I have held off on denouncing Harriet Miers and calling for her withdrawal, as so many conservative bloggers have been willing to do. The reason is simple. As Michael Ledeen says over at National Review, there is no award for being wrong first. Like most conservatives, I am not thrilled with the Miers choice. Yet the reason I am not thrilled ties into why I have kept the proverbial powder dry: we just don't know much about her. But then there is this post from John Podhoretz over at NRO:
Having read through the Miers questionnaire supplied to the Senate Judiciary Committee, I note with shock that in a legal career that lasted more than 25 years, she argued 8 cases before juries: "I have identified eight cases that were tried to verdict. I was lead counsel or sole counsel in four, lead local counsel in one, and associate counsel in three." That number again: 8. Eight. E-I-G-H-T. Turns out that the number is pretty important in Miers's career, since it's exactly the same number of cases she dealt with at the appellate level as well.
Her entire combined courtroom experience in the course of her long career: 16 cases. Thus does the last prong in the Miers defense -- that she will bring real-world lawyering experience to the bench -- collapse like a house of cards.
I feel like George Jetson: Jane, won't somebody stop this crazy thing?
I am reminded of the banter between Clint Eastwood and Tyne Daley in the Dirty Harry film The Enforcer. Harry, serving on the board that promotes people to inspector, has a young police officer played by Tyne Daley come before him. He says, "Tell me about your best felony arrest." She says, "I've never made a felony arrest." He responds, "Well how about your best misdemeanor arrest." And she must admit, "I've never made a misdemeanor arrest."
Conservatives have a choice. Let's assume that Harriet Miers is everything the Bush administration says she is. Should conservatives support someone who "votes right" even if it means giving up some integrity? One of the problems with the Bush folk's argument for Miers is that they tell us that we shouldn't care that she has no judicial philosophy, after all she'll vote right. But conservatives have been saying for four decades that it isn't the results that count, it's the philosophy behind them (although it's true that philosophy and results cannot be perfectly separated). Conservatives want someone who can defend strongly originalism or textualism as the appropriate way to read the Constitution. However Miers might vote, she seems likely incapable of mounting a vigorous defense of sound jurisprudence. You don't pick a nominee because she'll "vote right." If you pick one with the right philosophy, the votes will follow. In picking Miers, the Bush team gives up the argument that it's about philosophy, not results. So do you support the nominee who might give you all the results you want (including overturning Roe v. Wade) but does so based not on sound judicial philosophy but based on personal policy views?
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