By L.P. LUPO

WASHINGTON, D.C. — There is an interesting division of the Left on the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee John Roberts.

The Washington Post, house organ for the permanent liberal government here, has urged Democrats to vote for confirmation. The New York Times, house organ for the Noam Chomsky/Susan Sontag/moveon.org hate-America-first crowd, has editorialized against confirmation. The difference between the Post and the Times is not surprising, given their respective constituencies.

What is remarkable is the basis on which the Times has called for the rejection of the Roberts nomination. The Times has set a new default setting for the Senate confirmation:

It editorialized: “Senators should vote against Mr. Roberts not because they know he does not have the qualities to be an excellent chief justice, but because he has not met the very heavy burden of proving that he does.”

On one level this is simply foolish gibberish, or is it? The Times seems to recognize that Roberts would be an excellent chief justice but objects to him because he did not prove it.

On this level, the Times has reversed the time-honored confirmation standard, namely that the nominee have nothing in his or her background that would preclude him or her from being an able public servant.

Instead of pointing to a clean past, the candidate now must establish a glorious future, according to the Times. A strong resume has been replaced by soothsaying if the nominee comes out of the Republican camp.

On still another level, the Times makes an even more threatening reversal in the confirmation process. It takes the burden of persuasion from the opponents of the nominee, raises the bar to a “heavy burden” and places that burden on the nominee.

The preening senators get to waste four days by asking 20-minute questions about how the Supreme Court justice would rule as a father or uncle or as a man. In the end, it is the nominee’s “heavy burden” to prove himself worthy.

The liberal-interest groups have long ago demonstrated that the bill of particulars against every Republican High Court nominee is identical. The buzzwords are by now carved in stone: “Back alleys, coat hangers, Jim Crow, environmental disaster.”

But the Times is the first to acknowledge that the default setting for the confirmation process is rejection, and there is a “heavy burden” on the nominee to overcome the presumption of rejection.

The Times apparently does not believe Democrats ever will control either the White House or Senate again to want a fair confirmation process.

Either that or it is confident that self-promoting accused plagiarists like Alan Dershowitz will be up to the task of meeting the “heavy burden” of the Times and left-wing ideologues.