The Importance of Being Straightforward
It's time for the Bush Administration to start giving conservatives some more information about Harriet Miers. Of course, one political calculus would be that anything making the Miers nomination more palatable to conservatives would "upset" the liberals.
Well, so be it. At this point, the President has bigger problems with his base than he does with the Democrats. Chances are that even if a fair amount of very favorable information (from a conservative perspective) comes out, the Dems aren't going to complain about it -- because they aren't going to want to gamble that the President would choose another nominee more to their liking. And in the meantime, there would be more criteria for assessing the quality of the nomination.
In any case, one of the arguments against Ms. Miers that's just not credible is the "best and brightest" approach. I stand second to no one in my admiration for Justice Thomas -- he is a great justice and a great man. But when he was nominated to the Court, he had served only a short time (about a year) on the D.C. Circuit, before that having served as head of the EEOC, assistant secretary of education, a corporate lawyer and an aide to Senator Jack Danforth.
I had no problem with Justice Thomas' credentials at the time. He was a fine choice then, and is a magnificent justice now. But as I recall, neither did George Will nor many of the other conservatives who have heaped disdain on Ms. Miers' intelligence and experience express any reservations about Justice Thomas, and rightly so. Our confidence in him has been well borne out by the quality of his opinions.
The difference? People felt that they "knew" Justice Thomas and the way he approached the law. And here, the fact is that the "underqualified" arguments are nothing more than a smoke-screen for opposition to Ms. Miers because people don't know her -- and, not knowing her, fear that she isn't a strict constructionist. Those concerns are valid ones, and are shared widely within the conservative movement. But those who have opposed Ms. Miers from the get-go owe it to the rest of us to be straightforward about why.
And the President owes it to all of us to give us the information to help make an informed decision.
Well, so be it. At this point, the President has bigger problems with his base than he does with the Democrats. Chances are that even if a fair amount of very favorable information (from a conservative perspective) comes out, the Dems aren't going to complain about it -- because they aren't going to want to gamble that the President would choose another nominee more to their liking. And in the meantime, there would be more criteria for assessing the quality of the nomination.
In any case, one of the arguments against Ms. Miers that's just not credible is the "best and brightest" approach. I stand second to no one in my admiration for Justice Thomas -- he is a great justice and a great man. But when he was nominated to the Court, he had served only a short time (about a year) on the D.C. Circuit, before that having served as head of the EEOC, assistant secretary of education, a corporate lawyer and an aide to Senator Jack Danforth.
I had no problem with Justice Thomas' credentials at the time. He was a fine choice then, and is a magnificent justice now. But as I recall, neither did George Will nor many of the other conservatives who have heaped disdain on Ms. Miers' intelligence and experience express any reservations about Justice Thomas, and rightly so. Our confidence in him has been well borne out by the quality of his opinions.
The difference? People felt that they "knew" Justice Thomas and the way he approached the law. And here, the fact is that the "underqualified" arguments are nothing more than a smoke-screen for opposition to Ms. Miers because people don't know her -- and, not knowing her, fear that she isn't a strict constructionist. Those concerns are valid ones, and are shared widely within the conservative movement. But those who have opposed Ms. Miers from the get-go owe it to the rest of us to be straightforward about why.
And the President owes it to all of us to give us the information to help make an informed decision.
posted by LadybugUSA at 10:35 AM
3 Comments:
Just one question for all conservatives: Why are you acting so surprised?
Following his instincts come what may is all that Bush has ever done. Sure, when he has argument backing him up, he echoes it. But if the argument isn't there (or in this case, contradicts him), he plows forth with his gut anyway.
Has this been obvious to everyone except conservatives all this time? Evidently so. Well, I guess we reap what we sow, and all that.
Well, Mr. Miers does support strong women...
Harriet E. Miers has played a key role in exposing college students to some unmistakably liberal ideas.
In the late 1990s, as a member of the advisory board for Southern Methodist University's law school, Ms. Miers pushed for the creation of an endowed lecture series in women's studies ... [she] also gave money and solicited donations to help get it off the ground.
A feminist icon, Gloria Steinem, delivered the series's first lecture, in 1998. In the following two years, the speakers were Patricia S. Schroeder, the former Democratic congresswoman widely associated with women's causes, and Susan Faludi, the author of Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women (1991). Ann W. Richards, the Democrat whom George W. Bush unseated as governor of Texas in 1994, delivered the lecture in 2003.
http://chronicle.com/temp/email.php?id=e6yeo9i8hnrs60hye6marcd5rt52f6f5
Endlessly debating Supreme Court nominations is all well and good...but could someone explain to me the justification of threatening to veto an extremely generous military budget that includes a provision not to torture POW's?? I mean, does the Bush administration really need this option? And why is the Geneva Convention essentially without teeth? I keep taking about "constructionists" and "originalists". As far as I know "cruel and unusual punishment" is a pretty "original phrase in the Constitution and one we haven't yet hit with the wite-out. Granted, "detainees" (or whatever user-friendly term we're giving them these days) do not necessarily enjoy the rights of U.S. citizens, it isn't great P.R. to torture POW's while trying to "spread democracy". Plus, it doesn't work as am information-gathering tool. So why is Bush pushing this when he already has a battle with both the right and the left on the Mier's nomination. Is he losing it? Am I missing something?
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