Newest Supreme Court Nominee

President Bush nominated Harriet Miers today to fill Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's seat on the US Supreme Court. She has never been a judge, so there's no record of how she handles cases from the bench. Reaction to her nomination is mixed.

AP reported Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., had urged the administration to consider her, two congressional officials said. There was a long list of staunchly conservative judges that Democrats were poised to fight, Miers not among them.

If Harry Reid approves of her, then I'm less than thrilled. She may be everything conservatives hope for, but she may not, and we don't have any way of knowing. President Bush likes her, but he also likes his Guest Worker immigration program, so that's not necessarily saying much.

The Miers choice will likely be a disappointment to conservatives who hoped Bush would choose someone with a stronger "originalist" record.

"It looks like he flinched," commented Fox News analyst Bill Kristol. "It looks like a capitulation."

Indeed it does. I'm one of those disappointed conservatives.

If Bush had nominated a jurist with a long "paper trail" of decisions and conservative writing, he would have faced a much tougher confirmation fight in the U.S. Senate.

My question is, why is a tough confirmation fight in the Senate so bad? After other recent capitulations by Republican leadership and now this Democrat-approved nomination, I've started to think that the "R" after all the Republicans' names means something else:

Run away from a fight

Roll over and play dead

Retreat in the face of Democrat threats

Now is definitely time for a fight over judicial nominations, and unlike the President I welcome it. When Clinton got a nomination, he chose Ruth Bader Ginsburg, whose way-left viewpoint was front-and-center. So now it's President Bush's turn, but he didn't choose a front-and-center conservative. Instead he chose somebody whose record is invisible at best.

I listened to Laura Ingraham's radio show this morning, and there were a lot of conservatives who called in to express their disappointment over the nomination of Miers to the Court. Many of them said they'll probably be staying home when the next election comes around, and that doesn't bode well for Republican chances at another Supreme Court nominee. Their feeling is: If the Republicans can't stand up and fight, what's the point of electing them?

Ever the optomist, Hugh Hewitt has this to say about the nomination:

Harriet Miers isn't a Justice Souter pick, so don't be silly. It is a solid, B+ pick. The first President Bush didn't know David Souter, but trusted Chief of Staff Sunnunu and Senator Rudman. The first President Bush got burned badly because he trusted the enthusiams of others.

The second President Bush knows Harriet Miers, and knows her well. The White House Counsel is an unknown to most SCOTUS observors, but not to the president, who has seen her at work for great lengths of years and in very different situations, including as an advisor in wartime. Leonard Leo is very happy with the choice, which ought to be enough for most conservatices.

Let's hope Hugh is right.