More Conservative Reaction

As I survey the attacks on Harriet Miers, they seem to fall into a number of categories:

1. Chauvinism. She's not sufficiently intellectual if this from Ramesh Ponnuru is indicative:

which Supreme Court opinions Miers finds especially compelling in their reasoning. Perhaps she can be asked to go into that in the hearings. I'd be especially interested to know which opinions she has read and admired in the last three decades, although she may plead that the ones she likes involve live issues and that she therefore cannot discuss them.

Maybe he's just asking to know more about her judicial philosophy, but does he really think that a justice has to think like that? That's how people who write think, but it doesn't tell you much about a lawyer who doesn't read opinions for pleasure. (I don't know if she does or not. I just think it's a little like asking her, "If you could be a Supreme Court decision, which one would you be?")

I think that when you see "unqualified" they're not really talking about ability, experience or achievement. They mean she didn't go to a big name school, or practice in a big Washington or New York law firm, or go to cocktail parties that they go to and make small talk with them. She stayed in Texas, and doesn't mind going to Crawford, where everybody else, especialy the media, look like cats being held in the bath. This is the old "If you were any good, you'd be in New York," kind of bigotry.

Professor Bainbridge demands "Harriet Who?" and then gets insulted when Hugh Hewitt criticizes his arguments. If you want to throw mud, don't be surprised if it comes flying back.


2. Sour grapes. She wasn't their pick. This has been such a hot topic that everybody seems to have divided into camps and some seem furious that Bush didn't consult them or take a poll of the right wing before choising her. The "cronyism" argument seems based on the fact that she's not one of their own cronies.

3. Ideology. I just assumed that conservatives would want someone who wouldn't take political preferences into account in reaching decisions. But I'm beginning to think that a lot of Conservatives see themselves as smarter or more sophisticated than their Red State brethren, and that they are more interested in a battle with the Dems than in getting a judge who will do the job right. Maybe they see her as one of those distasteful Blblical literalists, who doesn't take her religion with a big dose of Neo-platonism. Or that she's not enough of a libertarian.

I've seen all of these indicated by the snooty reactions to her nomination, but considering how well selecting appeals court and state court justices has worked, I'm ready to try a new approach. I think that practicing lawyers who deal with actual people daily, rather than just theoretical legal questions, have a better sense of the importance of democracy than any other legal group.