Just wondering
Perhaps some of our legal brethren out there could help me out with my humble question.
Does becoming head of a law firm and having served as president of a state bar association qualify a lawyer to be appointed to the highest court in the land for life?
That and the fact that she's lacking a y chromosome are the only qualifications Bush can come up with for why congress should appoint his nominee Harriet Miers as a Supreme Court justice. Oh yeah, and she also thinks George is "the most brilliant man I've ever met." That helps.
This article by leading conservative George F. Will, who appears and sounds as though he's had a migraine since age 4, is getting a ton of attention. It lays out a pretty devastating argument against confirming Harriet Miers, and more broadly, against Bush.
posted by The Inside Dope @ 10/05/2005
2 comments
2 Comments:
Due to lack of information, I can't really discuss her qualifications to be on the Supreme Court. I would have to say that those assets alone, don't qualify her, but there are almost certainly more that will be considered in the near future.
It should be noted that at least 15 Justices before have had no judicial experience whatsoever.
Some have had even less legal experience and turned out well (i.e. FDR's appointments).
Furthermore, you'd be hardpressed to find a bevy of lawyers that would argue that L. Tribe is unqualified for the Bench, and he has never been a judge. On the other hand, he has written several editions of a Constitutional Law Textbook that has been used at Harvard Law and most law schools for several decades.
In fact, it is very likely a majority of judges thoughout this nation learned Constitutional Law from the text written by Tribe. Barack Obama had him as his Con Law professsor at Harvard Law and he seemed to think he was great. I don't know if he thinks he's qualified for the Court, but I'm willing to bet he would say yes.
Lib,
I appreciate your response, however, I wasn't suggesting that Miers' lack of judicial experience necessarily disqualified her from consideration, but rather that her general lack of experience with consitutional law and the sort of legal reasoning required by Supreme Court justices made her a poor choice.
It just seemed to fall pretty flat when Bush and his reliable flacks on these matters such as Roarin' Orin Hatch and others have nothing whatsoever to boast about her record other than she was born a female, headed a large law firm, and was president of the Texas Bar Association. (and of course, she was also White House council for Junior)
That seems to me to be far too slim a resume to suggest she's the most qualified, or even among the top 100 most qualified, candidates.
Old sourpuss Will seems to make this same argument in his now famous column.
The column is notable in that it signifies the point where it's dawned on even a leading conservative that Bush is NOT smart, he's NOT competent, he's NOT shrewd, and that he's just as shallow as he appears and that his inability to speak or read at above a 4th grade level isn't some endearing trait showing how "plain spoken" he is, but it's actually the plain evidence of how intellectually stunted he always has been.
Even the conservatives don't want to follow this guy anymore.
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