Oct
17
Hey Wait! You Weren’t Suposed to Actually Confirm Her!
October 17, 2005 |
I don’t know whether the Miers nomination is in actuality some sort of political head-fake designed to lull Democrats into a false sense of smugness while Bush softens them up in preparation for the real nomination, but no matter what happens it’s not very good news. James Taranto, referring to the facty that Republicans generally were supportive of the Ginsburg nomination 12 years ago, has one of the best lines in today’s Best of the Web:
The Republican attitude, that is, is that a Democratic president’s Supreme Court nominees are entitled to support as long as they are excellent. The Democratic attitude, by contrast, seems to be that a Republican president’s Supreme Court nominees are entitled to support as long as they are mediocre.
And he’s completely right. Of course they will support this nominee, and they will support her precisely because she is such a lousy candidate for the job. They know perfectly well that they’ve dodged a second Roberts bullet on this one.
It’s the rest of us who should be worried. Is Bush serious? Putting aside the Macchiavellian possibilities that might lie behind this nomination that I alluded to above, one has to wonder who the hell was presiding over the meeting where this decision was made. One begins to fear that it was Bush himself, and that this is what happens when you let him play with the grownups’ toys. We wait thirty years for this chance–some of us voted for Bush only because of this possibility–and this is what we get. And the Roberts nomination, of course, was just cruel now that we see how clueless our fearless leader is. Imagine getting us all excited and everything, only to dash our hopes when the climax was upon us.
I suppose it’s too much to hope for that even if all the Democrats vote for her there will be enough Republican votes against her to kill her nomination.
