Posted on 10/28/2005 8:45:16 PM PDT by Rummyfan
Mark Steyn on the dangers of the Court becoming a nine-member parliament.
HH: Mark Steyn, columnist to the world, are you in New Hampshire today, Mark?
MS: Yes, I am. A very snowy part of New Hampshire, too.
HH: Oh, it is. The noreaster got you, huh?
MS: Yup. I've got snow stuck on the ground, which isn't a good start to winter.
HH: No, it's pretty early, actually. A very somber day. What do you make of the Harriet Miers withdrawal, Mark Steyn?
MS: Well, you know, I think we can all ease up on the insults of Harriet Miers now, because I think she did...I must say, I think she did the right thing. I know you disagree on this, Hugh, and I think this is a day when we should remember the qualities about Harriet Miers that people are agreed on, that she's a loyal, kind, considerate, dutiful person, and I hope she continues to serve the Bush administration in various ways for the next three years. And the rest of the country, and the process of finding a new Supreme Court nomination now has to move on.
HH: I agree with that. I'm worried about lasting damage, because our mantra...I write about this in the New York Times tomorrow, Mark. Our mantra has been since 2001, an up or down vote on the floor of the Senate. But we took out one of our own. Do you think this diminishes the battle cry that actually was so significant in winning back the Senate in a healthy margin?
MS: Well, I think the point here is...and this is again, a big disagreement I have with you. I don't think it was elites. Yes, you know, my friend, David Frum, and some of the other National Review guys have got some pretty fancy pedigrees behind them. But I was stunned by the amount of grass roots anger with this, in part because I think if you're in Washington, it's very easy to look at the politics of this as a political thing. This is in a way the large problem with the Democratic Party, and the Tom Delay and Scooter Libby things, is they see everything in political terms. And I think a large part of the country looks at things in broader social and cultural terms. That's what is important to them. Abortion isn't just a matter of politics. It's a profound social and cultural issue. And I think there is...I think they want a president who is on the right side of that issue...those issues. That's the Democratic Party's problem. It's a purely political party that is out of tune with the American people on the social and cultural issues. And I think that's why there was a big dissatisfaction among the base, precisely on this basis, that they wanted to be sure about the nominee, and that they were unable. The more they learned about Harriet Miers, the less sure they were.
HH: Oh, I think that's absolutely true. No doubt about it, that the speeches that came out yesterday after the limb sawing that had been going for three weeks, you know, really left her without much support, and I think she just probably was not going to take it anymore, because it's pretty hard, I would think, to be her, have a sense of accomplishment about your whole life, and then get slimed every day by people who are allegedly conservatives. But...
MS: I think that's fair. I mean, I think with Bob Bork, for example, Bob is a tremendously...in some ways, a tremendously gloomy man with a dark view of human nature.
HH: Yes.
MS: And in a sense, I think what happens to him, he accepts as part of the vicissitudes of life. But I think unless you have that particularly...I find his pessimism rather bracing, myself. But unless you have that dark view of life, I think going through this thing is a hell that no reasonable person would want to do.
HH: Now, can you foresee a nominee, not a federal judge, or maybe a state Supreme Court judge in the future, Mark Steyn?
MS: I wouldn't want to...I think this is...in a sense, the Bork-Miers era bookends this terrible decay of the nominating process that has gone on in the last fifteen years, because on the one hand, you have someone who is clearly a brilliant man, who was demonized and travestied by the nomination process. And so at the other end of the spectrum, you nominate someone who is believed to be nice, pleasant, has no paper record, and is unobjectionable on that, and she suffers the same kind of treatment, and in many ways, more dramatic, in some respects, from her own side. And I think there is a...the real problem in this system is that the nomination process doesn't work, and you've got to find a way through it. And the Bork way didn't work, and unfortunately, the Harriet Miers way didn't work, either.
HH: Well, that's what I'm afraid will happen, is that the Roberts way worked. And Roberts worked because of brilliance. And so we're going to end up with what Robert Bork in his new book, A Country I Do Not Recognize, called increasing Olympianism on the Supreme Court, where it's a sort of high temple of the legal priesthood, as opposed to a group of judges making judgments.
MS: Now, you see, that...I think that's a really interesting point, because I would have...I basically think the president, if he wants to nominate Harriet Miers, he can nominate Harriet Miers. I would have no problem with that. And I think a century ago, if this had been William McKinley's America, Harriet Miers would have been a perfectly acceptable Supreme Court nominee, in the context of most late-19th Century Supreme Court nominees. That was a time when the federal government played a very limited role in American lives. Now, the Supreme Court has become the true...has become, effectively, a nine man parliament for the United States. it's the one that...it's particularly important to the left, because it's the only way they can advance their agenda, is through the courts. You can't get elected on half this rubbish, so they've got to have courts discover Consitutional rights to half this stuff. And I think for that reason, just playing into the idea that you need Olympian judges of staggeringly brilliant intellect...just by accepting those terms, you've essentially bought into the left-wing view of the Court.
HH: Right, and you have. And that's going to be the trouble. Now let's look ahead, though, because no sense starting another knife fight on the right, and talk about who does the president nominate now, with the term base uniter much in use in the web today?
MS: Well, I think I would go with your pick, which is Michael McConnell.
HH: Yup.
MS: If I were left to my own devices, I would prefer Luttig, but I don't think that's going to happen. And I think the advantage of McConnell is that he is someone that will actually be quite hard to demonize, because I think in a sense, the left now feel that the president is weakened. I don't think that's true, myself. But I think they're going to want to do to the next guy what they were unable to do with Roberts. And it's very hard to find another...I mean, John Roberts played those hearings beautifully. The Democrats made themselves look like fools.
HH: And that is Mike McConnell. A) the solicitor general experience, the number of appearances before the Court. He was a professor, John never was. He lacks the private practice that John did. But the 10th Circuit, he's been around. He's been vetted recently by the FBI, he's filled out the questionnaire recently. They threw everything they had except a filibuster at him, so it's not special circumstances. It just seems to me a compelling tactical sense. The downside, of course, is white male followed by white male. Not a problem for me, but do you think it will be a problem in 2006?
MS: No, I don't think so. And in fact, I think the one thing that isn't an issue here, is 2006, because I think that these people, some people I respect have been saying that 2006 is going to be another 1994, and I don't think it is. The simple reason is that 1994 wasn't just a throw the bums out thing. It was also a throw an actively...one of those rare elections, where people wanted to throw the bums in. In other words, the alternative party had a coherent agenda.
HH: Right.
MS: The Democrats...whatever the Republicans' troubles, the Democrats do not have a coherent agenda. I don't think they can find one by 2006, and I think the basic fault remains that in a sense, they are out of tune on the very issues that they attach so much importance to, in which is why...they're a great party for wrecking Supreme Court nominations, precisely for the reason that those issues do not play for them in the country at large. They've become very good at fighting, if you like, in the nominating committee, precisely because these issues do not win elections for them.
HH: Let me ask...we've got a minute left. The Plame affair, and alleged indictments. What's your prediction on this?
MS: Well, I would hope that there are no indictments, because I don't see that there is anything significant about the Valerie Plame leak that makes this leak so much more important than all the other leaks that have come out...the CIA has been leaking against this president for years, for example. I don't understand why leaking the name of Valerie Plame, which isn't a crime, should be the most important leak ever to come out. The real issue here is that Joe Wilson should never have been sent to Niger on that mission in the first place. The president was right on this. British intelligence, French intelligence, and even a former prime minister of Niger agree that Saddam Hussein was trying to acquire uranium from Niger. Why have we got into a huge criminal investigation, defending some obscure matter relating to the spouse of a buffoon, and an unqualified fraud who basically lied about everything he discovered in Niger?
HH: And on that, the conservatives can agree. Mark Steyn, always a pleasure. Steynonline.com, America.
I notice that Mark Steyn doesn't want to get into the foodfight, and doesn't want to criticize his host or make him uncomfortable. But he's clearly unhappy with the fact that Hewitt has just written a hit piece for the New York Times.
And he hits the nail on the head with this: "Yes, you know, my friend, David Frum, and some of the other National Review guys have got some pretty fancy pedigrees behind them. But I was stunned by the amount of grass roots anger with this."
He also understands the reasons for the anger, and explains it pretty well. But he has carefully tried to avoid getting mixed up in this dispute.
HH couldnt carry Steyn's jockstrap.
I don't understand why Steyn isn't a force on Fox News.
I don't know, so I'll just blame the Senate. They seem to specialize in screwing things up.
Who is Hugh Hewitt?
Could anyone expound on this a little bit? I was in the fourth grade when Bork was nominated, so I really don't know too much about him, besides his having been "borked."
HH couldnt carry Steyn's jockstrap.
He could if it was a jockstrap that was very, very loyal to Bush.
Please. HH is an intellectual lightweight.
Who is mark steyn?
BTTT
He's no Hugh Hewitt writing op-eds for the Communist NYT, that I know.
Love Steyn.
When he finally links it to the Rockefeller Memo(http://www.intelmemo.com/), perhaps he'll see this indictment for what it is, part of a plan to impeach the President. Which is not the last piece of this puzzle.
The Democrats are systematically trying to take out the top tier Republicans, Frist, Delay, Rove to get Bush, Scooter to get Cheney, so that the 25th Ammendment will kick in, and we'll end up with Jay Rockefeller in the WH.
And that would not be a good thing.
The MSM are dutifully reporting the script from the playbook that the Libby indictment was REALLY about WMD. Bush lied about WMD. Bush manipulated intel to attack Iraq... and so on.. it's started already tonight.
The CIA is at war with the WH, and I've no doubt will do their damndest to deliver the plan.
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment25/#annotations
Mark Steyn is maybe the best writer on matters political in the whole dang world. This Hewitt fella now, I don't know.
"Who is Hugh Hewitt?"
a party before principle republican party cheerleader.
Thank you.
Part of the problem and not the solution.
Political Centrists are a curse on America.
I suppose HH also supported extending the AWB.
Do you really care how the Arab press is reporting this??
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