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I'll bet someone gets a fatwa and a half out of this one »

After several updates my previous post on this subject is getting a little long. Guess it's time to start a new one closer to the top of the page.

Juliette Ochieng has a well thought out post on the Miers kerfuffle here, including a list of 6 reasons GWB might have had for not nominating someone more obviously qualified than Harriet Miers. Of the reasons on her list, the one I find most plausible is: "6. Because he wants to light a fire under the Senate Republicans to get them to fight for the conservative agenda." As I said in the comments to her post, I think The President may have been trying to kill two birds with one stone when he nominated Miers. First, and most importantly, he's putting someone he knows well and trusts on the court. At the same time, he's definitely awakened the Conservative base, who will now have no excuse for not supporting him tooth and nail when he nominates Michael Luttig and/or Janice Rogers Brown to replace John Paul Stevens and/or Ruth Bader Ginsburg a little later in his term.  Is "dumb ol' George capable of thinking that far ahead? --  Haven't you learned yet not to misunderestimate him?

"Captain" Ed Morrissey divides the right side of the blogosphere into three camps where the Miers nomination is concerned:

1. The Loyalist Army, headed, as Ed says, by Hugh Hewitt (with able support, I should add, from Texas attorney William J. "Beldar" Dyer)
2. The Rebel Alliance -- People like Ann Coulter, Charles Krauthammer, Bill Kristol and Michelle Malkin, who'd apparently (my description, not Ed's) prefer to see the Republican Party permanently crippled than see someone who they wouldn't have selected confirmed to a SCOTUS seat.
3. The Trench-Dwelling Dogfaces -- Those of us who can see merits in the arguments of both camps, but mainly just want the fuedin' and fussin' to be over soon.

Beldar continues to be all over this situation. I found his The moving Miers goalposts; Bork, Barrabas, and elitism; and the soft, unconscious bigotry of limited imaginations post particularly interesting.

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

Update 1:

Mister Snitch has an interesting take on things here. Poindexter factor? I like that.

Update 2:

Michelle Malkin has a good link roundup and some thought's of her own here. And don't miss Dafydd ab Hugh's thoughts on the matter here, or Patterico's comments on Dafydd's post here. (Patterico's Pontifications has been all over this issue, and I haven't been going by there often enough. this post, this post and this post are representative samples.)

John Hinderaker has an excellent point here:

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Miers' lack of experience as a judge is one of the main shortcomings alleged by many of her critics. Actually, though, the Constitution doesn't require Supreme Court justices to be lawyers, let alone judges. I've always thought it might be salutary to have a non-lawyer or two on the Court. God knows we have plenty of businessmen, scientists, historians, housewives and others who are perfectly competent to read and understand the Constitution or a federal statute. And I think it would be fun to have such a person say, just once, as the Justices are deliberating: "Where does it say that?"

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If you haven't been reading Power Line on a regular basis, go there now and scroll, scroll, scroll.

The Commissar takes his shots at a recent Beldar post here. I have to side with Beldar on this one.

On the other hand, Jeff Goldstein tells us something I really don't like about Miers here.

As always, don't miss Mudville's latest Open Post.

Update 3:

Thank you Scott Johnson for the news that National Revue is approaching its 50th birthday and the William F. Buckley Jr. is approaching his 80th. The NY Times has a surprisingly balanced history of Buckley's Conservative movement here, and NRO reports here on President Bush's recent tribute to Mr. Buckley. The Times and NRO articles leave me wondering whether GWB actually had the courage to look Mr. Buckley in the eye so soon after nominating Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court.

10/10/2005 Update 1:

I'm having a hard time keeping up with all of the intelligent columns and blog posts being written about this subject, let alone trying to sort it all out and make sense of it. For instance, don't miss the latest from Paul Mirengoff, Hugh Hewitt, Pejman Yousefzadeh, Beldar, and Mrs. Austin Bay. (As always,  if you skip the comment threads you're robbing yourself; these people all have very intelligent, very knowledgeable readers -- I just notice a comment from Beldar on Mrs. Bay's post, for instance.) At this point, I personally have very mixed feelings about this situation; GWB screwed up big time by not going with someone with a visible Conservative track record, but for now I guess I'd still rather see her confirmed than to see the damage done to the Republican party that I'm afraid all of the internecine bickering may be causing.

10/10/2005 Update 2:

Don't miss Stop The ACLU's latest Open Trackback post. Smash also has an Open Post here.

(Continued at Still more thoughts on the Harriet Miers kerfuffle)

Posted by Bill Faith on October 9, 2005 at 01:23 AM | Permalink

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