Blogotional

I remain aghast at the continuing rhetoric about the Miers SCOTUS nomination. Most of the punditry I heard on the radio yesterday seemed to think this intramural silliness will not hurt the Republicans and conservatism in general in 2006, but I am not so sure. Ally Hedgehog Blog said this yesterday

Does anyone agree with me that to see conservative Republicans strategically leaking, to the Washington Post, off-the-record meetings with the White House is both depressing and shameful?

I agree with him wholeheartedly. Now not only is there infighting, but there is dirty infighting. That really is the kind of stuff that will hurt us in 2006 and beyond. Mark Steyn put it this way

So the problem remains: how to slay Bush. And if this last week is anything to go by, it looks like Democrats are going to be denied that pleasure, and it will fall instead to conservatives to reduce the Bush presidency to rubble.

But let's move forward on this by continuing my discussion with Watchman's Words.

Bob's latest volley has four basic points. Let's look at each in turn. First Bob argues with my citation of Sun Tsu and states that it is not always preferable to when without a fight. As evidence, he first cites Iraq, stating

Can anyone seriously doubt that our situation in Iraq would be better had the Iraqi Army stood and fought and been defeated (and their numbers permanently reduced)?

This presumes facts not in evidence. My favorite US intelligence guy in Iraq said this just a few days ago

Austin Bay and Dan Darling capture exactly the nature of this struggle as essentially a fight driven by foreign forces and influences. Whatever Saddam and any hidden partners may have initially planned – and there is good reason to suspect he had co-conspirators and accomplices in Damascus and Tehran – Zarqawi and his ambitions have clearly overwhelmed whatever other military players still operate in Iraq. For all intents and purposes, the Baathist hold-outs have faded nearly out of existence.

In other words, in Iraq we currently fight Al Queda, not the remnants of the Iraqi army, we defeated it soundly, quite a while back, and at minimal cost in lives and material, certainly less than in a stand-up fight.

Bob also cites Peggy Noonan as support for his stand-up fight would be betterr argumennt.

If in the end President Bush lost, he'd lose while advancing a cause that is right and doing serious damage to the other side. Then he could come back to win with the next nominee.

Ms. Noonan is far smarter about these things than I, but whatever damage done to the enemy in the fight would be undone by their victory. The President would have had to come back with a weaker candidate, likely weaker than this one.

Bob's second point is that Mier's resume is weak. My father is an attorney and he explained this all to me long ago. Being a good judge on this level is more about being a good picker of clerks and a good manager of them than it is about being good at legality itself. Consider for example a pharmaceutical firm -- must the president of such a firm be the best pharmacist in the world for the firm to succeed? Now, he must know how to identify them and how to get the best from them. Miers can have at her disposal the absolute best legal minds we produce, she will not suffer. Her experience running a law firm will likely make her better at this than other justices.

But more importantly, this just smacks of elitism. The world is full of people who did not go to the right schools or kiss the right butts, which is where most "credentials" come from, that are a lot smarter than those that did. White House counsel is no mere job. She's plenty smart enough.

Bob's third argument is that there are "signs" she is not conservative enough

.It may not be established, but there are numerous disturbing signs that she is exactly that. From The Corner's Stanly Kurtz: "I note a worrisome report in today's Chronicle of Higher Education. It seems that Miers was a key figure behind the establishment of a lecture series in women's studies at SMU." From John Yoo: "She did not win a reputation as a forceful conservative on issues such as the administration's position on stem cell research or affirmative action." More Yoo: "She also apparently urged that the White House preserve the ABA's privileged role in reviewing the qualifications of judicial nominees."

Miers may be pro-life (but then so is Harry Reid, and I wouldn't want him on the court!), although I don't think we even know that for sure, but I have yet to see a single shred of evidence that she is a constitutional conservative in the mold of Scalia and Thomas.

This belies a serious misunderstanding of the key issue from a legal perspective. Let's dive in to the big one -- Roe v. Wade. I really hate to break this to the nation, but if Roe v. Wade were overturned tomorrow, abortion would not cease. Even before that ruling it was legal in about a third of the country, and if overturned most states would quickly pass laws to leaglize it in some form.

The biggest problem with Roe v Wade is not abortion -- the nation clearly wants it, even if I don't. The biggest problem is that it established the principle that there are "rights" contained in the Constitution not specifically spelled out. It is from this principle that all the other things that have flowed from the court that conservatives have trouble with has come. So, frankly, I don't care if she is a pro-choice lesbian who wants to marry her lover (SHE IS NOT) if she understands legally, and will rule in accordance with same, that there are not "hidden rights" in the Constitution. If she, and the rest of the Court, rule that way most of the other judicial activism we have seen in the last 40 years will tumble like a house of cards.

I had a very good conversation with Hugh Hewitt about this over the Roberts nomination on Hugh Cruise II this past summer. Hugh explained it and I agree, we cannot let the fight for the court be "issue" driven. If we do, then we are going against the very principles we as conservatives claim to uphold. We are all upset because the left has used the court to force issues down our throats. To make this an "issue" question is to do the same in reverse.

Bob ends his post this way

In closing for this round, let's talk for a second about the role of conservatives in the Republican party--specifically religious conservatives. I argued here that we have been used and abandoned over and over again, and that will not change until we stop saying, "Please sir may I have another." If we do not stand up and make sure we are heard, we'll continue to be taken for granted and have nothing to show for our blind loyalty.

Absolutely we have to make ourselves heard, but we have to be strategic in how and when we do so. The time to argue over who the President should nominate is while he is deciding. Send emails, write letters, make phone calls, blog, do all of that while he is deciding. But he is the leader of the party and once he decides, its time to:
(thanks Hedgehog)

If we cry and complain, argue and wrangle, pout and moan, we weaken our position. We cannot take our ball and go home.

One final note. The Noonan piece cited above mentions that she is gaining sympathy with some sort fo term limit for court appointment. This would, in my opinion be a disaster. The idea is to keep judical jobs as apolitical as possible. They are already far more political than they should be. If term limited, judicial appointments would be predictable and therefore they would become definitive, and opposed to the currently speculative, campaign issues. This would highly politicize appointments. I can easily firesee President being elected solely on who they promise to appoint. Nope, bad idea Peggy. It would have the affect opposite what you desire.