Anyway, the gist of the excerpts used in the CBS report made it seem like he was totally against the Republican effort to thwart the filibuster that Democrats have extended against some of the current judicial candidates.
This was the quote that CBS used: "This is a radical, radical departure from our history and from our traditions, and it amounts to an assault on the judicial branch of government."
As Powerline relates, Bob Scheiffer thinks that Starr was referring to the Republican effort, but here is a letter that Starr wrote about the report.
I sat on Saturday with Gloria Borger for 20 minutes approximately, had a wide ranging, on-camera discussion. In the piece that I have now seen, and which I gather has been lavishly quoted, CBS employed two snippets. The 'radical departure from our history' snippet was specifically addressed to the practice of invoking judicial philosophy as a grounds for voting against a qualified nominee of integrity and experience. I said in sharp language that that practice was wrong. I contrasted the current practice and that employed viciously against your father with what occurred during Ruth Ginsburg's nomination process as numerous Republicans voted, rightly, to confirm a former ACLU staff worker. They disagreed with her positions as a lawyer but they voted -- again rightly -- to confirm her.Does that sound like he thinks the Republican effort is a radical departure? Or perhaps someone else's?
Update: Tom Maguire has a roundup, mostly with comments on what Mickey Kaus' post on this. Kaus thinks the CBS reporter "wrenched" the Starr sentence into the context that Starr intended. But Maguire is having none of that. And he has the transcript of the broadcast.
What it sounds like to me is that Starr doesn't have a position, or say anything regarding how he feels about the "nuclear" option. He was commenting entirely on how destructive the fillibusters are to the judicial appointment process.
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