Posted on 10/05/2005 4:03:47 PM PDT by perfect stranger
I eagerly await the announcement of President Bush's real nominee to the Supreme Court. If the president meant Harriet Miers seriously, I have to assume Bush wants to go back to Crawford and let Dick Cheney run the country.
Unfortunately for Bush, he could nominate his Scottish terrier Barney, and some conservatives would rush to defend him, claiming to be in possession of secret information convincing them that the pooch is a true conservative and listing Barney's many virtues – loyalty, courage, never jumps on the furniture ...
Harriet Miers went to Southern Methodist University Law School, which is not ranked at all by the serious law school reports and ranked No. 52 by US News and World Report. Her greatest legal accomplishment is being the first woman commissioner of the Texas Lottery.
I know conservatives have been trained to hate people who went to elite universities, and generally that's a good rule of thumb. But not when it comes to the Supreme Court.
First, Bush has no right to say "Trust me." He was elected to represent the American people, not to be dictator for eight years. Among the coalitions that elected Bush are people who have been laboring in the trenches for a quarter-century to change the legal order in America. While Bush was still boozing it up in the early '80s, Ed Meese, Antonin Scalia, Robert Bork and all the founders of the Federalist Society began creating a farm team of massive legal talent on the right.
To casually spurn the people who have been taking slings and arrows all these years and instead reward the former commissioner of the Texas Lottery with a Supreme Court appointment is like pinning a medal of honor on some flunky paper-pusher with a desk job at the Pentagon – or on John Kerry – while ignoring your infantrymen doing the fighting and dying.
Second, even if you take seriously William F. Buckley's line about preferring to be governed by the first 200 names in the Boston telephone book than by the Harvard faculty, the Supreme Court is not supposed to govern us. Being a Supreme Court justice ought to be a mind-numbingly tedious job suitable only for super-nerds trained in legal reasoning like John Roberts. Being on the Supreme Court isn't like winning a "Best Employee of the Month" award. It's a real job.
One website defending Bush's choice of a graduate from an undistinguished law school complains that Miers' critics "are playing the Democrats' game," claiming that the "GOP is not the party which idolizes Ivy League acceptability as the criterion of intellectual and mental fitness." (In the sort of error that results from trying to sound "Ivy League" rather than being clear, that sentence uses the grammatically incorrect "which" instead of "that." Websites defending the academically mediocre would be a lot more convincing without all the grammatical errors.)
Actually, all the intellectual firepower in the law is coming from conservatives right now – and thanks for noticing! Liberals got stuck trying to explain Roe vs. Wade and are still at work 30 years later trying to come up with a good argument.
But the main point is: Au contraire! It is conservatives defending Miers' mediocre resume who are playing the Democrats' game. Contrary to recent practice, the job of being a Supreme Court justice is not to be a philosopher-king. Only someone who buys into the liberals' view of Supreme Court justices as philosopher-kings could hold legal training irrelevant to a job on the Supreme Court.
To be sure, if we were looking for philosopher-kings, an SMU law grad would probably be preferable to a graduate from an elite law school. But if we're looking for lawyers with giant brains to memorize obscure legal cases and to compose clearly reasoned opinions about ERISA pre-emption, the doctrine of equivalents in patent law, limitation of liability in admiralty, and supplemental jurisdiction under Section 1367 – I think we want the nerd from an elite law school. Bush may as well appoint his chauffeur head of NASA as put Miers on the Supreme Court.
Third and finally, some jobs are so dirty, you can only send in someone who has the finely honed hatred of liberals acquired at elite universities to do them. The devil is an abstraction for normal, decent Americans living in the red states. By contrast, at the top universities, you come face to face with the devil every day, and you learn all his little tropes and tricks.
Conservatives from elite schools have already been subjected to liberal blandishments and haven't blinked. These are right-wingers who have fought off the best and the brightest the blue states have to offer. The New York Times isn't going to mau-mau them – as it does intellectual lightweights like Jim Jeffords and Lincoln Chafee – by dangling fawning profiles before them. They aren't waiting for a pat on the head from Nina Totenberg or Linda Greenhouse. To paraphrase Archie Bunker, when you find a conservative from an elite law school, you've really got something.
However nice, helpful, prompt and tidy she is, Harriet Miers isn't qualified to play a Supreme Court justice on "The West Wing," let alone to be a real one. Both Republicans and Democrats should be alarmed that Bush seems to believe his power to appoint judges is absolute. This is what "advice and consent" means.
I tell you what, why dont you go back through every post of every single person who supports Miers and then form an opinion on the Mier supporters, instead of indulging in insults and intellectual barbarism.
"Exactly how is Coulter's opinion on the law better than a woman who headed a large law firm?"
Thank you for asking. She's whipsmart, probably brilliant, and a constitutional lawyer WHO HAS PRACTICED LAW.
How many Freepers are aware that, in many cases, a "woman who headed a large law firm" did, mainly, a management job. In other words, the company (law firm) needs to be "run." It is not always true, but great law firm managers have very often been lawyers who were not "allowed" to practice real law by the partners. Ask any of the lawyers here.
I am disappointed in this pick by the president...and reserve the right to be even more disappointed later. That said, I fervently hope that I am dead wrong, and that she turns out to be brilliant.
But let's be realistic: A person's path going forward is almost always indicative of what the next steps will be. Roberts, upon examination, is brilliant--and seems very much headed in the right direction. Miers, I fear, is simply not up to the job intellectually. Again, please let me be wrong.
The hearings will be interesting: If the Dems go lightly on her, it will mean to me that we've been had. On the other hand, if they hammer her, I fear she will wilt--again, we will have been had.
Finally, Ann is better on an off-day than most of us here are on our best days.
I well remember the years when I first entered the field, though. I had to do everything better just to be accepted as competent. I had to listen to crude jokes. I was once asked if I took birth control pills in an interview.
I didn't have the toughness to pursue my career. Harriet Miers did.
Ann Coulter denigrating Harriet Miers, who broke ground for people like Ann, is just shameful.
I have no doubt that people are disappointed. In my fantasies, I wanted Janice Rogers Brown and a knock-down fight with lots of juicy put downs of kennedy, Schumer, and Durbin.
But it is obvious to me that Miers is the best conservative that we will get confirmed in this environment. I count 7 Republicans that would not vote for a Janice Rogers Brown, minimum. Given that situation, it seems to me that (at least in public) we should take this as a win. It sure would help me deal with my disappointment in the conservative pundits if they could manage to be less elitist, condescending, and insulting.
I just don't like the level of venom in this article. It really does sound like Maureen Dowd, and that's pretty frightening.
I think his point is that there should be no division within this camp.
The schism should be between us and the liberal Democrats who want to thwart our goals.
That should be the divide.
Good for her. Sandra Day O'Connor had been on the Supreme Court for four years by then, so her service as an officer of some professional organization is hardly trail-blazing - rather, it is just the sort of demographic trivia that liberals obsess over, and could not possibly be less relevant as a qualification to serve as a Supreme Court Justice.
I hope she turns out okay, but have no reason to believe that this is a good choice. I do think it is a slap in the face to many very qualified jurists, some of them even (as if it matters) other women.
So, then, do you think Ann was right to emulate DU types and bring up Bush's past alcoholism?
Ann's earned all the abuse we have heaped on her. It's one thing to make your case in an objective and principled manner. It's another thing to be a jackass. And Ann was a jackass with this column.
Who would you rather have on the Supreme Court, Harriet Miers or Janice Rogers Brown?
Meanwhile pioneering and openly conservative women who have served state supreme and federal appellate court judges were passed by.
This pick is a joke.
That "blow to conservative jurists" just surfaced today after Coulter said it. What was your excuse righ after the nomination?
But Cautor thinks that means you are absolutely against her so he lumps the unformed opinions into the no vote column, ask him hes a math genius.
Ann has been getting on my nerves lately, and that is before the nomination of Harriet Meirs. I was embarrassed for her and for us conservatives when she said something on the Hannity / Colmes show last week that appalled me. Nope, Ann...you don't represent all of us.
I'm going to just assume that you were also a huge John Dean and Charles "F.C." Ruff enthusiast, when they occupied that position within the White House.
In her case she rose to those positions for the same reason she is to be elevated to the Court. Because of who she knows.
Ann Ann Ann... your being a whiny Witch!
True. He did promise more FedGov, and he HAS delivered.
Personal attacks started when Coulter starting saying Bush needed to be impeached!
Oh, puh-leeze. Cut the crap and realize that she has a lot of talent and works her rear off.
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