One in, one to go: In July, White House counsel Harriet Miers escorted Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts Jr., right, to a meeting with President Bush. Conservatives, many of whom were lukewarm about Roberts, have split over Bush’s choice of Miers to replace Sandra Day O’Connor.

Captain Ed in the Washington Post has How Harriet Unleashed a Storm on the Right.

Well, he’s finally done it. By nominating White House lawyer Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, George Bush has managed to accomplish what Al Gore, John Kerry, Tom Daschle and any number of Democratic heavyweights have been unable to do: He has cracked the Republican monolith. Split his own party activists. And how.

The president’s surprise pick to replace Sandra Day O’Connor has ignited a massive debate among his former loyalists, especially in the blogosphere, where I spend a fair amount of time. Wails of betrayal are clashing with assurances of the president’s brilliant strategic thinking. Meanwhile, the heavyweights of punditry drop columns like artillery shells into what already may be a conservative civil war.

And to think that Harriet Miers with a wink and a nod from President Bush and James Dobson was supposed to be a STEALTH EVANGELICAL CANDIDATE

Hugh Hewitt and the The Loyalist Army have it RIGHT.

Michelle Malkin and the The Rebel Alliance have it WRONG.

And since Harriet Miers will be a SUCCESSFUL EVANGELICAL STEALTH CANDIDATE we will have to wait (for validation or I told you so) until after she is sitting on the bench.

Flap recommends that the Eastern intellectual (?) and elitist RIGHT chill out.

Why are you carrying Leahy’s and Biden’s bags?

Technorati Tags: Supreme Court, George Bush, Harriet Miers, James Dobson

Supreme Court Justice nominee Harriet Miers, left, walks with her brother Jeb Miers, right, and sister-in-law Liz Lang-Miers, center, on their way to church services at the Episcopal Church of the Incarnation in Dallas, Sunday, Oct. 11, 2005.

The ASSociated Press has Specter to Question Miers’ Qualifications.

Focus on the Family founder James Dobson has said he is confident Miers opposes abortion, based on conversations he has had with the White House.

So, now we hear from Arlen Specter, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Will the Leftie Senators be far behind?

The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee said Sunday he plans to vigorously question Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers about her qualifications because she has not proved to him she can handle the weighty issues that come before the high court.

“I think she may well turn out to be the best qualified once we give her a chance to be heard,” Specter said on ABC’s “This Week.” “But when you deal in constitutional law, you’re dealing in some very esoteric, complicated subjects that require a great deal of background.”

“The jurisprudence is very complicated, and I will be pressing her very hard on these issues,” he said.

Sounds patronizingly SEXIST to Flap. But, will any women’s groups say so?

NO!

Specter said he would ask during the hearings whether Miers had privately given assurances to conservatives that she would overturnRoe v. Wade, the 1973 landmark ruling that gave women a constitutional right to an abortion.

Definitely a STEALTH candidate.

Flap having been there and done that….. we will have to take the President’s word and wait.

But, her long time friend, Judge Hecht has a different take, ‘Pro-life’ Miers to be unbiased on US court -ally.

“She is pro-life, and she has been for 25 years,” Nathan Hecht, a Texas Supreme Court justice and Miers’ longtime friend, said on “Fox News Sunday.”

Asked how Miers, with that view, could conceivably vote to uphold the
Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision that affirmed a woman’s right to abortion, Hecht said, “legal issues and personal issues are just two different things. Judges do it all the time.”

“In fact, a judge is going to take an oath that says I’m going to judge rightly in cases, which means that you have to set aside your personal views in deciding the case,” he said.

So, is Harriet Miers trying to have her cake and eat it too? This reminds flap of Mario Cuomo explaining his HYPOCRITICAL views on abortion while remaining a Catholic.

Stay tuned for a brutal Senate confirmation.

Hugh Hewitt answers some conservative critics of Harriet Miers, What Do The Critics of the Miers Nomination Want?

But, will these arguments be enough to call off the RIGHT dogs?

Technorati Tags: Supreme Court, George Bush, Harriet Miers, Arlen Specter, James Dobson, Nathan Hecht

Crystal Camacho, with her mouth covered in red tape with the words ‘Life’, protests with other members of ‘Bound4Life’, an anti-abortion group, in front of the Supreme Court, rear, in Washington Friday, Oct. 7, 2005. Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers’ footprints on contentious social issues suggest a moderate position on gay rights, an interest in advancing women and minorities and sympathy for anti-abortion efforts.

The ASSociated Press has Bush Predicts Miers Will Be Confirmed.

President Bush predicted Friday that the Senate would confirm Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, even as a Republican senator said she had much work left to ensure that outcome. A former Republican nominee called her nomination “a disaster.”

he displeasure from some on the right with Miers — they cite lack of experience or any record clearly identifying her as a strong conservative — has led to calls for the president to withdraw her nomination.

Asked about those suggestions, Bush did not answer directly. He instead suggested that withdrawal wouldn’t be necessary, voicing confidence that she would be confirmed.

“She is going to be on the bench. She’ll be confirmed,” Bush told reporters after an Oval Office meeting with Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany.

Among conservatives, William Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard, and the anti-abortion group Operation Rescue called for Bush to withdraw the Miers nomination. Former federal judge Robert Bork — whose nomination to the Supreme Court the Senate rejected in 1987 — described the choice of Miers as “a disaster on every level.”

OK…… Tantrum by the RIGHT must end.

Harriet Miers may not be Flap’s first choice or the first choice of others but……..

Technorati Tags: Supreme Court, George Bush, Harriet Miers

White House Counsel Harriet Miers (C), U.S. President George W. Bush’s nominee to serve as an associate justice on the Supreme Court, meets with U.S. Senator Mike DeWine (R-OH) (R), on Capitol Hill October 5, 2005.

The Washington Post has Conservatives Confront Bush Aides, Anger Over Nomination of Miers Boils Over During Private Meetings.

The conservative uprising against President Bush escalated yesterday as Republican activists angry over his nomination of White House counsel Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court confronted the president’s envoys during a pair of tense closed-door meetings.

A day after Bush publicly beseeched skeptical supporters to trust his judgment on Miers, a succession of prominent conservative leaders told his representatives that they did not. Over the course of several hours of sometimes testy exchanges, the dissenters complained that Miers was an unknown quantity with a thin résumé and that her selection — Bush called her “the best person I could find” — was a betrayal of years of struggle to move the court to the right.

Conservatives have the RIGHT to be Angry and FEEL Betrayed.

Harriet Miers is NOT the best candidate.

As the nominee continued to work the halls of the Senate, the White House took comfort from the more measured response of the Senate Republican caucus and remained confident that most if not all of its members ultimately will support her. Yet even some GOP senators continued to voice skepticism of Miers, including Trent Lott (R-Miss.), who pronounced himself “not comfortable.”

“Is she the most qualified person? Clearly, the answer to that is ‘no,’ ” Lott said on MSNBC’s “Hardball,” contradicting Bush’s assertion. “There are a lot more people — men, women and minorities — that are more qualified, in my opinion, by their experience than she is. Now, that doesn’t mean she’s not qualified, but you have to weigh that. And then you have to also look at what has been her level of decisiveness and competence, and I don’t have enough information on that yet.”

Harriet Miers will be confirmed but she is NOT the best candidate and the RIGHT is justified in its disappointment.

The Bush Presidency is over…… but Flap said that before didn’t he?

Read what Geroge Will and Pat Buchanan say about the Miers’ nomination.

Drudge has MIERS FOUND CHRIST, TURNED REPUBLICAN.

By 1979, Harriet Miers, then in her mid-30s, had accomplished what some people take a lifetime to achieve. She was a partner at Locke Purnell Boren Laney & Neely, one of the most prestigious law firms in the South.

But she still felt something was missing in her life.

The NEW YORK TIMES is set to splash the “something” on Page Ones on Wednesday, newsroom sources tell the DRUDGE REPORT.

It was after a series of long discussions with Nathan Hecht, a junior colleague and sweetheart, that led her to a decision that many of the people around her say changed Miers life.

“She decided that she wanted faith to be a bigger part of her life,” Hecht said. “One evening she called me to her office and said she was ready to make a commitment,” to accept Jesus Christ as her savior and be born again, Hecht said. Miers became an evangelical Christian and began identifying more with the Republican Party than with the Democrats who had long held sway over Texas politics. Developing…

Ok!

And she has taught Sunday school as well.

Both commendable.

And Flap continues to support her nomination.

Technorati Tags: Supreme Court, George Bush, evangelical christian, Harriet Miers

White House Counsel Harriet Miers sits in the Oval Office as President George W. Bush talks on the phone in the background in Washington in this July 1, 2005 file photo. U.S. President George W. Bush on Monday reached into his inner circle and nominated Miers for a Supreme Court vacancy, choosing a woman with legal experience but who is not a judge to replace the retiring Sandra Day O’Connor. Photo taken on July 1, 2005.

The ASSociated Press has Bush: Miers Qualified to Be on Top Court.

In the face of criticism from the left and right, President Bush insisted Tuesday that Harriet Miers is the best-qualified candidate for the Supreme Court and assured skeptical conservatives that his lawyer-turned-nominee shares his judicial philosophy — and won’t stray from a rightward course.

“I’ve known her long enough to know she’s not going to change, that 20 years from now she will be the same person with the same judicial philosophy she has today,” Bush said. “She’ll have more experience. She’ll have been a judge, but nevertheless the philosophy won’t change, and that’s important to me.

Flap is disappointed that Harriet Miers is the President’s SCOTUS nominee.

But, will cautiously support her nomination and confirmation.

Flap has support from other conservatives.

Hugh Hewitt has Integrity and Do You Trust Them?

Ken Masugi over at Local Liberty has Justice Miers?

Dr. James Dobson of Focus on the Family is cautiously supprotive as well.

Michelle Malkin is not so sure.

The American Thinker is very sure with Don’t misunderestimate Miers.

Stay tuned.

Technorati Tags: Supreme Court, George Bush, Sandra Day O’Connor, Michelle Malkin, Focus on the
Family, James Dobson, Harriet Miers

White House counsel and Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers stands with Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid at the U.S. Capitol, Monday, Oct. 3, 2005, in Washington after President Bush nominated Miers to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.

The reaction from Conservatives on Harriet Mier’s nomination to the United States Supreme Court has been largely NEGATIVE.

Michelle Malkin has MESSAGE TO THE WHITE HOUSE.

130pm EDT. Dick Cheney just finished an interview with Rush Limbaugh. Cheney pleads for Rush to “trust” him. First caller after the segment is a Republican woman who is “so disappointed” with Bush and the GOP…they don’t seem to care about their base…we fought hard to get a Republican majority…I am so dismayed…”

Hearing the same from scores of rank-and-file Republican e-mailers today.

Rush made a half-hearted attempt to frame the cronyism concern as liberal MSM-generated. But the concern is as strong, if not stronger on the right than on the left.

Next caller: “George Bush has caved on just about everything.” He lists education spending, campaign finance, budget, tariffs. Bush “advocates conservatism to placate the base and then he acts like a moderate because he is a moderate.”

Senator Chuckie Schumer and Senate Minority Leader are OK with the pick. And this is good news?

Hugh Hewitt is OK with the pick.

So is Carol Platt Liebau here, here and here.

But others…….

Captain Ed has Harriet Miers Gets The Nod

Miers may make a great stealth candidate, but right now she looks more like a political ploy. Color me disappointed in the first blush.

John Hinderaker at Powerline has A Disappointment.

The only positive spin I can think of is this: President Bush knows Miers well, and it is almost inconceivable to me that he is insincere in his repeated descriptions of what he is looking for in Supreme Court justices. He also is acutely aware that the Souter nomination was one of the chief blots on his father’s administration. Is it possible that he would waste a Supreme Court nomination on someone who isn’t a conservative? It’s hard for me to believe, but the evidence so far isn’t encouraging.

RedState.org has Harriet Miers — A Profound Disappointment

We can be convinced that Miers is stellar. We can be convinced that Miers will be an originalist willing to reject the liberal dogma of Roe. But from where we sit now, this is a profoundly disappointing nomination, a missed opportunity, and an abdication of responsibility to make sound, well qualified nominations. Whether it is also a betrayal of first principles is still to be determined.

XRLQ has Harriet Who?

Patterico via Angry Clam has Is this Really the Best They Can Do?

The only positive things about Miers going around on the blogs have essentially three sources. They’re all weak.

David Frum from National Review Online has MADAME JUSTICE

The Miers nomination, though, is an unforced error.

Flap continues the sentiment.

Woefully disappointed the nominee was not Priscilla Owen.

Update #1

Dr. James Dobson of Focus on the Family is carefully supporting Miers’ nomination.

Update #2

Pat Buchanan has Miers’ Qualifications Are ‘Non-Existent’

Handed a once-in-a-generation opportunity to return the Supreme Court to constitutionalism, George W. Bush passed over a dozen of the finest jurists of his day — to name his personal lawyer.

In a decision deeply disheartening to those who invested such hopes in him, Bush may have tossed away his and our last chance to roll back the social revolution imposed upon us by our judicial dictatorship since the days of Earl Warren.

This is not to disparage Harriet Miers. From all accounts, she is a gracious lady who has spent decades in the law and served ably as Bush’s lawyer in Texas and, for a year, as White House counsel.

But her qualifications for the Supreme Court are non-existent. She is not a brilliant jurist, indeed, has never been a judge. She is not a scholar of the law. Researchers are hard-pressed to dig up an opinion. She has not had a brilliant career in politics, the academy, the corporate world or public forum. Were she not a friend of Bush, and female, she would never have even been considered.

Well said Pat.

And William Kristol of the Weekly Standard is Disappointed, Depressed and Demoralized.

And…. Rush Limbaugh

“This is a pick that was made from weakness. There was an opportunity here to show strength and confidence, and I don’t think this is it. There are plenty of known quantities out there who would be superb for the court.”

Stay tuned.

Technorati Tags: Supreme Court, George Bush, Sandra Day O’Connor, Michelle Malkin, Focus on the
Family, James Dobson, Priscilla Owen, Harriet Miers