the Justice Department under President Bill Clinton. He brings to his Senate confirmation hearings a long résumé that shows him to be an effective and savvy advocate. Nonetheless, the Senate should decline to confirm as Deputy Attorney General a man who has a long history of representing the pornography industry and opposing laws designed to protect children from sexual exploitation.
. . .
Even those who think that adults have a right to obtain and use pornographic material should recognize that David Ogden’s advocacy for the pornography industry goes much further. His position would allow the purveyors of exploitative images to hide their abuse behind a vanishing paper trail. There is some irony in the fact that while our country employs thousands of inspectors to ensure that meat and poultry are safe, David Ogden opposed even basic steps to ensure that the images consumed by pornography users are not of children. While David Ogden’s stated concern was protecting “free speech”—in his confirmation hearing he said that he is opposed to the exploitation of minors, and presumably he is sincere—it is hard to see any justification for a position that has the effect of abetting abuse.

Read the whole thing here .