Posted on 10/08/2005 8:52:39 AM PDT by JCEccles
The lovably irascible Beldar, the Texas trial lawyer who is one of the two people on earth hotly defending the Miers nomination (the other being our buddy Hugh Hewitt), has posted a convenient link to articles written by Harriet Miers during one of her stints as a bar association honcho. He did this in part to address a charge I made on Hugh's show that Miers shouldn't be taken seriously because over the past 30 years of hot dispute on matters of constitutional law she hadn't published so much as an op-ed on a single topic of moment. Thank you, Beldar. But you shouldn't have. I mean, for Miers's sake, you really shouldn't have.
Miers's articles here are like all "Letters from the President" in all official publications -- cheery and happy-talky and utterly inane. They offer no reassurance that there is anything other than a perfectly functional but utterly ordinary intellect at work here.
Let me offer you an analogy. I was a talented high-school and college actor. I even considered trying it as a career at one time. As an adult, I've been in community theater productions (favorably reviewed in the Virginia local weekly supplement of the Washington Post, yet!) and spent a year or so performing improv comedy in New York. I'm a more than decent semi-pro. But if you took me today and gave me a leading role in the Royal Shakespeare Company where I would have to stand toe to toe with, say, Kenneth Branagh, Kevin Spacey, Meryl Streep, Kevin Kline and others, I would be hopelessly out of my depth. I would be able to give some kind of performance. But it would be a lousy performance, a nearly unwatchable performance.
Would that be because I hadn't acted at their level for a few decades? Would it be because I don't really have commensurate talent? Who knows? Who cares? I would stink. And based on the words she herself has written -- the clearest independent evidence we have of her capacity to reason and think and argue -- as a Supreme Court justice, Harriet Miers would be about as good.
Thanks for taking this out of context.
The poster said she was a glorified personal attorney. Don't you think that was a slur?
And accusing ANYONE who is critical of this Stealth Choice of being a DU-er is the HEIGHT of Hubris!
You act like all the folks supporting Miers are knee-jerk Bush supporters. Well, I oppose Bush's stances on illegal immigration, spending, education, Medicare and other areas.
I see...and THESE lapses in judgement/listening to the WRONG advice do not give you ANY reason to question this choice? If Bush said "Trust Me" on the Border issue (and hasn't he with his choice of Julie Meyers?), would you be as confident? Another Ted Kennedy Education Bill perhaps?
I feel that the irrational "Cult Of Bush" support...attacking LONG-TIME conservatives who question her nomination, and the process that led to it...the INCESSANT "DU-Troll" ism from the likes of certain OBL MORONS here...THAT is Knee-Jerk "Cult of Bush"-ism!
Just answer the questions I posed here fairly...I'll reprint the other one...
Just ask yourself...if Clinton had done this, and Miers was Clinton's nominee with EXACTLY the same record and assurances...would you support her?
If not...why not?
I don't believe that anybody who hasn't worked in a big law firm and experienced the rivalries, Byzantine politics, and covert warfare going on inside can fully appreciate what it means for somebody to have been managing partner of a big law firm.
If she could manage THAT job, eight old guys on the Supremes are going to be a cakewalk.
And how much input do clerks often have in writing SCOTUS decisions?
You just can't even concede any points, can you? If she submits briefs that win state and US Supreme Court decisions, well, then, you move the bar and then say she might not have written them - even though the brief is her responsibility.
That isn't a debate. That's just being deceptive and dishonest.
Oh, I don't accuse people making reasoned points against her to be DU-ers.
Just those parroting DU-type anti-Bush points such as cronyism.
Just ask yourself...if Clinton had done this, and Miers was Clinton's nominee with EXACTLY the same record and assurances...would you support her?
I wouldn't have supported ANY of Clinton's nominees. Unlike some in the GOP who are coming up with absurd reasons to attack this nominee from a GOP president.
She still yet may prove herself to be not suitable. But I'm gonna wait to decide, unlike you folks who attack like you're channeling Lanni Davis.
For all of you who are regurgitating this line about the "beltway snobs" (not meaning to single you out, Xenia), you should be aware of two things:
You are helping to spread a Whitehouse talking point. You didn't come up with this--they did. And they are very happy that you've decided to run with it. Yeah, down with the elites! We need normal, everyday people!
It's convenient, and appealing, but it's a straw argument. If Harriet's downhome-iness and regular person-ness makes her appealing as a SC judge, let's get a real salt-of-the-earth personage--what about the above-average intelligent guy who runs the Meineke near me? He's smart as a whip, in an unschooled way, and actually spouts real wisdom now and then. I recall him saying he went to community college for a semester--no way is HE an elitist! I can actually think of at least one way in which he is superior: He is avowedly pro-life, and will tell you that bluntly, without "parsing," in about a minute after having met you. But I guess Bush hasn't known him for decades.
#2: So many here are hammering Krauthammer, Podhoretz and so many others on this...and yet most of us seemed to agree with most of what most of them said most of the time in the past, didn't we? Hmmmm....
"I have known her since she was on the city council. Even then she was a stickler for going by the city charter, and often stated the courts are out of control, and we need to get back to the Founders original intent."
Come on: Back THEN she was invoking "the Founders original intent"? [sic] That's a little convenient.
Not to mention taking care of her 93 year old mother.
Aha! Nice to hear that particular anecdote about Harriet M..
John, thank your for your down to earth statements. This Miers is as elitist and insider as they come.
2. I often disagree with pundits. I have repeatedly disagreed with Peggy Noonan, disagreed with Coulter on her ridiculous tirade against John Roberts, disagreed with Krauthammer on the need to invade the Balkans and his screed against "The Pssion of Christ." While I don't know for sure that Harriet Miers will make a good Supreme Court justice, I am certain that these pundits have not provided any real proof that she will not. The longer they keep up this unreasonable, personal attack on Miers and the President, the less likely I am to ever read any of them again.
BTTT
It seems that there are two central camps:
1. Those who see this as the best chance to engage the enemy head on, draw copious quantities of blood and leave the enemy utterly vanquished. Or, willingly die on the battlefield content that they've sacrificed themselves for a noble cause.
2. Those who see the war as a war and are not yet ready to define it in the terms of a single, bloody battle; regardless of the momentary satisfaction of bloodlust it may bring.
The scope and extent of the arguments of generals rarely are shared with battalion commanders, platoon leaders, sergeants and corporals. Yet, when the generals decide, the rest of them must go forward. Front line grunts may disagree with the choice made, but forward they go.
Active debate between the blood spillers and the decision makers is a healthy thing, in the main. However, there is always a small, quite vocal at times, minority - both generals and corporals - for whom the immediate battle both defines the war and determines its outcome; usually due to the inability to shift from the narrow focus of the task at hand to the overall stratgey required to triumph in the end; for a variety of reasons not all of which either are explainable nor are logically evident.
The logical conclusion in this instance seems to be to maintain the ability to constructively and realistically criticize the process by which this decision was made. However, any specific, personal criticisms of the nominee's abilities, capabilities and probable future performance cannot logically be done until more insight is gained; which will only occur during the hearing process. Only then, will it be possible to render a cogent, logical decision; unless of course, one is in the habit of making such decisions from a foundation of emotion rather than logic.
Here's another interesting variable to throw into the argument. I wonder how many of the senators who may vote "No" on this nominee, yet who voted "Yes" for Ginsburg (and also, those senators' supporters who continue to vote for them in election after election and are FR posters) - knowing that they fundamentally disagreed with her ideology, her beliefs and her general world-view - will be able to logically justify that "No" vote if this nominee's positions more closely mirror theirs.
Rehnquist was a part of it. He went to Stanford, one of the finest law schools in the country. He spent two years clerking for a Supreme Court Justice. He taught law.
Anthony Scalis was part of it. Clarence Thomas went to an "elistist" law school.
Of the many women jurists that "these NRO"clowns would approve --Owen, JRB, Edith Jones, Karen Williams, Alice Batchelder--not ONE went to an Ivy League School (or, for that matter, a school in the NE.) In fact, apart from Batchelder, who got an advanced degree from UVA, not one of them went to a school in the top 10.
As for the "NRO Clowns" themselves, I don't know where Podhoritz went to school, but Katherine Lopez, the editor, went to Catholic U, and Jonah Goldberg discribes himself as an "afirmative action baby" at a women's college that was going co-ed.
And you think Miers bio does not make her an elitist? She is the Texas insider's insider.
I prefer to keep the faith in conservative optimism and the Army acronym: MOOSEMUSS! I begin to wonder if there are bitter little McCains running about on this forum.
At least I meet the minimal undergraduate degree in mathematics apparently required to discuss the qualifications of this nominee.
So, I take it you were against the nomination of John Roberts?
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