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October 23, 2005

George Will: the Old Maid in the Popcorn Bag

Hatched by Dafydd

Those of us who support the nomination of Harriet Miers (even reluctantly) were warned repeatedly that we would be devastated, blown away, and inundated by the Noahide deluge of Hurricane Gamma, George Will's unanswerable final whirlwind of rhetorical devastation of Harriet Miers. Instead, all we got was a spritz of seltzer down our pants.

Will's meticulous retailing of yawn-inducing epithets ("perfect perversity," "discredits," "degrades," "justifications," "deficit of constitutional understanding," "gross misunderstanding of conservatism," and "persons masquerading as its defenders" -- all from the first paragraph!); his hand-waving dismissal of counterargument (his entire final paragraph -- see below); the by now comical snobbery ("crude people"), looking down a sharpened beak at the ants crawling about his Ozymandian feet; all this does surely leave me breathless... but with an amazed sense of loss, not cowed submission.

Lately, Christopher Hitchens has turned into the most articulate defender of the global war on terrorism in the administration. Well actually, outside the administration; but he may as well be a presidential spokesman. Hitchens' denunciations of the Left's politics of bending over coupled with their moist invective of personal destruction -- which now takes the place of any attempt at rational debate of the war, its history, purpose, and effect -- has made him, much to his discomfort, the Cassandra of the death of Socialism as a serious force in world affairs: he sees where his beloved Left is headed and what is going to happen, but he cannot get them to beware of Moslems bearing rifts. No more eloquent spokesman for the conservative virtues of liberal western democracy now exists than Chris Hitchens, which must drive the poor man mad.

Did space aliens sneak down and switch the souls of the two polemicists, Will and Hitchens?

I rummaged through George Will's column looking for the big pop; instead, I'm holding just an old maid in my hand: the kernel is barely cracked, just enough to release its meagre store of steam, not enough to burst open and rattle the pot with its noise. The cherry bomb that fizzled. One of my mother's sneezes, where she gasps for air, teary eyes as wide as millstones; she flaps her arms and turns fire-engine red -- then nothing more than the squeak of a deferential churchmouse.

Oh, I cannot stand it. Let's jump right into some of Will's incisive invective.

Such is the perfect perversity of the nomination of Harriet Miers, it discredits, and even degrades, all who toil at justifying it.... Other arguments betray a gross misunderstanding of conservatism on the part of persons masquerading as its defenders.

Miers' advocates, sensing the poverty of other possibilities, began by cynically calling her critics sexist snobs who disdain women with less than Ivy League degrees.

Practically the first words out of Will's pen betray the very quality of discrimination that has served him so admirably for so long... until now, in his dotage. Which "Miers' advocates" would those be? Anyone in particular? In this case, a careful study of the record reveals that these advocates consist of Ed Gillespie -- assuming one is willing to look at a cap gun and call it a Howitzer. Will bravely shoulders that duty: so Gillespie said (according to Will) not only that "her critics" (all of them?) were "sexist" but that they were "snobs" as well.

Did Gillespie say "snobs?" Did anyone? I'm certain someone must have... and in the new world of Will's rhetorical cannonade, that is enough; what was said by one was said by all.

No longer can Will discriminate between one charge (sexism) and another (snobbery), or even between one man and another. Would collectivism be one of those new understandings of conservatism of which Will rises in defense? Alas, in George Will's case, this may not represent degeneracy: a man who calls himself a "Tory" can hardly claim the mantle of Ronald Reagan, or any other American conservative, can he? He rises and falls with the collectivist nature of Europeanism, where even parties on the right see people only as ordinals, never cardinals.

The sharpest piece of recent political dissection I have read is William F. Buckley, jr.'s "In Search of Anti-Semitism," the lengthy essay that underpinned the all-antisemitism issue of the National Review. In the essay, Buckley managed to disciminate between Joe Sobran, whose anti-Zionism, Buckley concluded, had metastasized into full-bore antisemitism -- and Patrick J. Buchanan, who Buckley absolved of that sin (at that time; revisiting, he might come to a different conclusion today). That is, Bill Buckley treated the two as individuals, not as representatives of some class of people.

The latter precisely describes Will's entire sloppy column; it is "Crown Heights" reasoning, named after the infamous New York pogrom: when a car in the motorcade of Rabbi Menachem Schneerson ran a red light in Crown Heights, New York City, striking and killing a seven year old black child named Gavin Cato, a mob of black residents, vowing retaliation, went and found the nearest Jews they could and assaulted them. Two men were murdered: Yankel Rosenbaum, for being Jewish -- and Anthony Graziosi, for looking Jewish. It mattered not to the rioters who actually drove the car or whether the collision was intentional; one Jew (or bearded man in black) was the same as any other, and intentions are always irrelevant in tribalist warfare.

Thus, if Ed Gillespie says something that can be interpreted as tarring all critics, including conservative ones, with the brush of sexism or elitism, it is right and proper to today's George F. Will to lash out in retaliation against all "advocates" of Miss Miers' nomination (that is, advocates of waiting to hear what the woman has to say in the hearings). We are all "degrade[d]," we are all guilty of Gillespie's sin, all including Hugh Hewitt and Bill Dyer and Dafydd ab Hugh -- regardless whether Gillespie even meant what Will inferred; intentions are irrelevant to Will.

(But not to Amy Ridenour. Displaying a willingness to listen that eludes Prince George, she writes:

(I just received a gracious phone call -- especially considering what I have been writing -- from Ed Gillespie. He made a compelling case that he was not referring to conservatives when he referred to some critics of the Harriet Miers nomination with the terms "sexism" and "elitism," but to others who said things that, when he described them, did sound rather sexist and elitist.... I believe him when he says he didn't means us with those words.)

Worse, Will's simplistic denunciation does not even understand the charge -- of which he, more than anyone, is truly guilty. The "elitism" or "snobbery" charge is not that the Rebel Alliance looks down upon Miers because she graduated from Southern Methodist University; the charge is that her critics insist that only a person who is a particular kind of professional legal intellectual qualifies for the Supreme Court. Those who make that argument are fond of analogizing the Court to brain surgery; Charles Krauthammer (another snob) japed on Brit Hume Friday, if you needed brain surgery, would you go to a podiatrist? But the Court was never intended to be the supreme legal university; if judicial conservatives are to be believed, the primary purpose of the Supreme Court is to adjudicate disputes, not churn out postdoctoral dissertations on arcane and occult points of constitutional doctrine.

But I must not spend forever on a couple of sentences (though I could). Here is Will's refined elucidation of Miers advocates as know-nothings:

In their unseemly eagerness to assure Miers' conservative detractors that she will reach the ``right'' results, her advocates betray complete incomprehension of this: Thoughtful conservatives' highest aim is not to achieve this or that particular outcome concerning this or that controversy. Rather, their aim for the Supreme Court is to replace semi-legislative reasoning with genuine constitutional reasoning about the Constitution's meaning as derived from close consideration of its text and structure. Such conservatives understand that how you get to a result is as important as the result. Indeed, in an important sense, the path the Supreme Court takes to the result often is the result.

By contrast, Miers' advocates (all of them) must understand none of this; I'm sure Will's clarification comes as an eye-opener to Hugh Hewitt, for example. In an earlier piece, Will was more explicit:

[President Bush] has neither the inclination nor the ability to make sophisticated judgments about competing approaches to construing the Constitution. Few presidents acquire such abilities in the course of their prepresidential careers, and this president, particularly, is not disposed to such reflections.

This is the high-verbal lynching carried to the point of low comedy.

Of course a judge must understand the Constitution; but caselaw (common law) is equally important, including an understanding of contracts, torts, legislation (state and federal), and every other area of the law besides con-law that might pop up in a legal dispute. Nobody is an expert in all; every justice must rely on the writings of specialists (often previous judges that they quote at length... at great length).

But equally, every justice must look within himself to decide where he lands when the experts disagree -- which inevitably is always. Judicial philosophy is indeed important, as judicial conservatives and liberals alike argue; and contrary to Will's later snoot-cocking, I do not consider it "inappropriate" for senators to inquire into the nominee's opinions on past cases to determine her judicial thinking. But the "brain-surgery" analogy is infantile; it paints judging as merely a narrow technical skill, rather than a balancing act of competing verities that collide in the instance of a single set of facts.

Reducing the Court to a gaggle of lecturing professors is not only offensive, it's a blunder. Intellectuals, especially truly clever ones, can talk themselves into anything. There is good reason why so many of the brightest lights of the twentieth century talked themselves into joining the Party -- but Ronald Reagan never did. Room must be made on the Court for a person grounded in sanity and the real world, rather than airy theory and lugubrious rhetoric.

Harriet Miers may very well not be that person; I do not know her -- that is the best argument for the Rebel Alliance, that nobody really knows her but George W. Bush. But Will could drip the same sneer with equal indiscrimination onto anybody who fit the Ronald Reagan profile, not simply Miss Miers: if you are not an effete, egocentric, snide, condescending, etherial, arrogant, elite intellectual -- preferably, one who sports the ridiculous affectation of a bow tie -- then you need not apply for the position, in Will's determination.

His argument is sloppy, ugly, and self-important. But can we really expect more from a man who accepted the twin lures of lucre and the chance to strut and fret on a weekly basis in order to stay on at This Week? Will remained long after all the real journalists had left, throwing in his lot with the limp-brained, talentless, preening, no-count, wriggling, pencil-necked, geeky political hack George Snuffleupagus to carry the torch of David Brinkley forward into the twenty-first century.

This is Will's brave, new world, the tiny pond in which he chooses to shimmer. He holds court in Chevy Chase (not quite in but definitely of the Beltway) -- in the pages of the Washington Post -- on the set at ABC treating a former Clinton campaign operative as his journalistic equal (he is probably right) -- looking down his bespectacled nose at the lower classes, such as evangelical Christians (the "crude people" who resort to the "incense defense" of Harriet Miers) -- and whose favorite political figures are all from Europe... yet he has the chutzpah to pontificate to the rest of us about the nature of conservatism. Will, who never attended law school, lectures us on the duties of those who would interpret the law. He is not a minister, but he incessantly enunciates the Gospel of St. George, in which the only mortal sin is to be "unseemly."

I am astonished that Will did not openly campaign for John Kerry, they are so much alike. Perhaps Will was put off by Kerry's overemphasis on athletics: except for baseball, which Will sees as "contemplative," a form of meditation, perhaps, he seems uncomfortable with exhibitions of manhood.

In the end -- the last paragraph -- Will anticipates that some conservatives (or in my case, anti-liberals) may have the bumptious presumption to disagree with his assessment. He prepares for that eventuality with the classically liberal best defense: the cerebral threat.

As for Republicans, any who vote for Miers will thereafter be ineligible to argue that it is important to elect Republicans because they are conscientious conservers of the judicial branch's invaluable dignity [almost as good as seemliness]. Finally, any Republican senator who supinely acquiesces in President Bush's reckless abuse of presidential discretion -- or who does not recognize the Miers nomination as such -- can never be considered presidential material.

Well! Who could argue with that?

This column is a sad chapter in the long twilight denouement of George Will's career. I doubt the Rebel Alliance can see its errors; they have long since dropped into a form of tribalism themselves, in which any anti-Miers remark is embraced as a sacrament, even if it comes from Arlen Specter or Patrick Leahy (the new arbiters of conservative judicial competence). Doubtless, the Alliance will seize upon the Will piece to wave as they lurch through the streets, sharpened writing quills in hand, looking for some "Miers advocates" to stab (any will do). See how easy collectivist caracature can be?

And that, too, is sad.

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, October 23, 2005, at the time of 4:41 PM

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Comments

The following hissed in response by: beebop

I wonder how you and Hugh would have blogged the controversy over GHW Bush reneging on his "read my lips" pledge. Would you have dropped into goosestepping support mode, savaging all who felt betrayed by the abandonment of core principles?

I am willing to accept Miers as a "C-" jurist - just as I accepted Dan Quayle as VP - but that doesn't mean I have to shut up when there is still a reasonable chance of avoiding this form of Russian Roulette. All of your defenses of Miers "diversity" might have some merit if we had six or seven competent Justices on the Court - and what is my definition of a competent Justice? - I think it's the same as Krauthammer and Will's - someone in the mold of Thomas or Scalia.

You state: "But the Court was never intended to be the supreme legal university; if judicial conservatives are to be believed, the primary purpose of the Supreme Court is to adjudicate disputes, not churn out postdoctoral dissertations on arcane and occult points of constitutional doctrine."

On this I disagree with you by 180 degrees, and I think you would recognize my point if you weren't so driven by vitriol against the apostates. What the base wants with this nomination is to try to move the entire legal/industrial complex (i.e., law schools, establishment bar, etc.) by the power of persuasive opinions written from the pinnacle of the profession. We can not do that by sending mediocre writers like Miers when we need Luttig's or McConnell's.

The above hissed in response by: beebop at October 23, 2005 6:19 PM

The following hissed in response by: Timothy Goddard

If the alternative is joining the idiots who helped elect Bill Clinton, I should hope so...

The above hissed in response by: Timothy Goddard at October 23, 2005 7:27 PM

The following hissed in response by: Barry Dauphin

Two cases of sneering rhetoric. It sounds almost like Will could have ghost written your column.

The above hissed in response by: Barry Dauphin at October 23, 2005 7:29 PM

The following hissed in response by: dwild

(that is, advocates of waiting to hear what the woman has to say in the hearings)

I fail to understand how this will prove anything. More or less by general acclimation, no appointee to the SCOTUS worth their salt is going to say much of anything in the hearings. It will all be coded double-talk, and that's if we're lucky.

I do notice you trash George Will's column, but fail to present anything like a solid defense of Miers, other than "let's hear what she has to say in the hearings".

Here's an idea--rather than parsing Will's column into minute particles until nothing is left, how about you make a defense as to why Harriet Miers is the best candidate for associate justice to the Supreme Court. I'd be very, very interested in that argument. In fact, you'd become quite a celebrity, since nobody has made this case. Not once.

Finally, if we follow your instructions and wait to see what Miers has to say in the hearings, and she provides little more than pap bromides, what then? A vote? Now we've got Miers for 15-20 years. Would you be satisfied with that? Better still--would you be satisfied with Miers on the court knowing nothing more than what you know now? Because even after the hearings, we're going to know precious little more than what we know now.

The above hissed in response by: dwild at October 23, 2005 7:44 PM

The following hissed in response by: banachspace

Please, please, pleeeze, continue with your idiotic navel-gazing/fatuous bloviating. Only 3 months till 06.

Again, your complete lack of coherence is a wonderful gift to those who want to reclaim this country for the reality-based community.

God-speed foil-hat man! Many thanks.

The above hissed in response by: banachspace at October 23, 2005 7:49 PM

The following hissed in response by: beebop

T.Goddard,

I think if GHW Bush could have been redirected before completing his abandonment of "read my Lips" we would not have had Perot or Slick Willie.

The above hissed in response by: beebop at October 23, 2005 7:55 PM

The following hissed in response by: chase

Can we play the what if game now? What if HM is rejected? Then what? Who will be nominated? Then what? I think someone has already thought this one through.

The above hissed in response by: chase at October 23, 2005 8:11 PM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

Dwild:

Here's an idea--rather than parsing Will's column into minute particles until nothing is left, how about you make a defense as to why Harriet Miers is the best candidate for associate justice to the Supreme Court.

I shall be more than happy to give you my impression of the woman's qualifications -- after the Senate hearings, which I intend to watch as much of as they allow on C-Span.

Did Antonin Scalia's flamboyant rhetoric ever persuade the other justices (not counting his fellow conservatives) to his side? Was he ever able to convince Souter, Kennedy, or O'Connor, let alone Ginsburg, Breyer, or Stevens?

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh at October 23, 2005 8:23 PM

The following hissed in response by: AcademicElephant

Will's column is a disgrace. He starts to sound more like Ted Kennedy or Charlie Rangel with SAT words than a conservative--so who's masquerading here?

And I'm always suspicious of anyone who resorts to calling those who don't agree with them stupid.

Good show.

The above hissed in response by: AcademicElephant at October 23, 2005 8:41 PM

The following hissed in response by: beebop

DD,

"Did Antonin Scalia's flamboyant rhetoric ever persuade the other justices (not counting his fellow conservatives) to his side? Was he ever able to convince Souter, Kennedy, or O'Connor, let alone Ginsburg, Breyer, or Stevens?"

Read some of David Frum's columns on how Scalia's opinions have helped form the Federalist Society and brought us (Conservatives who oppose an elastic Constitution) to the jaws of victory. Yet you want us to accept/allow Bush to snatch defeat for the sake of his sycophant.

The above hissed in response by: beebop at October 23, 2005 8:44 PM

The following hissed in response by: RBMN

Little kids, should think before they pitch a fit and throw their Malt-o-Meal at the President, to make him more ... flexible. Because when that Malt-o-Meal dries, it's gonna dry like cement. Especially when you throw it at George Bush. If you've noticed, that's how it works with Bush, with very few exceptions. Just an observation.

The above hissed in response by: RBMN at October 23, 2005 8:50 PM

The following hissed in response by: senorlechero

Dafyd....whateveryernameis

Great post!!! Now I'm going to get out my dictionary and read it again.

I don't at all get the comments criticizing it. Your points are all right on the mark......BULLSEYES every one. Your critics are shooting spit wads

I sent Will an e-mail this morning where I crudely made a couple of the same point you make, but am really happy that someone could make them so much better than I.

Don't you just love the agrument that it doesn't matter how Miers would rule on the court.......what matters is how she comes to her conclusions. WOW!! Snobery in it's purest form

As for reasons why I support Miers........GWB picked her and he hasn't been wrong in a Judicial pick yet.............I'm sure glad the detractors are not the ones doing the picking

The above hissed in response by: senorlechero at October 23, 2005 9:11 PM

The following hissed in response by: Mike

Excellent commentary.

You might also be aware that George Will questioned the suitability of Clarence Thomas when he was nominated to the SCOTUS.

I hope you will use the magic TTLB words if you haven't already:

"I support the Miers nomination"

Mike's America

The above hissed in response by: Mike at October 23, 2005 9:27 PM

The following hissed in response by: beebop

RBMN,

Bush has some great qualities, but the ability to look into someone's soul and devine how they will act in 10 years is not one of them. He didn't do it with Paul O'Neil, with Bernie Kerik, with Brownie, not to mention Chirac or Putin. One of his first acts after taking over the Texas Rangers was trading Sammy Sosa for a nobody. I would not be throwing my Malt-o-Meal if I didn't think it was very, very important to me and to the country.

I agree with your premise, by the way, I think Bush might be so petulant he'd nominate AG Gonzales or someone similar out of spite. All I can say is if he is that small a leader we will have to deal with that insult when it comes. In an ideal world he would take this rebuke like a man and nominate Janice Rodgers Brown or one of the white males on the short list.

The above hissed in response by: beebop at October 23, 2005 9:38 PM

The following hissed in response by: Jim in Chicago

"Would you have dropped into goosestepping support mode, savaging all who felt betrayed by the abandonment of core principles?"

Gotta love that first commentator. Couldn't wait to throw out a fascist reference.

The self-appointed conservative "base" is morphing into moonbat fantasy land before our eyes.

Anyone who disagrees with their anti-Miers stand is a goosestepper. Oh, and Krauthammer takes a page out of the lefty playbook to urge senators to ask for docs behind the executive and atty/client privilege firewalls.

Gee, where have I seen that tactic before.

Really pathetic by the "base".

The above hissed in response by: Jim in Chicago at October 23, 2005 9:38 PM

The following hissed in response by: Patterico

I don't know about that, but Scalia has voted with each of these Justices. Whether it was his rhetoric that won them over or not, I can't say.

I like the fact that you call George S. "Snuffleupagus." I thought I was the only one in the world who did that. But then, I thought I was the only one who called sausages "snausages."

The above hissed in response by: Patterico at October 23, 2005 10:00 PM

The following hissed in response by: The Hedgehog

Dafydd: I was surprised and disappointed at Will's decision to reason from his personal pique. He looks horrible. I fear you come perilously close to sneering back at him, but even so you have exposed the nasty and condescension in his piece. Judging by some of the comments here you have also attracted a few of our less thoughtful brethren on the right. (Notice how diplomatically I described people who are all to prone to slip into name-calling?)

The above hissed in response by: The Hedgehog at October 23, 2005 10:01 PM

The following hissed in response by: Timothy Goddard

how about you make a defense as to why Harriet Miers is the best candidate for associate justice to the Supreme Court.

That's not the argument that needs to be made. (Partly because it's absurd--there is no one 'best candidate.') The President has nominated her. Now the question is, is she qualified. Anyone who claims she's not is simply ignorant, either Willfully (get it?) or accidentally.

The above hissed in response by: Timothy Goddard at October 23, 2005 10:08 PM

The following hissed in response by: beebop

Jim,

If "goosestepping" is a little too colorful, I apologise, but after reading what's above it I don't think I can be accused of being the one frothing at the mouth. I know Dafydd will probably admit that his insults directed at Will were over the top, when he changes back into Bruce Banner. Will is not a Europeanized communitarian enemy of the conservative movement in this country, but he doesn't like cant or hypocracy too much either. I've noticed a pattern developing in this Miers dispute: the opponents always argue facts and the supporters argue ad hominums. Thus David Frum laid out a cogent argument against the confirmation, and HH,(one of the best pundits around)lowered his normally excellent standards and said Frum must have been dissed by Miers when they were in the WH together. Why can't we opponents of this blunder be honorable people too?

The above hissed in response by: beebop at October 23, 2005 10:59 PM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

Patterico:

I don't know about that, but Scalia has voted with each of these Justices. Whether it was his rhetoric that won them over or not, I can't say.

Or perhaps Ginsburg won Scalia over!

I like the fact that you call George S. "Snuffleupagus." I thought I was the only one in the world who did that. But then, I thought I was the only one who called sausages "snausages."

Two thoughts with but a single mind between them.

Wait a minute: strike that; reverse it.*

(Actually, I call him Snuffleupagus because I can never remember how to spell his real name. It's all Greek to me.)

Dafydd

* Bonus points to Slytherin if anyone can place this quotation.

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh at October 23, 2005 11:59 PM

The following hissed in response by: adriandrews

"Wait a minute: strike that; reverse it."

Willy Wonka

The above hissed in response by: adriandrews at October 24, 2005 2:21 AM

The following hissed in response by: deignan

Amazing.

Snobbery--isn't that holding a person in esteem for what they are rather than for what they do?

Miers was a mathematician. Dafydd thinks just this fact is great for her--a reason to support. I look at this in the pattern of Miers life-choices and come to the opposite conclusion. Who is the snob?

Miers is a corporate lawyer and not a judge. Dafydd thinks this is itself qualification. I see a potential problem in lack of engagement with the type of experience that Dafydd asserts Miers has. Does she have it? Dafydd refuses to elaborate. Snobbery?

It is true as far as I have read that no positive case is made for Miers here. In fact, the criticism of Will's article lacks even an acknowledgement of his thesis. This is not arguing--it is polemics.

Have at it. You know where I live when you want to argue.

The above hissed in response by: deignan at October 24, 2005 4:02 AM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

Deignan:

You know where I live

Yes, and I've seen your mug shot. And I have to say, that's the shoddiest looking mug I ever saw!

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh at October 24, 2005 4:35 AM

The following hissed in response by: wizard61

Those who feel the need to use brass-knuckles in this in-family fight should take a step back and count to 10. Conservatives should debate vigerously these matters.

The above hissed in response by: wizard61 at October 24, 2005 6:48 AM

The following hissed in response by: dennism

The coaches put this senior kid on the B squad because he wasn’t getting enough varsity playing time. He was undersized, very fast, and a bit of a dim bulb. Joe Don being a senior, he got to be captain. We called him Joe Don, after a well-known crazyman.

Late in the game, defending at our own 20, we sacked their QB on fourth down. A penalty flag was down, holding. So the refs snag Joe Don for the call, “You want the ball? Or the ten yards?”

Us smart guys started yelling “we want it! We want it!” and Joe Don fumbles out “we want it.” The jerk refs pretended that Joe Don asked for the penalty. They marched off the yardage penalty with big smiles and we didn’t get possession.

Krauthammer and Will remind me of us. They obviously think Bush is a dummy.

Ms. Miers’ detractors seem to think this country is a meritocracy. But the fact is, not a soul in the Congress or the Executive is fit for honest work. (Tip of the hat to Mark Twain.) I do income taxes. Not a one of the sitting Supremes is qualified to do his/her own taxes. None of the Supremes are qualified to rule on disputes arising out of securities law. Yet disputes over taxes and securities get resolved in the SCOTUS.

The above hissed in response by: dennism at October 24, 2005 6:49 AM

The following hissed in response by: Aitch748

All of this arguing about Miers is moot. Unless the Miers opponents have a plan in place to force her to withdraw before November 7 -- in two weeks -- Miers is going to get her hearing before the Senate, and her opponents will simply have to learn to cope with that.

Apparently I'll get called a fascist goosestepper for saying this, but even if Bush has fallen down on federal spending and illegal immigration, his past judicial nominees have all been excellent. Bush's word on illegals might not be good enough for me, but his word on judicial nominees still is, so I'm inclined to trust that Miers is a good pick, even if we can't verify this for ourselves.

Bush's problem is with the jellyspines in the Senate. We've been watching Bush nominate one great person after another, only to have the Democrats filibuster the nominees, and the Republicans talk and do nothing about it. When the Republicans finally did look like they were getting serious about the "nuclear option," the Gang of 14 forms and comes up with this compromise, to ensure that the option remained unused, so that the minority could still filibuster. Not only that, but the Republicans in the Senate apparently actually told Bush to his face that they really didn't want to have to fight for Priscilla Owen a second time. That's the kind of thing that Bush has been facing, and that's why he's going with Miers (someone WITHOUT a paper trail) instead of somebody more to George Will's liking.

The object is to help Bush get people on the Supreme Court before his successor does. You may not trust Bush, but who's going to succeed him? It's a little early, of course, but Hillary's name keeps coming up. So there's that tactical aspect to think about as well.

The above hissed in response by: Aitch748 at October 24, 2005 7:01 AM

The following hissed in response by: deignan

I'm so glad we have the internet with blogs and all that.

Just keep pushing Miers. Come midterms you will be looking for excuses to blame the losses on those who tried to warn you.

And you can repeat that excuse in 08 and 10 and 12 and every even number year for a decade or so--because that is the period of time it will take to convince another crop or pro-lifers that the GOP is worth voting for.

BTW, "Just follow/trust Bush" is for the birds. He works for us.

The above hissed in response by: deignan at October 24, 2005 7:12 AM

The following hissed in response by: Mike

deignan:

I won't need to look for excuses if we suffer more than expected setbacks in 2006 elections or lose the White House in 2008.

The evident and rising vehemence of the anit-Miers crowd has made it all too clear that folks who oppose Miers will take their marbles and go home if Miers isn't withdrawn.

To provide you another childlike analogy: Many of the anti-Miers crowd are behaving like spoiled children who did not get the red tricycle they wanted for Christmas and are now pouting in their room.

Want to see the evidence for youself? Visit a site like Confirm Them and you will see repeated threats to not give "one more dime" to the Republican Party. I was monitoring the site from the hour BEFORE the nomination for the Miers nomination was announced and quickly became appalled at the quickness with which many who call themselves conservatives turned on President Bush with a viciousness that can only be described as pathological.

Just this weekend, one comment at Confirm Them read: "I dont care how weakened [the President] & GOP look from here on out...and to hell with the rest of Bushs agenda."

The sad fact is that we do NOT have a CONSERVATIVE government in Washington, we simply have a Republican majority. If you want to nominate certified movement conservatives to the court, you will need a CONSERVATIVE MAJORITY.

Now, deignan, please explain to me how we will get a conservative majority if so many on the right are going to hand over a huge advantage to the Democrats, who are unlikely to nominate conservatives to anything?

Mike's America

P.S. Bush promised to nominate judges "in the mold of Scalia and Thomas." I notice you do not mention Thomas. Quite a few parallels between pre-Thomas qualifications and background and Miers n'cest pas?

The above hissed in response by: Mike at October 24, 2005 8:10 AM

The following hissed in response by: kierkegaard

I have shared your criticisms of George Will for some time; I consider his writing to be intellectually flaccid and lazy. He is well-known in the local writing community for hiring research assistants to provide the quotes from Macauley or John Stuart Mill, etc, which used to begin most of his columns, then for filling the rest in with grandiose innuendo leaked to him by a few highly-placed sources. Over time those sources have dried up, and he has become marginalized and increasingly spiteful--rather like Brent Scowcroft, in fact. However, having met all three men, I see very little resemblance between Mr Will and Senator Kerry; Will is shy and almost furtively private, while Kerry, to my mind, demonstrates in person the symptoms of Asperger's Syndrome. The nation dodged a bullet there, though not, horrifyingly, by much.

Some of your other comments also bear correction. Chevy Chase is, in fact, inside the Beltway. And Hitchens I think, has become like me, a convert not to the current administration but rather to the 'enthusiasmos' of excessive patriotism, a madness which strikes many men in late middle age; his articles, I believe, articulate a consistent defense of 'America under siege', which means that he finds himself in agreement with the administration on some, but by no means, all points. I have viewed his political evolution with great relief, since it has coincided with my own and reassures me that I have not simply gone mad. I find no such reassurance in the empty utterances of Mr Will. On the particular subject of this column, I have no opinion; Ms Miers will prove to be an embarrassment to the Republican Party, whether she is confirmed or not, for many years to come; President Bush, however, is well within his rights to appoint her, or indeed, one of his own daughters, to the post. However, this misstep strikes me as a sign of political senility, and if so, that will do no one, not even his most ardent opponents, any good over the next three paralyzed years.

The above hissed in response by: kierkegaard at October 24, 2005 9:35 AM

The following hissed in response by: matoko kusanagi

Well, Dafydd, you might as well stand up and be counted.
Personally, I'm allergic to social engineering, especially on the Supreme Court.

The above hissed in response by: matoko kusanagi at October 24, 2005 10:52 AM

The following hissed in response by: leftnomore

This is the funniest and most effective writiing I have encountered through all of this Miers brouhaha. Thanks for making my morning! Reading RedState and NRO can sure bring a guy down, and I've had enough of that for a lifetime. Keep it up!

The above hissed in response by: leftnomore at October 24, 2005 11:21 AM

The following hissed in response by: leftnomore

After all, Will does get his paycheck from the Washington Post, which is enough to give me pause.

The above hissed in response by: leftnomore at October 24, 2005 11:27 AM

The following hissed in response by: dbc

Say what you will about Will, his vocabulary or his style of dress. (The bow tie has never worked for me.)

On the one crucial point Will is exactly right: When setting the course of American jurisprudence, the reasoning by which the S.Ct. reaches its decisions is much more important than the decision reached. For the litigants, the decision is the thing.

The above hissed in response by: dbc at October 24, 2005 1:54 PM

The following hissed in response by: KarmiCommunist

Dafydd,

Most *EXCELLENTLY* Hatched!!! From start to finish...

I rummaged through George Will's column looking for the big pop; instead, I'm holding just an old maid in my hand: the kernal is barely cracked, just enough to release its meagre store of steam, not enough to burst open and rattle the pot with its noise.

heeheeeeeeheheeee...great stuff. When i told my only Friend, back in Oct. '02 that humble me was going to register to Vote in order to support W, he blew-a-fuse. A few days later, he brought me an article by George Will, told me that Will's was a "Conservative", and suggested that i read it before Voting. Here was a diehard Democrat supporting Liberal introducing me to "Conservative" George Will.

His argument is sloppy, ugly, and self-important. But can we really expect more from a man who accepted the twin lures of lucre and the chance to strut and fret on a weekly basis in order to stay on at This Week?

This Week with George Snuffleupagus...i don't know why i watch any of those Sunday morning programs (i do like Chris Wallace though), expecially the George Snuffleupagus one!?! Howard Dean was allowed to repeat lie after lie yesterday...

This is Will's brave, new world, the tiny pond in which he chooses to shimmer.

Enough said...

The above hissed in response by: KarmiCommunist at October 24, 2005 2:34 PM

The following hissed in response by: Steven55

Steady, lads. Calm down. All of you.

The above hissed in response by: Steven55 at October 24, 2005 7:47 PM

The following hissed in response by: deignan

Mike,

Its called Tit for Tat--probably the most effective gamining strategy there is.

Combine that with irrational deterrence and you have a winning combination (think Nixon).

The above hissed in response by: deignan at October 25, 2005 1:05 AM

The following hissed in response by: deignan

BTW, on Thomas, he was not for affirmative action set asides.

Sure, I know, you will say that the original Constitution had the 3/5th compromise. Fine. then come out with your new definition of originalism. We already fought a civil war over it and the Union won.

The above hissed in response by: deignan at October 25, 2005 1:09 AM

The following hissed in response by: FredRum

In case anyone is wondering...

banachspace = truck (prolific CQ troll during the 2004 election season)

The above hissed in response by: FredRum at November 23, 2005 5:54 PM