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(Continued from "More thoughts on the Harriet Miers kerfuffle")

Michelle Malkin has another good quote and link roundup here.

Dafydd ab Hugh says Captain Ed's Washington Post piece overlooked a significant portion of the electorate: "Cowboys," and follows up with another well-thought piece here.

Go to HughHewitt.com and just keep scrolling. Every day.

PoliPundit.com is another site that's been staying on top of the situation.

Captain Ed points out that Miers could end up being confirmed even if a substantial number of Republican Senators vote against her. (Won't W be proud of himself then?)

Peggy Noonan: The Miers Misstep

John Fund has been talking to people who've dealt with Miers over the years and "came away convinced that questions about Ms. Miers should be raised now--and loudly--because she has spent her entire life avoiding giving a clear picture of herself." Radio Blogger has a transcript of Hugh Hewitt's interview with Mr. Fund here.

Daniel Wiener makes a very good point in a comment on this Instapundit post:

The damage to Bush has already been done; no one will ever again believe that his only concern is with quality and that his only desire is to choose the best person possible. But by rejecting Miers' nomination, we can at least retain the ideal of a Supreme Court as an objective arbiter rather than a politicized legislature. Bush will be under enormous pressure to replace a rejected Miers with a top-notch individual whose qualifications are beyond reproach.

Up till reading the Wiener comment, I'd been leaning toward Hugh Hewitt's "Don't damage the Republican Party by quibbling about this" camp. I'm not any more. I don't really want to see the Republican Party or the Conservative movement damaged, but it's too late for that. It's time for Congress to whop W upside the head with a clue-by-four and remind him he's just a President, not a King. Maybe once he starts paying attention he can be shown the error in his ways in other areas, such as illegal immigration and his tendency to spend the public's money like a drunken sailor. Preserving the Republican Party is one thing; preserving W's ego is quite another. Let's hope the former can still be saved and the latter can be shrunk down to a reasonable size.

http://technorati.com/tag/Harriet%20Miers

Don't miss Mudville's latest Open Post.

Update 1:

Ann Althouse has mellowed on Harriet Miers, but part of her reasoning worries me a little:

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... Why is it not a good thing to have one person on the Court who approaches constitutional decisionmaking the way a lawyer would deal with the next legal problem that comes across the desk? Perhaps the Court is harmed by an excess of interest in the theoretical. A solid, experienced lawyer like Miers, with no real background in constitutional law, might look at the text, the precedents, the briefs, and use the standard lawyer's methods to resolve the problem at hand ...

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OK, I'm not a lawyer and maybe I just misunderstand the lawyerly thought process, but I think it goes something like this:

A) Identify desired conclusion (e.g. "client is innocent," "client has money coming", etc.)

B) Examine appropriate Codes, Case Law, precedents etc.

C) Construct best possible argument to support conclusion identified in step A)

My concern is that a Justice Miers, lacking solid familiarity with the Constitution, might substitute her personal beliefs, based on nothing more than "I feel sorry for these people" or "What would GWB say?" for step A), and then proceed with steps B) and C).  I hope I'm wrong, but I'd feel a lot more comfortable with a nominee with firmly established judicial, not lawyerly, habits.

Professor Bainbridge isn't won over by Ann's argument, for different reasons.

Don't miss Mudville's latest Open Post, where I found this link to yet another anti-Miers post.

Update 2:

I think it's about time for me to quit trying to keep up with the Miers Kerfuffle, at least until more information becomes available. My guess right now is the Miers will probably be confirmed; she may even turn out to be a good Justice. That doesn't change the fact that GWB screwed up big time by nominating someone he knew, or should have known, would be so controversial. Nor does that  change the fact that I'm disappointed in Capt. Ed and Michelle Malkin for letting al-Reuters and The Washington Post sucker them into posting things like this and this. At least Bryan Preston had sense enough to back away from his earlier take on the matter after Dafydd ab Hugh actually (gasp!) watched a video of the interview in question and posted a transcript of the relevant portion.  Sister Toldjah has more.

Linking to Stop The ACLU's latest Open Trackback post.

(Continued here.)

Posted by Bill Faith on October 11, 2005 at 12:00 AM | Permalink

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» I am a Cowboy from Don Singleton
After reading Big Lizard's post I realize I am not just a member of the Loyalist Army, but I am a Cowboy. [Read More]

Tracked on Oct 11, 2005 10:22:14 AM

» Michelle Malkin laps it up from Mister Snitch!
Spanking Michelle Mankin (and other überstrident conservatives): [Read More]

Tracked on Oct 12, 2005 3:01:26 AM

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