Harriet Miers has withdrawn her nomination! by Skywalken

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Harriet Miers has withdrawn her nomination!

POSTED BY: SKYWALKEN
UPDATED: Friday, October 28, 2005 03:20
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Thursday, October 27, 2005 3:06 AM

She has done the right thing. I'm sure she is a fine White House Counsel, but she simply wasn't qualified for a position as a justice on the SCOTUS.

If the president has any courage left then he'll now nominate a woman in the mold of Ed Meese, or Antonin Scalia, or Robert Bork.

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 3:26 AM

CREVANREAVER

Quote:
Originally posted by Skywalken:
I'm sure she is a fine White House Counsel, but she simply wasn't qualified for a position as a justice on the SCOTUS.

In fact, just look at her bio:

Miers has served as Counsel to the President since February, 2005. Prior to that, she served as Assistant to the President and Staff Secretary. Miers was also Co-Managing Partner at Locke Liddell & Sapp, LLP. Previously, she was President of Locke, Purnell, Rain & Harrell, where she worked from 1972 until 1999. From 1995 until 2000, she was chair of the Texas Lottery Commission. In 1992, Miers became the first woman president of the Texas State Bar, and in 1985 she became the first woman president of the Dallas Bar Association. She also served as a Member-At-Large on the Dallas City Council. Miers received both her undergraduate and law degrees from Southern Methodist University.

In comparison to the bio of John Roberts:

He received an A.B. from Harvard College in 1976 and a J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1979. He served as a law clerk for Henry J. Friendly of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit from 1979-1980 and as a law clerk for then-Associate Justice William H. Rehnquist of the Supreme Court of the United States during the 1980 Term. He was Special Assistant to the Attorney General, U.S. Department of Justice from 1981-1982, Associate Counsel to President Ronald Reagan, White House Counsel's Office from 1982-1986, and Principal Deputy Solicitor General, U.S. Department of Justice from 1989-1993. From 1986-1989 and 1993-2003, he practiced law in Washington, D.C. He was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 2003. President George W. Bush nominated him as Chief Justice of the United States, and he took his seat on September 29, 2005.

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 3:36 AM

AURAPTOR

America loves a winner!

Good. Saves us the time, money and effort of having to go through a circus of the Senate hearings.

W, ya get a do over. Make this one count.

" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 4:08 AM

EMBERS

Skywalken you beat me to it! I only just heard the news.

I had been so encouraged by the obvious qualifications of Roberts that I had been very shocked that Bush nominated Miers.

So...now it'll be interesting to see who the next nominee is.

**********************************************
watch the R. Tam Session vids: http://www.hittarivertam.nu/
and buy the 'Serenity' comics published by Dark Horse,
and have you joined the Browncoats yet?
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&u=embers&linkID=36

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 6:22 AM

CREVANREAVER

Fred Thompson (aka Arthur Branch) was a part of the selection process for choosing John G. Roberts, so maybe the president should get him involved in the process of selecting the next nominee.

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 6:42 AM

HERO

What qualifies a person to be a Supreme Court justice?

1. Experiance on lower US courts? Some of our best had none.
2. Prior judge experiance? Not required, again some of the best had none.
3. Top law school? Nope, thats just elitism talking. In truth you don't even have to be an attorney to do that job.

So what really qualifies you? You have to do enough to get noticed (by the guy nominating you) but not enough to get attacked (by the guys voting on you confirmation). Liberal, conservative, we've got both these days. Yep, what really matters is how much you get noticed. Or you could change you race to black, gender to female, and philosophy to liberal. Then your record, experiance, and qualifications don't matter at all. Its just "I can't answer that" for a couple weeks followed by 98-0.

H

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 8:21 AM

SEVENPERCENT

Quote:
Originally posted by Hero:
What qualifies a person to be a Supreme Court justice?

1. Experiance on lower US courts? Some of our best had none.
2. Prior judge experiance? Not required, again some of the best had none.
3. Top law school? Nope, thats just elitism talking. In truth you don't even have to be an attorney to do that job.

So what really qualifies you? You have to do enough to get noticed (by the guy nominating you) but not enough to get attacked (by the guys voting on you confirmation). Liberal, conservative, we've got both these days. Yep, what really matters is how much you get noticed. Or you could change you race to black, gender to female, and philosophy to liberal. Then your record, experiance, and qualifications don't matter at all. Its just "I can't answer that" for a couple weeks followed by 98-0.

H

You seem to want to turn her nomination into a big game of "pick me, pick me, I'm a good conservative" instead of trying to find an appropriate justice.

You ask what does it take? I might not be able to answer that to your satisfaction, but I can tell you what it does not take to be a good candidate.
1. "Dear George. U R the 3L33T35T dude EVAR." - Too loyal to the Pres, and not the constitution. George flaunted her loyalty to him, and considering that some of GWB's cronies and pet issues may be coming before her, this made her a poor choice.
2. Her religion is her guiding compass. - How lovely. But religion should not come anywhere near the LAW. She is counted on to interpret law based on what is written in the law and on past practice, not on a WWJD basis. The minute her religion became a factor (thanks again, Georgie), her days were numbered.
3. "The new conservatism." - There was a time when being a conservative justice meant having a particular way of reading the law (as I believe Roberts to be). Now, they are picked on whether or not they are anti-choice, pro-Jesus, and anti-gay. The court shouldn't be about ideology; it's about the law.

As a Democrat, I particularly liked Roberts' nomination. Roberts was qualified and I think he'll make a good CJ. Meiers was a doomed choice, and it has nothing to do with race, age, or gender, as you imply, Hero. It's not a game of who can win the most offices, it's about the rule of law in this country. Republicans are too eager lately to turn everything into a game of "we winned and you all are teh suxxors!LOL!!"

It's not supposed to be that way.

------------------------------------------
He looked bigger when I couldn't see him.

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 10:14 AM

KJW

I agree as a Democrat I am more than happy with Roberts as CJ. I expect conservatives to be appointed by Bush, but they have to be competent and have a philosophy of jurisprudence as opposed to passing a litmus test on specific issues or loyalty to a President. SCOTUS deals with incredibly complex issues and someone like Miers would have added little to US jurisprudence, and probably diminished it. I think kudos have to be given to Senators on both sides who made it clear to the White House that this nomination was unacceptable. I know Bush will appoint a consevative, but like I said, whoever he appoints needs at least to be competent.

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 3:29 PM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up

Can't you people see the plan? Put up someone who is (by Republican standards, anyway) a moderate. When the Dems attack her, withdraw her and say "Well, I tried to provide a moderate, but you guys didn't seem to want one. Here's a raving Right-wing ideologe for you then." Wanna bet the next nominee is way to the Right?

"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Thursday, October 27, 2005 7:00 PM

DREAMTROVE

I don't think it's a plan. To say that Bush has a plan, about anything, even arranging a brunch, would be giving him too much credit.

As a conservative, of course I oppose Miers on her probably left Roe v. Wade stance, but so what. It's not a major issue to me. I don't think it was a major issue for most people, esp. in the Senate.

Miers failed on many many levels.

First and foremost she failed to pass the rather simple "not a crook" requirement for SCOTUS.

1. She bribed a judge to give her an award roughly 10x what was meritted by right of eminant domain.

2. She set up a tax shelter that defrauded the feds, in the words of Norm Coleman "to the tune of millions of dollars"

furthermore she failed to meet the "not a cronie" standard.

there is a qualification, she had no understanding of the law or the constitution.

she said that the fifth amendment was "antiquated, and obsolete" she thought the equal districting law was part of affirmative action, when actually it was an electoral college issue.

and finally, she failed to release any of her information or answer any questions.

She's fine to be whitehouse council because I don't care enough about the president to care whether he has a good defense or not :)

Roberts is fine with me. Hopefully the next nominee will be someone off of the shortlist that Spector made up.

I just have to add this. Spector gathered the senate gop, and asked for suggestions, he had the judiciary vett them, and then made the list and went to see the president in person. This took him a week or so. The president barely even looked at the list and showed no interest in anyone on it, asked no questions, and then told Spector he'd come up with someone himself. Well he did that, and now he hopefully knows better.

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Friday, October 28, 2005 3:20 AM

KJW

Yeah, there is no strategy here with the Miers nomination, it was a mistake. The political capital lost by the President with this fiasco will hurt him, especially if indictments come out against Libby or Rove. For some reason, this very slick administration is crumbling and if this continues into next year then Republicans will likely lose some ground in Congress. Though I severely doubt the dems will gain control of either house in 2006. Bush has no message right now, besides tax cuts and that is getting old.

With the Administration's credibility lost the dems can really challenge anyone he nominates now, they really didn't even challenge Miers and she was withdrawn. If Bush had appointed a conservative judge who was qualified then the nomination would likely have succeeded. Roberts is quite conservative and he flew through the process. Republicans have the Senate and the success of Roberts gave Bush some real credibility on SCOTUS appointments, but he squandered that in one decision. His chance for an ultra-conservative has been lost.

If Bush wants to get anything through Congress in the next year, he does not need another political battle over a SCOTUS nomination. He will likely appoint another judge in the vein of Roberts, someone conservative, but very qualified. I doubt he will appoint a woman or minority, at this point there is little need and it won't provide cover for a less than competent ultra-conservative nomination like it did with Thomas. Times have changed in that regard.

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