Posted on 10/06/2005 2:30:51 PM PDT by freedomdefender
In many ways, the biggest fault line emerging among conservatives is between East Coast elites, on the one hand, and rank-and-file conservatives elsewhere in the country. As soon as the [Miers] nomination was announced, Beltway conservatives began griping that Miers, a former Dallas lawyer and a graduate of Southern Methodist University Law School, lacked the credentials to serve on the Supreme Court. "An inspiring testament to the diversity of the president's cronies," quipped National Review's Ramesh Ponnuru. ...
Away from the Eastern seaboard, however, conservatives were warming to Miers. Irate National Review readers wrote to accuse the magazine of elitism. A conservative Texas lawyer complained that calling Miers's old firm "undistinguished" was "the kind of thing that only an absolute snob--someone who takes the position that no Texas firm could ever be anything but undistinguished--would say." Meanwhile, prominent evangelical leaders were busy singing Miers's praises. James Dobson, the president of the Colorado-based Focus on the Family, gushed that "Harriet Miers appears to be an outstanding nominee for the Supreme Court." Marvin Olasky, the compassionate conservatism guru, noted with satisfaction that Miers had been active in a conservative evangelical church for 25 years, with all that implies about hot-button social issues.
What explains the divide? ...what's important here isn't ideology but sociology --that conservative elites are frequently as credentialist, even snobbish, as the liberal elites they scorn. ...
To be fair, the conservatives who populate National Review's blog retreated from the credentialist critique of Miers once the angry e-mails began pouring in. They emphasized instead that Miers lacked a coherent conservative legal philosophy--that she'd "never written seriously on constitutional issues," as National Review's Jonah Goldberg wrote. But this is really just a politically correct form of the same argument. Pretty much the only places where students are encouraged to develop a coherent "legal philosophy" are the top 20 law schools. These philosophies then get refined in the kind of academic or professional writing that only a tiny fraction of lawyers ever do.
Hinterland conservatives had none of these reservations. An article on Focus on the Family's website talked up Miers's record at the "prestigious Dallas law firm of Locke Purnell Rain Harrell" and quoted the organization's legal analyst, who pronounced himself unconcerned by Miers's lack of judicial experience or fluency with constitutional issues. Contrary to the widely repeated axiom that conservatives wanted Bush to appoint a "strict constructionist," most rank-and-file conservatives don't really care about legal philosophies. They care about their political objectives, such as abortion and gay marriage. ...
So which side will win out? Allow me to answer with a brief digression. A few years ago, I interviewed a top adviser to New York Governor George Pataki. New York conservatives, particularly neoconservatives at think tanks like the Manhattan Institute, were up in arms over the governor's habit of buying off interest groups with generous state contracts. I asked the adviser whether he was worried. Without missing a beat, he told me that no New Yorker had ever rejected a candidate because the "neocons" didn't approve. And he was right: Pataki won an overwhelming majority of Republican votes that fall.
The same can probably be said of legal politics: No voter is ever going to walk into a voting booth wondering whether the president's Supreme Court nominees share her legal philosophy, for the simple reason that most voters don't have a legal philosophy themselves. That may be unsettling to conservative elites. But, then, George W. Bush has never been one to worry about elites of any kind.
Not true. Ann Coulter's screed against Miers is all about Miers' law school not being "good enough" in Coulters' mind.
I think so long as the "snobbish conservatives" do the will of the people they will get their support. But as soon as they turn on someone for not being as snobby as them selves they will very quickly lose that support.
ps I can now announce, after much deliberation, that I support Harriet Miers for Supreme Court Judge.
I am sure this will secure her nomination ;)
Well, Ann is speaking for a very small minority if that is her arguement. Not too many people care what school Miers went to, most people just care how she views the Constitution. Perhaps she is good, but how does anyone know.
People who continue to post the same phrase, over and over on every thread, because they think it's cute aren't very creative.
In fact, Harvard Law does not guarantee merit. It guarantees a pedigree, but that is all.
Every one of the current justices went to Harvard or Yale, at some point. Would you call the results they produce meritorious?
I wasn't addressing YOU specifically. It's your thread, I posted by using Reply to post 1.
While we're at it, I don't wish to be lumped in with Ann Coulter. I don't care where Harriet Miers went to school.
Yes, that does seem to be the consistent reason Miers is being denigrated and criticized by the conservatives who are doing that. Grover Norquist and others who are opposing Miers all do so based upon "the disappointment in this nomination" and when questioned about that, explain that Miers is someone they don't imagine will be capable of influencing the liberals on the S.C., someone who won't be fully capable of understanding the tasks involved by a S.C. justice and similar, including those comments by Coulter that really did surprise me (Coulter says she's an evangelical and as an evangelical she opposes Miers but didn't explain farther other than Miers was a disappointment and, as Coulter said, wouldn't be up to the job).
Miers has a law degree and good character and is known well professionally to Bush and that's all it takes Constitutionally (actually, the law degree isn't necessary for the nomination as per the Constitution) to be nominated and even confirmed as a S.C. justice.
And, Miers has been forthright, outspoken even (when she HAS made public statements) about her understanding that if she is included on the S.C., she would "not legislate from the bench" but would "interpret and apply the Constitution" to issues before her/the court.
AND, she's holds conservative, even evangelical values and beliefs. SO, I don't see any problem with her character so far, from what I know about her, and the criciticsms by conservatives are all otherwise based upon those who find her "less than" in some social or "power" player terms.
As in, she's evangelical but to Coulter who is also, Miers didn't attend "the right...school" (incredible elitism at work in that statement), and on and on.
I rather like the idea of an ordinary American (if Miers can be called that, although to my view she's above average based upon her achievements) on the S.C., especially a woman of middle American experiences and educational history.
Liberal or conservative...East Coast elites, particularly inside the beltway, have always mocked anyone outside of their play-groups.
They didn't like Reagan but grudgingly got on board when the Revolution got rolling.
They like Bush even less and carped loudly about how he'd have to get rid of his TX advisors if he wanted to get so much as a pizza delivered in DC, then flipped over the genius of Karl Rove.
The best thing about elites is that they like keep to themselves, saving others the trouble of avoiding them.
"People who continue to post the same phrase, over and over on every thread, because they think it's cute aren't very creative."
Are they as clever as the 'go vote for hillary' crowd?
The conservatives that a New Republic writer or editor in Washington would be likely to know are people of similar background to New Republic staffers. Hence that means Ivy Leaguers and highflying elitists. This is sort of a "I polled everyone I know, and they all think ..." article.
Make that your tagline and save some wear and tear.
That is untrue, sinkspur. I have expressed this thought exactly twice. It was quoted several times, mostly by posters who did not understand what I meant.
If you can't refute it or even grasp it, why don't you just ignore it?
Egads! You think there's an uproar about Meirs' qualifications!
Oh, an excellent point!!! Hadn't thought of that. I am sick of them all, theirs and ours!
As a matter of fact, a person who may have once embraced the so-called "liberal" philosophy and then studied the writings of America's Founders, of Adam Smith, of people like Dr. Russell Kirk and other great intellectual giants in our history of conservative thought, tend to be better informed and more able to defend the ideas of liberty than others of us.
We have showcase "conservative" talk show people who major in provocative talk, and they have served a worthwhile purpose in arousing public dialogue, but they should not mistake themselves for authentic scholars and sole defenders of the ideas that underlie our Constitution. When they do, they appear childish and shallow.
I grasp it. The sentiment it expresses is, indeed, elitist.
The main point of objection, that most of us NON East Coast conservatives have, is that she is, to US, an unknown, and that although we'd love to trust the president; experience has taught us, that lifetime appointments, and the future of this Nation, this Culture, this way of life, the FUTURE of our FAMILIES!, is too D@MNED important to bet on "trust".
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