A Forest Of Strawmen

Jim, now you're resorting to misrepresenting my views and putting words in my mouth, to wit:"Ah, now the truth comes out. Dig long enough and it usually does. The President decides to create a “Christian seat” on the Supreme Court, and that’s all it takes to buy you off." All I said was that I view her Christianity as a PLUS, while you seem to think it is the only reason for her appointment.

Well, Jen, were these not your words?:

I think her evangelical Christianity is a PLUS, an item in her favor. Why don't you? Would you rather have someone with no religious foundation as your "constitutionalist" justice? Most of our Founders had Christian backgrounds and beliefs. Why don't you want the same in the Supreme Court justices?

You certainly seem to value her religious underpinnings a great deal more than the alleged originalist fealty nobody has yet been able to unearth. And while you did go on to add that, "While being an evangelical Christian is certainly not the only consideration in choosing a nominee..., " it came across to me as an afterthought, as if via a belated realization of how the preceding comments sounded like single-issue/identity politics in need of mitigation.

So, even with your "clarification," it still appears that you place faith in Christ as the top criterion in selection a SCOTUS Justice over faith in the original intent of the Constitution's authors. Personally, I would prefer both qualities in any prospective nominee, but if I had to choose, I would pick constitutionalism over Christianity ever time, because it is only by the former that religious liberties can be preserved and, ultimately, fully restored.

And, incidentally, I have indicated what I think are the reasons Bush chose Harriet Miers: (1) she's his friend; (2) her name was on Harry Reid's list; and an additional two I neglected to add, (3) the ability to wear a skirt without it being cross-dressing, and (4) revenge on the GOP base for crapping all over his other best bud Alberto Gonzales, and/or as a stalking horse for an eventual replacement of Miers BY Gonzales. Miers' faith is merely being exploited by the White House to try and foist her on conservatives - and the vast majority of us are not buying it.

Incidentally, just as Bush could have nominated a constitutionalist judge as well as an evangelical in Michael McConnell, so he could have also nominated a constitutionalist judge as well as woman and close friend from Texas, Priscilla Owen. And he passed over her for the same reason he snubbed McConnell - no stomach for an eminently winnable Senate showdown.

Heck, I didn't even say I support her nomination, but you have referred to me as a "Miersian" and a "Miers Cheerleader" or some other such nonsense.

Please, Jennifer, don't backpedal into disingenuousness now. Either concede the point or stand steadfast and fight for what Bush described yesterday as "his girl."

His other embellishment was to say that, "I think she'll make a good judge." Whatever that means.

Even for as abysmal a rhetorician as Dubya, that's pretty lame, dontcha think?

I don't know her well enough to be a cheerleader for her. That has been my whole point throughout this discussion. YOU don't know her well enough to be so convinced that she is a disaster.

Odd that I have been making the very same point. The line of demarcation seems to be that that mystery doesn't disturb you in the least, whereas it outrages me because that isn't what Bush promised us for the past five years. We were promised Scalias and Thomases, not "The Unknown Justice" or what's behind door #3. And with a double-digit Senate majority - which was also sold to us as the path to Scalias and Thomases - there's no reason or justification for going the stealth route.

It's not as if I enjoy watching the Bush presidency go up in flames, after all. I've looked at this nomination from every conceivable angle, and there's just no way to rationalize it, no consolation to be had. Miers is not qualified; she's never been a judge, never tried a case before the SCOTUS, and has no writings indicating any thought or pondering of constitutional law/issues. She wouldn't be the nominee if she weren't Bush's personal attorney. She was chosen because Harry Reid gave his permission to do so. It's inflamed and demoralized the GOP base. It will at best not move the Court in the right direction, and may well end up losing ground. And it will probably cost the President further erosion of his war-fighting powers.

I guess my primary frustration with you on this topic is that you seem so willing to be mollified with the "Trust Dubya" stonewall. Again, that's your choice to make, but I can neither do nor understand that. A Republican president running on a promise to appoint Scalias and Thomases who then takes the almost universally disastrous "stealth" route has, to my admittedly and stubbornly logical mind, broken that promise. The very act of breaking that promise forfeits his claim upon his supporters' trust. And to be told to trust him anyway is akin to telling us to turn off our brains and stop thinking for ourselves.

Even if I could do that, I wouldn't. It just perplexes me that you apparently can, as your next blurb once again illustrates.

I know you disagree with me on this (to a rather puzzling degree), but give me a little credit for thinking about this for myself rather than, what was it you said? Just blindly "following the man?" Apparently Bush thinks Miers will make a better Justice than McConnell. Did that ever occur to you?

Not in the context of the President actually knowing what he's doing, no. I assumed he did, but that was before this Miers pick. Nobody with three brain cells to rub together would seriously conclude that Harriet Miers would make a better Supreme Court Justice than Michael McConnell (or Luttig, Garza, Jones, Karen Williams, Samuel Alito, Alice Baumgartner, Edith Brown Clement, William Pryor, Maureen Mahoney, Priscilla Owen, Janice Rogers Brown, or hell, even Alberto Gonzales). Since not even the Democrats think Bush is that stupid, I can only conclude the reasons I alluded to above - which, given that he has called Miers "the best person I could find," indicts his veracity instead.

The "hysteria" links can be had by linking to just about every conservative blog. George Will's column. David Frum's column. Your posts. And don't forget the comments section at sites like Polipundit. Many conservatives have just decided to take their ball and go home because of this. Yeah, I call that hysteria.

What you insultingly deride as "hysteria," we see as intellectual integrity and adherence to conservative principle and presidential accountablity. It is, once again, the difference between being a Republican conservative and a conservative Republican. It is the realization that partisan discipline and loyalty and hard work and keeping our eyes on the "big picture" have proven futile because the "big picture" was a fraud.

You know the take I've always maintained on intra-party spats and the dim view I've taken of blowing off the whole shebang over single-issue obsessions. That's why I've highlighted all the other areas in which Bush has either let us down or never bothered to make a difference in the first place. I, as much as anybody since I've argued that side of this subject for years, understand the need to build coalitions and win elections in order to advance as much of the right-wing agenda as possible. You don't always get everything you want, but what you don't get you come back for the next time. To borrow a football analogy, I don't sweat not throwing hail marys on every play as long as we're moving the chains down the field. If we're moving forward in most areas, I'm happy.

The uncomfortable truth is that under Bush, not much of that agenda has moved anyplace, other than backward. But we stuck with him because of the tax cuts, the war, and [drumroll] the courts. And the tax cuts are sunsetted, the war has stagnated, and now he's trying to pack the Court with his friends. For a lot of us, that last thing is the last straw because it was literally the last area on which Dubya hadn't bailed. Now that he has, what do we have left?

Kerry would have done SUCH a better job at picking judges. Real productive.

Irrelevant strawman. Please stick to the topic at hand.

You guys have declared Harriet Miers a disaster without even hearing her out. You have declared George W. Bush's presidency a failure because you didn't get the nomination you want. YOU tell ME how helpful that is to conservatism.

We have condemned George W. Bush because he didn't make the sort of appointment he PROMISED in two national campaigns. YOU tell ME how THAT is helpful to conservatism.

Better yet, go back and read the David Frum column I quoted yesterday and innoculate yourself against this sort of nonsensical wishful-thinking.

Now all of a sudden you can't seem to think of one thing Bush has done right.

Looks like you're no stranger to misrepresentation, either.

My last word...

Doubtless of the "famous last" variety.

Trust me, I'm an expert...;-)

....is this: I voted for George W. Bush because I'm sure he was, and is, the best man for the job. He is a decent, honest man and someone whom I feel I can trust.

He was the best electable candidate running, yes. And he has been a decent, honest man. That's what makes this hideous mistake, and what has followed over the course of the past week, and what it all reveals about his character, so crushingly disappointing.

Nobody's perfect. Everybody makes mistakes and does things they regret later. It's just tragic that, in Dubya's case, the nomination of Harriet Miers to the SCOTUS has now supplanted that DUI thirty years ago. Because this error will leave a helluva lot bigger of a mark.

You say you (and the other anti-Miers bloggers) are keeping this up in order to try and derail this nomination so a "bona fide constitutionalist" can be nominated in her place.

I can't speak for any other constitutionalist bloggers, but I will be "keeping this up" because it's the right thing to do. I would be ecstatic if Miers' name was withdrawn and a real constitutionalist (and real judge) appointed in her place, but I'm under no illusion that I can have any impact on making it happen, or that it even will.

The death of her nomination in the Senate may be a different story.

However, you admit to not knowing whether Miers will be a constitutionalist, and refuse to think Bush could possibly have nominated one in this case.

I admit no such thing. I say that there is no objective evidence that Harriet Miers is in the Scalia/Thomas mold. And there isn't. You're still stuck on trying to get us to prove a negative instead of Miersians proving that she's everything Bush says she is. That isn't the way it works, Jen.

If you wonder why I consider you to be in that latter camp, this is a pretty good indication.

Okay...so if he nominates someone you approve of next time and the Left starts their attacks, please don't use the "Hey, Bush won the election! Get over it!" argument. That would be the height of hypocrisy.

Another strawman. I said the other day, and you acknowledged that I said it, that yes, Bush did win the election (two of them, actually) and yes, he does get to pick whom he wants to elevate to the Supreme Court. And if he completely botches a pick, we get to flay him alive for it.

And applaud him if he admits his mistake and rectifies it.

I hope and pray he does so. 'Cause that's the only thing that will close this breach.

Oh, yes, I'm still waiting for what you think are Ms. Miers' qualifications to sit on the Supreme Court. Just remember that "because Dubya said so" doesn't count.