Posted on 10/10/2005 2:59:18 PM PDT by quidnunc
I suspect that President Bush was shocked to find such an uprising against his choice for a Supreme Court nominee. Why? Because it is coming not from the Liberal Left, but rather from his own base. Even George Will ran an opposition piece against Harriet Miers.
Conservatives have complained, in the past, about the elitists in the Democrat party as being the most liberal group and seemingly in a consistent state of launching snob attacks at everything this “cowboy” (as they call him) does.
I think that the Conservative-Republican cause also has its own share of these elitists, those who look down their noses at anyone who does not graduate from Harvard or Yale or even Stanford. …
-snip-
My personal views:
1. President Bush has "lived” with this woman for many years and knows her heart and soul. She helped him find Judge Roberts and the others potential candidates, so she knows what is needed to save this country and he knows this! No other president has ever been associated for so long or worked so closely with a Supreme Court nominee, so the fact that other presidents have been fooled by past selections does not mean that this can happen to this president!.
2. It is bad enough having the Democrats and fellow Leftists against us; we don't need Republicans, too.
3. It is not as if Bush carried a mandate when elected. There are still letters to the editor claiming that either Gore or Kerry really won the presidency, the latter by a bad vote count in Ohio. The media is trying daily to smear the President or his administration.
4. We don't need a long drawn-out battle in Congress right now with a possible filibuster, especially with all the problems raised by the Democrats and the biased media re Iraq, Katrina, the budget deficit, et al.
5. The President may have to appoint two more Supreme Court judges before his term expires, so there is still an opportunity to put up controversial conservatives for the Supreme Court and have the time to wage war against the Socialists in Congress.
6. We lost one election to William Jefferson Clinton because too many Republicans were mad at Bush Sr. including me, and so we voted for Perot. As a result, we had Clinton for 8 years. Let's not make that error again. Do you really want eight years of Hillary and her court nominees?
7. Did the Democrats condemn Clinton when he was impeached? No! They blamed everything on those “mean nasty Republicans” who thought that having sex with a young intern in the Oval Office during business was bad. Some Republicans joined the Democrats. Do the Republicans constantly back President Bush? No! If he is not 100% perfect, we want to punish him. Even 90% perfect is not good enough.
8. No baseball team could win a game if the team was run by what the fans in the park demanded instead of what the coach saw as a winner. Nor, could employees successfully run a corporation if the CEO had to follow their rules rather than what he (or she) knew best. We elected a boss. Back him. The next time, we had better get a stronger mandate (more voters) if we are to obtain an even stronger hold over Congress in 06 and 08!
-snip-
>>wvobiwan wrote: Yes. In fact we can DEMAND more. We're owed.
>>You sound like a Democrat-voting welfare recipient.
Welfare recipients don't earn their payouts. We worked damned hard to get a conservative in the White House.
I don't think Teddy or Biden would want to go there with a nominee like Brown, who would fight back.
I don't really have a problem with state lotteries. I am all for them until someone can come up with a better way to get money out of the great unwashed.
Apples and oranges. Reagan had a history of anticommunism going back to his days as head of SAG. His "A Time for Choosing" speech in 1964 placed him firmly in the Goldwater camp and he continued to preach conservatism wherever he went. Miers has done no such thing.
Reagan got Scalia confirmed 98-0.
Let's see, she contributed to Dukakis and the DNC in 1988. 2005-1988=17
Wrong. We worked damned hard to get Bush in the White House. He isn't a conservative.
Marshall had a record as a Federalist. He was a popular and good attorney before running for office. He spoke for Federalism, voted for Federalists, contributed to Federalists and was rewarded.
Miers has no record as a conservative. Her tenure on the school board was pro-diversity and she brought Gloria Steinem to SMU.
Again, I am not going after her on "qualifications." The constitution articulates no specific qualifications for SCOTUS so I think it is a non-issue.
The issue here (as I have said on earlier posts on this thread) is that conservatives have been burned too many times on SCOTUS nominees to back someone with a questionable philosophy.
No, I didn't forget this. She is unknown to us.
It's been well-suggested and well-assumed. Not well established. My point is that we would know for certain, if the pick was Luttig, Owen, or Alito.
Yes, he could do so, and I would welcome such a dialogue. As of yet, he's said nothing of the sort.
I agree that some of the conservative response has been venomous. I have not engaged in such behavior. I do understand the feeling of disappointment, as President Bush talked during the campaign about Antonin Scalia being his model for a Supreme Court Justice. But then, with this nomination, he did not follow-through, which is not like President Bush. He usually does what he says he will.
I agree. I really can't figure him out on all of this. I am bitterly disappointed in him. My wife predicted that he would cave on this nomination because of the pounding he has taken on Iraq and Katrina, and I at the time feared that she was right -- but on the other hand, it just didn't sound like him.
Up until now, he has, on every core issue that got him elected, stubbornly stuck to his guns and surprised his opponents by not giving an inch, even when "conventional wisdom" (i.e. the liberal elite and the MSM) said that this time he simply "had to" compromise. I hoped that his stubborn streak would prevail and that he would nominate a Brown, a Luttig, or (to really tick them off) someone they had blocked for a lower court appointment, like Miguel Estrada.
Unlike his father, he has not until now alienated the conservative base -- something daddybush did practically within months of being elected. Again, I am surprised that he did it.
A part of me wants to believe that he and Rove have something up their sleeves, but mostly, I think the Bush genes finally came through and he caved.
Another speculation is that a large part of the Republican party doesn't want Roe v Wade overturned, worrying that it would hurt them at the polls were that to happen. By this theory, Bush was under pressure to find people who look conservative, but that would ultimately keep the status quo (i.e. more O'Connors and Kennedys). Wouldn't surprise me, especially with the rising influence of folks like McCain and Guiliani.
What we have learned since - and could have guessed - is that Bush first decided it had to be a woman, for affirmative action and ease of confirmation reasons - and that the most qualified in that deliberately limited pool of the less than best turned it down as not worth the political circus involved in a confirmation fight. Leaving us with the most experienced female lawyer friend of the President who is willing to have spitballs thrown at her - a stellar recommendation, isn't it?
Naturally, some of the blame for that state of affairs belongs on other shoulders. Those who inventing "Borking", those who have appeased affirmative action nonsense for decades, those unwilling to put up with personal attacks for a greater good for their country, etc. But it is a profile in the opposite of courage, any way you slice it.
The only point I was making in comparing Miers to Marshall was the lack of judicial experience should not be a deciding factor. You might want to try drinking your hate instead of spewing it.
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