Gods vs. Geeks

Slate ^ | 05 October 2005 | John Dickerson

[Lorianne]

The debate within the Republican Party over Harriet Miers has quickly devolved into a simple question: Is the nominee qualified because of her religious faith, or unqualified by her lack of intellectual heft?

In this battle, the White House has clearly sided with the churchgoing masses against the Republican Party's own whiny Beltway intellectuals. The Bushies have always mistrusted their own bow-tied secularists, but the rift has never before been so public. "This is classic elitism," says a senior administration official of the GOP opposition to the Miers nomination. "We often blame the left for it, but we have it in our own ranks. Just because she wasn't on a shortlist of conservatives who prepared their whole life for this moment doesn't make her any less conservative … and just because she hasn't penned op-eds for the Wall Street Journal doesn't mean she hasn't formed a judicial philosophy."

Left-wing bloggers may see the Bush administration and its allies as a uniform mass, but like all successful political teams, it's actually a coalition. At the heart of the coalition is an uncomfortable mix between, on the one hand, right-wing intellectuals, including the neoconservatives whose backing for the Iraq invasion has been so important, and, on the other, the evangelicals who turned out in such numbers to vote for a man who boasted that he was one of them. The Bible-thumbing armies may carry the elections, but they sometimes make the elites in the Republican Party as uncomfortable as they make Maureen Dowd and Michael Moore. In return, the mega-church attendees are mistrustful of the party's often secular, often not-Christian pundits and wizards.

[villagerjoel]

I don't like the pick and this article doesn't describe why. Maybe she'll turn out to be a great justice (if confirmed), but the very fact that she was so close, and there are so many other candidates who are so much more qualified, and also more conservatie and were not picked is what I have a problem with.

[sourcery]

Apparently, she has favored "affirmative action" (politically-correct discrimination based on race or gender) in the past.

[nathanbedford]

The article is illustrative of the difficulty a secular elitist has in closing with the truth so he keeps circling it. The author comes close to the truth here, but reflexively reverts, Marxist-like, to a secular dialectic later:

But the Miers pick is more reminiscent of the candidate who in 1999 was asked who his favorite philosopher was. "Christ," Bush famously replied, "because he changed my heart. ... When you turn your heart and your life over to Christ, when you accept Christ as the Savior, it changes your heart and changes your life."

Here the author had it, but must revert to his nature and see the matter in terms of Bush striking back at elitists like he saw at yale or even within his party. The truth is straightforward, as usual. Bush is first a committed Christian, then a devoted family man who values personal loyalty to an extreme, and third, a conservative when that philosophy does not conflict with the first two. In this appointment, Bush believes he has satisfied all three legs of the stool. This is what I posted yesterday:

On the limited evidence available, I do positively believe Bush appointed her because she has been reborn. I mean that quite respectfully. I mean that he is counting on her being a new person. Most of the time it means she will vote conservative. But I honestly do not think Bush appointed her to vote conservative. I think he appointed he to vote in the SPIRIT.

Rather than a trojan horse, I think Bush saw her as wise as a serpent - in keeping with the Biblical injunction to the Saints to comport themselves thus.

[rebelyell7]

"But I honestly do not think Bush appointed her to vote conservative. I think he appointed he to vote in the SPIRIT."

Is this an argument in favor of her? This isn't the nation of Islam, I don't want judges chosen by their willingness to vote on religious grounds. I want a solid conservative who rules based on what the CONSTITUTION says, not what her personal beliefs are.

[nathanbedford]

Hey Rebel, stop yellin at me, I was simply offering up my deduction for what it is worth. I do think that in practice you will get an origonalist if you get a Christian, but you are quite right, every President should be compelled by common practice to justify his nominees as a "constitutionalist."

But I think we both would agree, all the sturm and drang about this nomination misses the real problem, we have been brought to this place by leftists who have by judicial coup so altered our constitution that we find ourselves governed according to a method repugnant to the original document, as amended. So, this appointment, indeed every appointment to the court, unavoidably assumes armageddon-like dimensions. The left have so rigged the deal that our childrens' very liberties and birthright to a real democracy are just one more Souter away from extinction.

Are we to blame Bush for appointing a cipher who can be approved but in whom he has confidence not because she is an acknowledged origonalist with (gasp) a paper trail, but because she is born again? Our frustrations should be directed at the gang of seven who undermined Bush and left him with a difficult calculus. If Bush deserves criticism it should also be directed at his reluctance to use the Bully Pulpit and change the culture at the time of the unilateral disarmament of the nuclear option.

[Reactionary]

"So, this appointment, indeed every appointment to the court, unavoidably assumes armageddon-like dimensions. The left have so rigged the deal that our childrens' very liberties and birthright to a real democracy are just one more Souter away from extinction."

You're exactly right. And as someone who is at best an agnostic, I have no problem with Harriet Miers, her judicial "philosophy" (from what I know of it), or her Christianity.

[Reactionary]

"If Bush deserves criticism it should also be directed at his reluctance to use the Bully Pulpit and change the culture at the time of the unilateral disarmament of the nuclear option."

Even God Himself couldn't change the spinelessness of the United States Senate. If Republicans are itching for a fight they're welcome to one, of course, but there is little chance that it will end in victory.

Bush did the only intelligent thing he could do, given the political realities we face. And Harriet Miers is, I think, a solid choice.

[nathanbedford]

Even God Himself couldn't change the spinelessness of the United States Senate. If Republicans are itching for a fight they're welcome to one, of course, but there is little chance that it will end in victory.

Bush did the only intelligent thing he could do, given the political realities we face. And Harriet Miers is, I think, a solid choice

I disagree and I think Majority Leader Daschel might disagree as well if he believes no one is listening. Bush did quite well campaigning against the libs obstructionism on judicial nominees. He had the mo after Daschell's fall but slept it away. You cannot say under these circumstance of making no effort to shape the debate on the nuclear option (I think he spoke once) that he certainly would have failed had he tried.

These are his nominees, he is the leader of the party, he has the bully pulpit, it is covered in the modern day job description of a President.The fact is he didn't try and thus he is partially responsible for this fiasco. Having slimply abdicated the moral high ground, along with the momentem after the election, he compounded our problem with an appointee who is a cipher, who smacks of cronyism, and whose qualifications are apparent only to George Bush.

He might have gotten away with this appointment if he had campaigned on the nuclear option.