Where Is It
By Erick Posted in The Courts — Comments (42) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
It is 9:30pm and, as Tim Chapman notes, Harriet Miers' questionnaire revisions have not been returned. They were due at 6pm. Perhaps she is watching the world series or Lost. Perhaps there are some Fitzgerald induced distractions at 1600 Penn. Ave. tonight.
« BREAKING: Supreme Court Rejects Challenge To Indiana Voter ID Law — Comments (21) | Miers Withdraws — Comments (201) »
Where Is It 42 Comments (0 topical, 42 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
Maybe she's decided she's not going to turn it in because she's going to withdraw tomorrow. I can only hope.
Sen Schumer's office (I know, I know) is reporting it won't be delivered to the Senate until 11pm this evening.
We're told it'll get to them around 11 p.m. ET. Said NY Sen. Chuck Schumer in a statement at 8:45 pm: "This is another in a series of disappointments. The Miers nomination is suffering from a serious bout of delay, distraction, and disorganization and needs a dramatic turnaround."
she fell asleep, drooling over her CONLAW 101 textbook.
See, if she pulls out on the day that indictments are handed down, both huge stories will suck each other into a vortex of media confusion, with one story blunting the damage of the other, and vice versa.
Karl Rove agan. Brilliant!
she didn't nominate herself. In my opinion (which is much less informed than many around here, to be sure), she's a thoroughly inappropriate nominee. BUT the fact of the matter is that she shouldn't be in this position in the first place. She's intelligent and capable and has spent her whole life building a career, and now she's been reduced to a punchline. It doesn't seem right to me.
(ps: m-a-y-b-e)
I agree with that. Everything I've heard, from folks who've met her and interacted with her, points to a nice, capable, intelligent woman who went pretty far in what's still a man's world -- litigation practice.
She's not right for this job. She's not a joke, either.
Do you think Rove will get Cindy arrested in front of the White House at the same time? And leak information about WMD's in Iran! Anounce massive new tax cuts! Endorse Condi's 2008 run for pres!!!!
Ah to have such power...
Miers would not be having trouble in the Senate if conservatives were not standing up.
Having the two stories blunt each other would work very well, and Miers is the type of nominee who would play along.
Although I don't buy the whole "Karl Rove grand strategy" thing, I do believe in unintentional intentional walks.
or - maybe she is out getting coffee and donuts to bring to the Senators along with her revised answers. did they require her to write them in a Blue Book?
To say that conservatives should not think for themselves and that they should support everything across the board or it will ruin the conservative movement is to say that the conservative movement is weak.
I think the right can stand on it's own merits and not collapse if people think for themselves. There is no need to agree with and support everything gw bush does.
The real danger to democracy is the thought that no one should question anything their government does.
The post concerned ideological vs. institutional Republicans. The commentator suggersted that the ideological members of the GOP must stand up against the lukewarm establishment folks.
Furthermore, Perspective seems to consider the president to be an establishment type.
Meanwhile my comment is simply that ideological conservatives in the Senate such as Coburn and Brownback have stood up, and slowly the rest of the caucus is moving to follow.
A couple of news sources have said that President Bush has come to agreement with Sandra Day. She will stay on the court and withdraw her resignation. Miers will automatically be forced to withdraw her nomination. Sandra Day has convinced President Bush that she wants to stay on for a few more years.
Keep piling it on. Given that Miers looks more and more liberal, Bush could have gotten this through easily if he was a little more on the ball. Timely answers and some compromise on documents probably would have gotten virtually every single Democrat on board (I mean Miers is probably the best Republican nominee for them since Earl Warren).
Honestly, I'm starting to think that the Miers nomination will do what the Democrats have been totally impotent in doing - breaking the Republican coalition. Whatever you might say about the nominee, what I notice more and more is that commentators on the Right are becoming increasingly snippy and uncivil with each other. I wonder if, when this is over (whether Miers is confirmed or not) the Right will be able to kiss and make up. My thought now is "no." The anti-Miers crowd now distrusts those who seem to be throwing themselves in front of the train for her, and the anti-anti-Miers crowd appears to be increasingly dismissive of those opposing her.
Forget about what any individual Senator decides when voting - this applies, I think, even if she is withdrawn - this nomination will have dire consequences for campaigns in 2006 as the two sides go on in-fighting on smaller scales.
Congratulations President Bush - you have managed to make yor legacy the unravelling of the Republican majority you professed to want to ensure.
Beign called a "GOP slut", "pimp", "shill", a "Flavor-Aid drinker", or "Bushbot" at various times can make people snippy about things.
I no longer trust the Beltway conservative establishment. I have also lost a lot of respect for them.
it would imply that O'Connor was a major influence on the Miers pick.
Remember that O'Connor has always had the power to sink any nomination.
"Congratulations President Bush"???
This is an example of what is often called "blaming the victim." GWBush had no reason to suppose that his nominee would be borked by conservatives, especially conservatives who had earlier espoused principles (which they now put aside) such as the right of the president to appoint someone of his own choosing. I personally do not understand the emotional vituperation this has raised.
Hugh Hewitt has some good thoughts here. One line stands out:
What ticks me off more than anything else about the long knives is that Harriett Miers has been on the political front lines of the GWOT for five years, and they are trying to deny her a hearing.
What is most disappointing is that, in the hunger for instant gratification and disappointment at the slow progress being made, that many conservatives in the blogosphere are willing to abandon political power to the Left by their inability to work with other conservatives over whom they have differences. Elsewhere we read about a media campaign (!) against Ms. Miers. This is what we expect from Mr. Soros; we now have some conservatives who need to calm down and reconsider what they are doing and, quite frankly, what and whom their actions end up supporting. (Hint: it isn't the progress of conservatism nor any more-conservative Supreme Court nominee.)
My guess in 3-5 years most people attacking Miers and Bush will be saying "I was sole voice that knew she would be like Scalia and Thomas. All my Federalist/Conservative friends were wrong."
On Souter everyone blames Bush 41. None of the Senators or conservatives are blamed for the nomination. Bush 43 knows this and that is why she was selected.
The thing is, the divide is very real, and it cuts across all cross-sections of conservatives. This is not a conventional intra-movement battle. This is not the fiscal cons versus the social cons or the establishment versus the grassroots. With Miers, we have members of each of those groups talking at one another on both sides of the issue.
I'm not really sure how to describe the chasm in the GOP over Miers. On one side are a combination of judicial conservatives who feel that O'Connor's replacement must move the Court to the right along with conservatives who expect excellence out of their government. This is what brings Brownback and George Will to the same table. McCain would be there too if he weren't strategically staying out of this fight.
On the other side are conservatives who have the utmost trust in Bush's judgment and those who, for identity reasons, want someone like Harriet Miers on the Court. That last group could consist of any number of folks who would throw consequences to the wind if it meant getting a woman and/or a Texan and/or an evangelical and/or a Middle American on the Court. Presumably, these folks view the Court as a political body and would trust that their fellow Texan or evangelical or whatever will best represent their views on the Court. These folks misunderstand what jurisprudence is all about and, as a consequence, are calling those of us opposed to the nomination elitists and snobs.
The result is yet another divide amongst conservatives and probably one that will remain until a post-Bush leader can unite the movement again.
That is also why respect for the office of the president requires deference until the hearings. Roberts actually answered a lot during his questioning -- assuming you are sharp enough to understand what he was really saying.
If Miers can use the platform of her hearings to substantially unite the GOP behind her (as evidenced by a strong endorsement by Brownback and Coburn after the hearing) and avoid a filibuster, then she deserves the job and should be confirmed.
Brownback and Coburn have less reason to wimp out than other senators on the committee. Yet they still have a duty to give Miers a fair hearing and to support her if she is qualified.
Miers will have the toughest hearing in recent history, and if she can get through that, then she is clearly qualified.
I just checked, and excitablestate dot org is still available if you think redstate dot org is getting too misleading. :->
I happen to be an evangelical Texan. Heck, I'm even from SMU Law. I happen to believe that Miers, her 1993 speech notwithstanding, would represent my views on the court. However, I realize that a Supreme Court Justice is not a representative. He is an arbiter of disputes. I want justices that recognize that fact and leave their own views out of it.
As an evangelical Texan, I would rather have an athiestic Oklahoman who has proven to be a judicial conservative than an evangelical Texan with the judicial philosophy implied by Miers's 1993 speech.
That said, I suppose a conservative judicial activist is more favorable than a liberal judicial activist, but I expected this President to do better.
The speeches "indicate a radical feminist worldview, a penchant for judicial activism, race and sex quotas, a liberal characterization of the abortion debate and government spending, and an inability to articulate her positions clearly," the group said in a statement
see the story at
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-miers27oct27,0,3538156
.story?coll=la-story-footer&track=morenews
The sun is reporting that 2 GOP's will call for Miers withdrawl Thursday. This isn't just the final nail in the coffin...the whole thing is burried now! Yea!!!!!!
Dobson is not returning calls.
but instead she opted to take on a task she is obviously unqualified for.
Sure she didn't nominate herself, but somebody who is unqualified sure enough has the ability to say "don't consider me."
I still wonder what Bush was thinking though, when he chose her.
to date she hasn't been able to "wow" the senators in one on one meetings, and she seems to have made several gaffs.
I am not so sure that she will be able to handle the hearings. The only thing in her favor is that most of the senators on the committee view hearings as oportunities to grandstand rather than gather information from the candidate.
I'm not in the beltway, and my views have been characterized by the rinos as sexist and elitist. Try again.
For Pete's sake, I was just trying to bring some levity to the situation.
And, it was more of a slight against the faceless Bush administration than at Miers. By all accounts, she's a nice, church going person. Good for her. But her nomination process has been plagued by silly little problem after silly little problem.
Pushing back a deadline, a deadline as simple as this, is simply unacceptible. Period. If I miss a deadline, a judge will have me rear end for it. Should we not expect, at the most elemental level, that a supreme court nominee would meet these simple deadlines?
To be sure, she's not entirely to blame. But the WH team responsible for this interrogatory response is..
I agree. And yes I feel Roberts did answer a lot in his hearings. His ability to go far enough in his answers to satisfy the Republican Senators, but coming short of providing any ammunition to Kennedy, Schumer, and Leahy was amazing. He was playing with the Senators from the start.
Miers will not be able to do this. The Senators will have the ability to attack her.
soo.. this fuels the speculation...
1. was this W's master plan all along?
or
2. did conservatives bloggers have a major impact in having this nomination withdrawn?
TINFOIL HATS ON!
Charles gave them a way out and they took it.
My post wasn't to condemn, just to point out that conservatives can withstand the withdrawel of miers and should.
..."Veronica Mars."
But you were all very, very close. ;)
Something big needs to happen and happen soon to redirect the conservative juggernaut. If the GOP does not stand up and support the conservative agenda across the board, the GOP is in danger of ruination for a generation.
Amazing how "quickly" it can all change.