Up Front

So much euphoria reigns over the nomination of Judge Sandra Day O’Connor for a Supreme Court apP01!1tment t~at maybe nobody will notice much if an old sourpuss slips a mite of cynicism into the goingson, just for the heck of it. The thing is that the politics of deception – another term for the end justifying the means – doesn’t go down easily unless greased with cynicism. Ideally, too, it should be a first-class grade of cynicism – the kind that’ll provide a slippery coat for whatever it is we’re bent on swallowing, so that, once it’s down, we won’t even know the cynicism was there in the first place. Now that’s good cynicism. It has utility. I’ve a hunch that Judge O’Connor may be the best Supreme Court appointment in the past couple of dec- ades. But doesn’ t it mean anything at all that President Reagan – when he. was candida~e Reagan – promised – promised! – the antiabortion folks he would not name to the highest court in the land anyone whose views on abortion countered theirs? He sought out the endorsement of the National Right to Life Committee and, in return for that support, pledged Carolyn Gerster, co-founder in Phoenix of that organization, that he would not name a pro-abortionist to the high court. So she says anyway. Maybe there’ll be a denial. But she fills in her story with some rather vivid detail, including the claim that, to turn the tide of support last summer in Iowa that was building among Republicans for George Bush, Reagan told her, “It will mean a lot