"This is the latest start to judicial confirmations of any presidential election year in 160 years," the Utah Republican said this week. "That was before Utah even became a territory, let alone a state."

Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., says in reality, it's only been 12 years since it took even longer to get a judicial nominee through. That was when Hatch chaired the Judiciary Committee, and members of Congress could zoom back to Washington in commercial jets.

"We are three months ahead of the schedule followed by Republican leadership during that presidential election year," Leahy said of 1996.

You say tomato. I say cucumber.

In the nation's capital, these types of arguments are what pass for entertainment. Both Hatch and Leahy have valid points, as long as you don't look too closely at the details.

In this year's version of the perennial fight over judicial nominations, Hatch joined several other Republicans this week to battle for President Bush's proposed judges, taking to the Senate floor for an animated argument and then to the press gallery to bemoan the judicial backlog.

In response, the Democrats promptly produced numbers to back their case that more judges are getting through under their control than when the Republicans bickered with President Clinton.

But this is where it gets confusing, because in Washington, statistics are viewed as foot soldiers in the partisan war.

As of Thursday afternoon, about 85 percent of President Bush's circuit and district court nominees have been confirmed, whereas 75 percent of President Clinton's nominees were confirmed, Leahy's office asserts. Nearly half of Clinton's circuit court nominees were not confirmed while 72.5 percent of Bush's have been.

One would assume then that Bush's nominees are actually getting a better break than those of his Democratic predecessor. Not so, argues Hatch.

The Utah Republican says the list used for those calculations is probably bogus. One Clinton nominee, Roger Gregory, for example, wasn't confirmed during Clinton's presidency but was re-nominated by Bush and confirmed. If he is counted as a Bush nominee and not a Clinton one, then the numbers are off, Hatch's office complains.

"Facts are indeed very stubborn things," Hatch said in a floor speech. "The majority [party] has already virtually shut down the judicial confirmation process. . . . The majority has refused to do what the American people sent us here to do because they can. That may be the reason, but there is no excuse."

Of course, as of Thursday there were a total of 50 vacancies in federal courts, 20 of those with no nominee submitted by President Bush. At the end of the Clinton presidency and a Republican-controlled Senate, there were 80 vacant spots.

At that time, Leahy says, Hatch claimed 67 open spots on the courts amounted to "full employment" and an even a higher vacancy rate fell short of a judicial crisis.

Dizzy?

Wait, there's more.

One might think that either Leahy or Hatch is wrong when they argue about the last time the Senate was this sluggish in approving judicial nominees. Hatch says 1848. Leahy says 1996. They both can't be right, right?

Well, here's how it breaks down:

In 1996, two judicial nominees were approved Jan. 2, but technically those judges got the OK in the first session of Congress because that session wasn't gaveled to a close until Jan. 3. So Leahy's case that Congress didn't approve a judicial nominee until July in the 1996 session is right. So is Hatch when he says there were two confirmations only days into the year.

See, everyone is right about the other party being wrong.

"Both parties are guilty of this practice of arriving at a conclusion, regardless of the facts," says Dan Gerstein, a former senior aide to independent Sen. Joe Lieberman, of Connecticut who spent a decade in the Capitol Hill spin machine.

It's all about conforming your facts to advance your political agenda, Gerstein says. "The sad part is rarely do they stop and engage in debate. Both sides have their talking points, and the goal is not to kind of persuade each other, but to put on a show."

And like some shows, the facts and figures have been changed to protect the innocent.

tburr@sltrib.com

Order (or chaos) in the courtDueling statistics on judicial nominations

Political parties offer dueling statistics on judicial nominees

* 104 Ð the number of district and circuit court judges confirmed during the two years Sen. Orrin Hatch chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee under President Bush

* 140 Ð the number of judges confirmed during the 32 months Sen. Patrick Leahy chaired the committee under Bush

* 80 Ð number of judicial vacancies at the end of the Clinton administration with a Republican-controlled Senate

* 47 Ð number of current judicial vacancies under Bush administration with a Democrat-controlled Senate

Source: Sen. Patrick Leahy's office

* 72 Ð number of district and circuit court judges confirmed in the 1999-2000 Congress when Hatch led the Judiciary Committee

* 12 Ð number of Clinton nominees withdrawn without a confirmation vote

* 21 Ð appeals court nominee hearings held under Leahy in 2001-02

* 5 Ð appeals court nominee hearings held in 2007-08 so far

Source: Sen. Orrin Hatch's office