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The manner in which Miers was sunk gives the Dems in the Senate a huge lift. They can freely say they were willing to support the President's nominee, but she was sunk by the "radical right wing". Whomever the next nominee is -- unless he/she's definitely more liberal/moderate than Miers, will be portrayed as a pick forced on the President by the Terry Schiavo/Pat Robertson freaky right wing, and opposed on that basis. They've wanted an opportunity to derail the process, and it was just handed to them. It would have been much better for her to have failed on a vote where there would be a lot of Democrats on record as having opposed her. Now, the withdrawal will be blamed entirely on the right. And the Dem "support" for her will be there excuse to derail future nominees.

You got that exactly right. So much for our claim about everyone deserving a fair up or down vote. We are all severely weakened... but some feel there is victory in defeat or are just content with "moral" victories. Those victories NEVER get anything done in Washington.

The manner in which Miers was sunk gives the Dems in the Senate a huge lift. They can freely say they were willing to support the President's nominee, but she was sunk by the "radical right wing". Whomever the next nominee is -- unless he/she's definitely more liberal/moderate than Miers, will be portrayed as a pick forced on the President by the Terry Schiavo/Pat Robertson freaky right wing, and opposed on that basis. They've wanted an opportunity to derail the process, and it was just handed to them. It would have been much better for her to have failed on a vote where there would be a lot of Democrats on record as having opposed her. Now, the withdrawal will be blamed entirely on the right. And the Dem "support" for her will be there excuse to derail future nominees.

Exactly right. Now we can't even blame this one on the Dems - we did it to one of our own. Did you know that a Conservative Christian group took a whole full blown ad out yesterday in a paper asking Bush to withdraw Miers? How pathetic is that when they don't even know what she is like?

Very good points both of you.

The GOP has no party discipline. One of the things that has enabled the Dems to become so powerful is that, even when they are in the minority, they adhere to party discipline, do what they are told and support their leaders. Objectively, this is a bad thing; but from a political point of view, it is the only thing that works. They must be really happy now, having watched us do their dirty work for them.