"I predict george will will be attacked on this thread like never before."
I'm disturbed by how many commentators I used to respect seem to be using no logical reasoning in this case. Larry Kudlow is on the radio right now and he was discussing Miers basically saying "well ((such and such)) has supported her and that's good enough for me"... "and this group supports her and they're good". Where are his critical thinking skills? Anybody who honestly thinks "Bush picked her and I trust him" is an argument, really scares me.
that's my problem as well.
It's like saying "I give up my right to be critical and evaluate something on its merits because it was done by someone else I was told I should trust."
NEVER give away those rights and responsibilities.
Let me try to give this a shot.
I would venture that 99.999999% of the FReeper nation has never met, talked, listened to, or even knew Miers until just recently. I read everything I could find about her yesterday after the announcement and the most negative was she once donated to Gore. Well damn, I once VOTED for Jimmy Carter. DUH!
We do not get to interview her, we do not know her, we will never "know" her and therefore put a modicum of trust in the person we elected twice to the highest office in the land.
The jury is still out but I think this will work out in our favor.
President Bush says Miers is an originalist, Miers says she's an originalist. Do you think one or both of them is lying?
Agreed.
One of the functions of the president is to be the leader of his party.
If you can't trust the leader of your party, that is YOUR problem, not mine.
I've got a better argument. Constitutionally speaking, she is totally qualified. (The Constitution is silent on judicial qualifications.) Her qualifications are at least as good as if not better than a sizeable number of the 109 people who have served on the court since 1789. Here's one recent example:
He served in World War II with the Army Air Corps. When the War ended, he entered Stanford University and graduated in 1948 with both an undergraduate and master's degree. He earned a second master's degree from Harvard University in 1950 before enrolling in Stanford Law School. After graduation in 1952, he served as law clerk to Supreme Court Associate Justice Robert H. Jackson for one term. He settled in Phoenix, Arizona, the following year and practiced law for 16 years until 1969, when President Richard M. Nixon appointed him Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel in the Department of Justice. On October 21, 1971, President Nixon nominated him as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Who is he? The late Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who spent most of his career in private practice, before serving briefly as an Assistant Attorney General and then being nominated to the Supreme Court.
Here's another example (there are plenty more):
Lewis F. Powell, Jr., Associate Justice 1972-1987. Lived most of his life in Richmond, Virginia. He graduated from Washington and Lee University in 1929 and from Washington and Lee University Law School in 1931. In 1932, he received a master's degree from Harvard Law School. Powell entered practice with a Richmond law firm, where he became senior partner and continued his association until 1971. During World War II, he served in the United States Army Air Force in Europe and North America. After the War, Powell resumed his law practice. He served as the President of the American Bar Association from 1964 to 1965 and of the American College of Trial Lawyers from 1968 to 1969. In 1966, he served as a member of President Lyndon B. Johnson's Crime Commission. On October 21, 1971, Richard M. Nixon nominated Powell to the Supreme Court of the United States. Powell served on the Supreme Court for fifteen years. He retired on June 26, 1987, at the age of seventy-nine.
One last example, just to drive the point home:
Arthur J. Goldberg, Associate Justice 1962-1965. Graduated from Northwestern University in 1929 and received his law degree in 1930. Goldberg was admitted to the bar and joined a law firm in which he specialized in labor law. He first gained national recognition by representing the Chicago Newspaper Guild in a 1938 strike. Goldberg served as Chief of the Labor Division of the Office of Strategic Services in Europe during World War II. After the war, Goldberg returned to his practice and became counsel to both the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) and the United Steelworkers of America. He played a major role in the merger of the two largest national labor organizations in 1955 (AFL-CIO). President John F. Kennedy appointed Goldberg Secretary of Labor in 1961. The following year, on August 29, 1962, President Kennedy nominated Goldberg to the Supreme Court of the United States.
Harriet Miers is qualified to serve on the Supreme Court. The Constitution is silent on judicial qualifications and, instead, entrusts the President of the United States with making the decision as to qualifications. In other words, the Constitution says "trust the president."
Admittedly, we don't know a great deal about her, but from what we do know, she is a conservative.
As far as I can see, she is being pilloried by a lot of elite conservative snobs and their easily stampeded followers simply because she doesn't have an elite education and prior judicial experience on a U.S. appeals court, where her political leanings might have become an open book.
She has vetted most of Dubya's court picks and it looks to me like she's done a pretty good job. Most of the names I have heard around here as "better picks" are only known here because this woman found them and vetted them.
To me when I saw her come into the Oval Office with President Bush I was like..."who is this? she looks like a lady named Betty who lives in my old neighborhood when I was a kid and worked bake sales, church raffles,the woman's club, and took you to the carnival when my mom couldn't."
Not the future SCOTUS Judge for the next 30 + yrs that Bush needed to pick. One of my biggest arguments besides her being a political hack friend of W's is...SHE IS TOO OLD FOR THE POSITION. He should have started with someone around 48-51 yrs old max.
Put someone who will be on there for 30 yrs at-least. I will be surprised if she makes it 10-12 yrs max...she looks tired already with her racoon eyes at age what? 61? C'mon!