Roberts' Professionalism

John Roberts should be glad he's not a member of the press.

The future Supreme Court nominee worked -- pro-bono -- to help gay rights activists. Yet social conservatives brush off this particular bit of judicial bonhommie as Roberts simply doing his job. He's a straight professional -- it just shows you can't discern his own views from the fact that he did the task assigned him, they say. The same explanation is used in regards to touchier issues he wrote about when in the Reagan administration -- he was just following administration policy.

So one is forced to wonder what sort of superman is this John Roberts that he possesses these extraordinary powers of self-discipline of being able to put aside his personal feelings -- block out his own biases as it were -- when working on hot-button issues.

He must be a superman because, judging from what conservatives say about the media, one would think that the ability to work around one's own prejudices when doing a job is rare indeed if not wholly unknown.