The Indispensable Mr. Krauthammer
I picked up on Charles Krauthammer’s new column today. It was linked through Drudge. The link below will take you to it, and I emphasize our readers to read this, and understand where I am coming from here at the Asylum. (Keep in mind that Marcie is in favor of her, as is our new guest-blogger, Mistress Pundit. I’m the one stuck out in the cold on this one.)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/06/AR2005100601468_pf.html
But Charles brings up a couple of solid points in his column, and they’re cited below.
It is particularly dismaying that this act should have been perpetrated by the conservative party. For half a century, liberals have corrupted the courts by turning them into an instrument of radical social change on questions -- school prayer, abortion, busing, the death penalty -- that properly belong to the elected branches of government. Conservatives have opposed this arrogation of the legislative role and called for restoration of the purely interpretive role of the court. To nominate someone whose adult life reveals no record of even participation in debates about constitutional interpretation is an insult to the institution and to that vision of the institution.
There are 1,084,504 lawyers in the United States. What distinguishes Harriet Miers from any of them, other than her connection with the president? To have selected her, when conservative jurisprudence has J. Harvie Wilkinson, Michael Luttig, Michael McConnell and at least a dozen others on a bench deeper than that of the New York Yankees, is scandalous.
The first paragraph brings up a very important point, and it’s one that I have cited in this debate. Aside from the president urging us to "trust" him on this nominee, there’s nothing in her past that shows that she would interpret the Constitution in a constructionist or an originalist way. When this question is raised, those in favor of her throw her religion in our faces. That’s all well and good, but that’s the liberal way of dealing with a debate. Her religion—her faith—doesn’t factor into the debate at all. It can’t, and it’s hypocritical to inject it into the debate as it can’t even be brought up during the committee hearings.
And I have to agree with the second paragraph, as well. The amount of nominees far more qualified than she is a bench AND a bull-pen deeper than the Yankees. Yesterday, I listed ten superb, highly-qualified jurists that could have easily been nominated by the president. The excuse I’m now hearing is the party in power in the Senate (that would be the GOP for those keeping score at home) stated that they wouldn’t fight for those nominees because too many bloody RINOs are in the Senate that have no backbone unless they’re presented with an opportunity to trumpet their paltry little selves.
THIS is a serious problem, and it’s time it was dealt with, but the Senate can’t do it. So, to all the voters out there griping about this, get up off of your butt at election time and get rid of these RINOs. The president can’t nominate, approve and vote on his nominees all by himself. This is a part of "advice and consent" in the Constitution. If they lack the spine to fight for the nominee, then put someone in office that has the testicular fortitude to fight on behalf of the president and his nominees.
Miers will surely shine in her Judiciary Committee hearings, but that is because expectations have been set so low. If she can give a fairly good facsimile of John Roberts's testimony, she'll be considered a surprisingly good witness. But what does she bring to the bench?
This, say her advocates: We are now at war, and therefore the great issue of our time is the powers of the president, under Article II, to wage war. For four years Miers has been immersed in war-and-peace decisions and therefore will have a deep familiarity with the tough constitutional issues regarding detention, prisoner treatment and war powers.
Of course Miers will "shine" in the hearings. She’ll be coached like Chief Justice Roberts was, and she should do fine. But the question Charles poses still hangs in the air. What will she bring to the bench? Her advocates to the war-and-peace argument, which is true. But I contend that many of the cases dealing with such matters are already being addressed. The DC Circuit Court has had decisions regarding prisoner treatment and detainment. I’m not saying that the Supreme Court ruled correctly. (They clearly didn’t in the Rasul, Padilla and Hamdi cases.) But to cite this reason to appoint her to the bench smacks of almost conservative activism on the court. It’s almost like the president is telling the Left that if they don’t play his game of ball, he’ll stack the deck in his favor. Either way, activism is activism, and it has no place on the court.
Perhaps. We have no idea what her role in these decisions was. But to the extent that there was any role, it becomes a liability. For years -- crucial years in the war on terrorism -- she will have to recuse herself from judging the constitutionality of these decisions because she will have been a party to having made them in the first place. The Supreme Court will be left with an absent chair on precisely the laws-of-war issues to which she is supposed to bring so much.
And that’s the damnable thing about this. By their admission that she would lend so much to this issue coming before the court, her experience with it would cause plaintiffs to request her recusal. And rightly so, as those plaintiffs would hardly feel that they were receiving a fair hearing of their grievance before the court.
Charles makes a simple request with the title of his column: Withdraw this nominee. Again, as I have stated for three days now, I’ll wait and see what the hearings show us. She is a nominee, and deserves her fair hearing before the Judiciary Committee. I can only hope that if she shows she isn’t qualified for the seat on the high court, or is unfit to make such determinations, then the GOP had better vote her down. Hell, shrug your shoulders, look at the president and say, "Sorry, Mr. President. She doesn’t pass muster. Who’s next?" If that happens, I hope the president goes back to that deep bull-pen, and pulls out a stellar starter that is up to the task.
Publius II
I picked up on Charles Krauthammer’s new column today. It was linked through Drudge. The link below will take you to it, and I emphasize our readers to read this, and understand where I am coming from here at the Asylum. (Keep in mind that Marcie is in favor of her, as is our new guest-blogger, Mistress Pundit. I’m the one stuck out in the cold on this one.)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/06/AR2005100601468_pf.html
But Charles brings up a couple of solid points in his column, and they’re cited below.
It is particularly dismaying that this act should have been perpetrated by the conservative party. For half a century, liberals have corrupted the courts by turning them into an instrument of radical social change on questions -- school prayer, abortion, busing, the death penalty -- that properly belong to the elected branches of government. Conservatives have opposed this arrogation of the legislative role and called for restoration of the purely interpretive role of the court. To nominate someone whose adult life reveals no record of even participation in debates about constitutional interpretation is an insult to the institution and to that vision of the institution.
There are 1,084,504 lawyers in the United States. What distinguishes Harriet Miers from any of them, other than her connection with the president? To have selected her, when conservative jurisprudence has J. Harvie Wilkinson, Michael Luttig, Michael McConnell and at least a dozen others on a bench deeper than that of the New York Yankees, is scandalous.
The first paragraph brings up a very important point, and it’s one that I have cited in this debate. Aside from the president urging us to "trust" him on this nominee, there’s nothing in her past that shows that she would interpret the Constitution in a constructionist or an originalist way. When this question is raised, those in favor of her throw her religion in our faces. That’s all well and good, but that’s the liberal way of dealing with a debate. Her religion—her faith—doesn’t factor into the debate at all. It can’t, and it’s hypocritical to inject it into the debate as it can’t even be brought up during the committee hearings.
And I have to agree with the second paragraph, as well. The amount of nominees far more qualified than she is a bench AND a bull-pen deeper than the Yankees. Yesterday, I listed ten superb, highly-qualified jurists that could have easily been nominated by the president. The excuse I’m now hearing is the party in power in the Senate (that would be the GOP for those keeping score at home) stated that they wouldn’t fight for those nominees because too many bloody RINOs are in the Senate that have no backbone unless they’re presented with an opportunity to trumpet their paltry little selves.
THIS is a serious problem, and it’s time it was dealt with, but the Senate can’t do it. So, to all the voters out there griping about this, get up off of your butt at election time and get rid of these RINOs. The president can’t nominate, approve and vote on his nominees all by himself. This is a part of "advice and consent" in the Constitution. If they lack the spine to fight for the nominee, then put someone in office that has the testicular fortitude to fight on behalf of the president and his nominees.
Miers will surely shine in her Judiciary Committee hearings, but that is because expectations have been set so low. If she can give a fairly good facsimile of John Roberts's testimony, she'll be considered a surprisingly good witness. But what does she bring to the bench?
This, say her advocates: We are now at war, and therefore the great issue of our time is the powers of the president, under Article II, to wage war. For four years Miers has been immersed in war-and-peace decisions and therefore will have a deep familiarity with the tough constitutional issues regarding detention, prisoner treatment and war powers.
Of course Miers will "shine" in the hearings. She’ll be coached like Chief Justice Roberts was, and she should do fine. But the question Charles poses still hangs in the air. What will she bring to the bench? Her advocates to the war-and-peace argument, which is true. But I contend that many of the cases dealing with such matters are already being addressed. The DC Circuit Court has had decisions regarding prisoner treatment and detainment. I’m not saying that the Supreme Court ruled correctly. (They clearly didn’t in the Rasul, Padilla and Hamdi cases.) But to cite this reason to appoint her to the bench smacks of almost conservative activism on the court. It’s almost like the president is telling the Left that if they don’t play his game of ball, he’ll stack the deck in his favor. Either way, activism is activism, and it has no place on the court.
Perhaps. We have no idea what her role in these decisions was. But to the extent that there was any role, it becomes a liability. For years -- crucial years in the war on terrorism -- she will have to recuse herself from judging the constitutionality of these decisions because she will have been a party to having made them in the first place. The Supreme Court will be left with an absent chair on precisely the laws-of-war issues to which she is supposed to bring so much.
And that’s the damnable thing about this. By their admission that she would lend so much to this issue coming before the court, her experience with it would cause plaintiffs to request her recusal. And rightly so, as those plaintiffs would hardly feel that they were receiving a fair hearing of their grievance before the court.
Charles makes a simple request with the title of his column: Withdraw this nominee. Again, as I have stated for three days now, I’ll wait and see what the hearings show us. She is a nominee, and deserves her fair hearing before the Judiciary Committee. I can only hope that if she shows she isn’t qualified for the seat on the high court, or is unfit to make such determinations, then the GOP had better vote her down. Hell, shrug your shoulders, look at the president and say, "Sorry, Mr. President. She doesn’t pass muster. Who’s next?" If that happens, I hope the president goes back to that deep bull-pen, and pulls out a stellar starter that is up to the task.
Publius II
posted by Syd And Vaughn | 12:55 PM
2 Comments:
can't figure out how to embed a link? That's pretty basic, you know.
To Anonymous,
I use cut and paste to insert links in posts, or there's a link icon on the Blogger "create a post" page you can click on, and paste the link. Either way, the link works to take you where you the link is supposed to send you.
Thomas
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