Redstate

I've made this point before and I apologize for recycling, but...

I can remember my reaction in early 2003 to the rattling sabers and beating war-drums. I was then a half-hearted supporter of the war. Still am.

I thought at the time, and said to a few people, that Bush had staked his whole presidency on a single swing of historic proportions: an attempt to liberalize the Arab (and by extension the Muslim) world. In general, the reaction to this was stupefied silence, or something like "well who are we to tell the Arabs how to live?"

Who indeed? This is one hell of a question, fraught with moral implications as well as practical ones. All I can say is that if Bush succeeds, schoolkids will be reading about him in their textbooks 500 years from now.

Because the really big, millennial events in history are always greeted with near-universal disapproval at their inceptions. And that makes perfect sense, because anything easy to do gets done easily by a lot of people and doesn't attract a lot of attention.

You can count on one hand the direction-changing events in the 1400-year history of Islam. A turn toward freedom and valorization of all citizens would be one of them.

But win, lose, or draw, this struggle has become the focus of his administration to the exclusion of all else, including a whole raft of Conservative agenda items that have fallen by the wayside. Of course the Bush people have to deal with whatever comes up (like hurricanes and what-not), but the essential focus is on the War on Terror.

Yada, yada, yada, with this theory and that theory and qualifications on and on. Simple. Bush is pro business and pro life. He picked Miers because he knows her positions on these things, and with no paper trail, the Dems can't find out. She is confirmable without an energy draining bloodbath and will move the Court to the right at least in the O'Connor seat. He may have not expected all the wailing and gnashing of teeth from the "conservative" wing of right, and he obviously misoverestimated the political savvy of the pundits and the self annointed keepers of the conservative flame.

"Would a commander ever execute a war by ignoring the morale of his own troops, refusing to go after the opposition, and hoping to somehow win over the neutrals?"

Would a good commander lead bonsai charge after bonsai charge, when a flanking maneuver is more effective just because his soldiers might not understand his battlefield strategy?

There's a lot going on here, but most of it seems on target.  If you look for commonality between Miers and Roberts, the thing that would jump out at me would be a likelihood to defer to Executive power.  This aspect of their judicial decision-making, combined with the relative lack of a fight in the Senate (saving political capital for other things) unite the picks much more coherently than most other theories I've heard.

In all likelihood, Bush's legacy is going to be measured almost entirely by the war in Iraq.  Theoreitcally, it might all wrap up rather quickly and there would be a chance to make big domestic changes as well.  That seems unlikely, though.  So, thinking purely about "legacy", he is probably right to focus his attention here.  Whether a single-minded focus on one effort is likely to result in success under our political system is a separate question, which the latter half of this story addresses with better insight than I'm going to attempt.

... the bonsai charge after bonsai charge.

how about Bork, Ginsburg & Estrada? How about those left by the way side because of The Deal?

Which is to be preferred - defeat now, or defeat in the future, extending over decades?  For the truth is that we are being asked to wager on Miers in a way we were not asked to wager over Roberts, and surely not in ways would be asked to wager on some of the foremost minds of legal conservatism.

Same question for Bork and for Ginsburg. Just because the other side squawks does not make someone a "bonsai charge". By that logic, a Scalia would be one as well. Perhaps you are willing to accept that Kavanaugh, Boyle, Saad and the rest are out of the mainstream while justices like Ruth Bader Ginsburg are considered perfectly acceptable. I don't, and I think if that is the prevailing attitude, then Harold Hutchinson is totally correct when he suggests that Chuck Schumer has won the war.

I do not think that going with "flanking actions" has proven to be a success either, as that has resulted in, since Bork, Kennedy and Souter counter-balanced only by Thomas.

The other problem with that strategy is, since it puts the definition of what amounts to a "bonsai charge" completely in the hands of the other side, who will gladly continue to move the line. They had already said that if Bush had turned around and nominated one of the three from the gang of 14 agreement, they would have taken that as a sign of bad faith. That line just doesn't seem to want to stay put.

"this struggle has become the focus of his administration to the exclusion of all else"

So basically you are saying that this administration can't walk and chew gum at the same time.  I find that pretty depressing.

I don't think that it is too much to ask that someone with the power and resources of the entire federal government behind them and access to the best and brightest individual, think tanks, etc. be able to attend to more than one thing at a time, or delegate accordingly. To focus the entire administration on only one thing isn't leading; it's abdicating.

Of course, I'm not sure this administration has ignored everything else.  Frankly, I think that is wishful thinking - wishful because it implies some sort of benign neglect instead of a more malignant agenda.  The administration has been very agressive in supporting sweetheart legislation to benefit favored moneyed interests and/or curry favor with big corporate donors (like MBNA, and Big Pharma and Big Oil).  By and large those folks have gotten plenty from this administration.  Those who haven't are the small humble donors who believe in things like federalism and limited government and fiscal responsibility.  And from what I read on these boards it seems that the SoCons haven't gotten what they wanted either.  

At some point you need to consider the possibility that these results are not the products of mere neglect.

We're stuck with Harriet Miers for the next 15 to 20 years on the Supreme Court....All because Bush needs democratic support and isnt willing to fight chuckie schumer and dick durbin on a front in which they are obviously wrong and he's right.

Here's a quote I've found a few weeks ago:..."Yet the White House and the Republican party know that if they force on the major issues (abortion, gay marriage, stem-cell research, ten commandments) it would trigger a backlash.  THEY'D RATHER ECHO EVANGELICAL RHETORIC, DO LITTLE, AND LET SOCIAL CONSERVATIVES TAKE OUT THEIR FRUSTRATION AND ANGER ON "ACTIVIST JUDGES, THE LIBERAL PRESS, HOLLYWOOD ELITES," AND VARIOUS OTHER LEFTITS "BOOGYMEN"

of illigitimacy it casts over the entirety of our philosophy, as though it were some shameful thing that had to be concealed away in some closet.  Ours is not the governing philosophy that dare not speak its name.

From the information I have read, I think the President made the only play he really could have. The Senate is the problem, there are too many non-conservatives there. There just aren't the votes for the 'nuke', Specter is only looking out for his legacy and nothing else, and there are more than 5 weak kneed Republicans who won't fight for a nominee that I would want. So to me, it is a battle we lose now, we lose a possible tool for later (nuke), we scare off more potential nominees that would have to run the gauntlet, and embolden the Democrats even more (not sure how possible that last one is though).

One thing about Roberts was that he had led the perfect life, no skeletons, even still there were whispers that maybe he was gay, or maybe his son is gay. And while that second suggestion was rightly troll-rated on Kos, all it would take was one slip up years ago, and DNC/NARAL/Moveon would hand it to their MSM allies. You think the data mining for Able Danger can compare to what the DNC/NARAL/Moveon can come up with? Would you want to put your family through that? I wouldn't.

You can let me know when ALL of the Senate Republicans (or at least 50) are ready to go to battle. Until then, we are left with the reality that some in the Senate will shoot our side in the back. This is the same Senate that threw Estrada, Kavanaugh, Boyle and Saad under the bus and Borked Bork just because the Democrats said so.

A very thoughtful piece and I agree that the President does take a judges view on the power of the presidency in the GWOT and other situations as probably the most imporant feature. I believe "W" feels GWOT is more important than all other issues.

Though I feel the editors and others who opine this blog have given the impression that "W" has run of the reservation in his views. That the Meirs selection was the straw that broke the camels back. I feel that is unfair and a true review of what "W' has done I feel is quite extraordinary.  No president will do 100% of what you would like.  

I feel the poll numbers are really not much different from one year ago. Lets be honest and say the CBS poll has never been right and the pollster who was very accurate during the election was Rasmussen and he has "W" floating between 43% and 48%. During the finals months of the election "W" had numbers between 47% and 52%. A loss of probably 5 pts which has been there for months. I feel most of the loss of support for "W" is a liberal MSM story than anything in real fact.

The assumption of Bush comitting the same mistake his father did with Souter is so mistaken.  Bush has done almost everything different than his father because he saw the mistakes his father made.  Bush knows Meirs and Souter was unknown to Bush 41.

Also "W" has never back down from a fight. He has never relented on GWOT, taxes, nuclear option, sending nominees back to the senate and spent 4-5 months touring the country on Social Security reform the great 3rd rail of politics. With no support from his own party and complete opposition from the Dems and other such as AARP.

To say the President suddenly did not want to fight the opposition parties core is just wrong. "W" has been fighting since day one it has been some senators in the party who have not been up to the fight.

I know the selection to some people has been hard to swallow but why did "W" do this is rather simple.  He is on the hook for all nominations to the SCOTUS not us.  He understands the importance and the legacy it will leave him. Lets take the words of "W" for what they really mean.  He wants someone who he has confidence in that will be conservative now and in 15-20 years from now. He has learned the mistake of his father and does not want to appoint someone he does not have confidence in. The easy thing would have been to nominate a Luttig or Brown or Owens. He would have immediate support of the base and the fight against the left would be nothing new.  The hard decision is to nominate someone he knows the base may not like, but in the long term is the right choice. Now that is the hard path to take and "W" has taken the hard path since he was put into office.          

"The Senate is the problem, there are too many non-conservatives there"

If this is the case, then how does this nomination help rectify this problem? I don't think it does.

"This is the same Senate that threw Estrada, Kavanaugh, Boyle and Saad under the bus and Borked Bork just because the Democrats said so"

And the Democrats will continue to say so, and will say so in more and more cases, until they pay a price for doing so.

We can only avoid this fight by conceding it from the outset.

over the repetition of the idea that the nomination of anyone with more of a record than Harriet Miers would be an exercise in futility is more than counterbalanced by the mental image of someone sprinting up a hill brandishing a small tree in a pot.

I don't think that the President is thinking about that. I think he is trying to work within the system right now, and doesn't want to drag out the nomination just to help rectify this problem (at least right now, over a year out from the election). And IF the president knows that a 3rd vacancy will be opening up sometime spring/summer next year, right in the middle of the campaign season, wouldn't that be a better time?

"I don't think that the President is thinking about that."

That's part of the thesis here, wasn't it? That he isn't thinking about things like this, and should be?

"And IF the president knows that a 3rd vacancy will be opening up sometime spring/summer next year, right in the middle of the campaign season, wouldn't that be a better time?"

It depends. If the vacancy he knows about is from Stevens or Ginsburg, yes. If it is from Scalia, I am skeptical. Further, if it is from either of the former, I am very skeptical of his ability to know what is being supposed he knows.

I think it is much more likely that, if there is another vacancy coming in his term, it will be after the next elections.

"That he isn't thinking about things like this, and should be?"

My answer is a solid maybe. Heh.

But you haven't really gotten to the heart of my question.  There are credible analyses circulating that argue for the proposition that Miers is a ringer for the profile of a Souter. In other words, we are more warranted in believing that Miers will end up becoming the defeat that keeps on giving than we are in accepting bland assurances of precisely the types that were offered on behalf of previous justices who got in touch with their inner liberal, juridical godhood.  The odds, therefore, are long, and a loss will not merely raise further the wall between the SCOTUS and sane jurisprudence, but, incontrovertibly, will fracture the conservative movement and the Republican base, whereas even failure in the Senate confirmation Gotterdamerung will only serve to unify that movement, energize the base, and elect more sound Republicans.  

If the nominees bow out, then does it matter how much President Bush and the Senate are willing to fight?

Senators who wimped out were merely a bonus.  Schumer targeted the nominees themselves.  The filibusters of Appeals Court nominees, even those who eventually got through (Owen, JRB, Pryor), were meant to wear them down.  With Miguel Estrada, it was even more successful - he backed out of the nomination for the DC Circuit Court of Appeals seat.

It's like going after a free-agent pitcher.  If he doesn't want to play for the Cincinatti Reds, it doesn't matter how much the Reds are offering him - they are not going to get him, and once it's clear he doesn't want to go there, it's time to move on to find someone who is willing to go there.

There are other also "credible analyses" out there.

Although I will point out that I should not have posed that as a question. It is the thesis I put forth in this piece.

Now if it is the correct thesis, on that I will join you in saying "maybe." I think he should be, but concede that I just don't know.

It doesn't. And until we figure out how to make Schumer and company pay a political price for their approach, they will continue to engage it, and will continue to move the line even further.

Above I linked to a piece by Harold Hutchison. Not only did I spell his last name wrong, I linked to the wrong piece. The correct link is here. Mea culpa.

For sure he's avoiding.

Maybe it's the war.

Or maybe, if you believe the WSJ, it's because a large chunk of his admin is about to be indicted and he is not going to be able to fight for a while.

Or maybe it's because at heart, Texans are more western libertarian conservatives, true conservatives like me, than religious conservatives who seem to want to use the power of the federal government to impose their religious views on the rest of us at the point of a government gun.  

I don't know what Meirs stands for.  Neither do you.  She belongs to the establishment church.  Good for business.  

Or maybe it's because an "out" religious conservative would further undermine his poll numbers.  So the question becomes, is religious conservatism becoming the ideology which dare not speak its name, or at least be honest and up front about its views?  Are the culture wars over, as Gingrich surmises, and has this trend run its course without quite having made it over the top?

is like icing on the cake for Schumer. You guys going to sing him happy birthday to?

The problem we're facing is not timidity on the prt of the President or the Senate.  It's timidity on the part of the people who are saying, "I do not wish to be considered for this position."

The Demcorats have alreadyshown they are willing to pay a political price for the filibuster.  In 2002 and 2004, they had a net loss of six seats, mostly in red states where this is an issue.  The problem that has arisen is that they have been willing to pay that price - furthermore, they have expanded their intimidation effort to candiates.

Is it a coincidence that after it became public knowledge that Michael Steele's credit report had been obtained by the DSCC (run by Schumer) what two A-list candidates declined to run in North Dakota and West Virginia, states where the Democrats had incumbent Senators who would have been vulnerable to a campaign based partially on obstruction of the President's nomineees?

I don't think so.  In fact, I wonder who let slip that the DSCC had acquired the credit report in the first place.  It would certainly add another edge of uncertainty to a potential candidate, would it not?

And I don't have the looks either.

I am not advocating the right wing do anything. I don't have that sort of pull, even if I was so inclined.

Instead, I am merely pointing out what the reaction is, and what the likely results of certain approaches will be.

The fact is, I do not think there is a right approach for us to take at this point. The bell can't be unrung.

the historical record of republican appointments argues in favour of my reading, as does this sort of nonsense in her record of past accomplishments, not to mention the fact that her aversion to the Federalist Society and affinity for the left-leaning ABA scarcely commends her as a likely practitioner of originalist jurisprudence.

The odds still swing my way.

But too obscure in its relation to the discussion to establish a point.

1. This President was for the nuclear option
   
   
2. He renominated Brown, Owen and others.
   
   
3. Fantastic record on nominations for the courts
   
   
4. has fought the Dems on many fronts with never backing down.

Can it just be that he wanted Harriet Meirs.

But I will do it again here.

"The problem we're facing is not timidity on the prt of the President or the Senate.  It's timidity on the part of the people who are saying, "I do not wish to be considered for this position.""

The problem is both. The President wants to avoid a fight, so he eliminates from consideration many, including the most obviously committed to the conservative judicial approach. The remaining ones considered pare themselves further. But the ones committed to the conservative agenda to the degree that would be willing to run the gauntlet are disproportionally those who have been already fighting the fight in clear view-- the ones eliminated from consideration because the President wants to avoid the fight.

I agree with you that what Schumer is doing has had a chilling effect. I am suggesting it goes a bit further than you are suggesting.

And the answer still is, we have to figure out a way to win that battle, to make it that Schumer et al pay a political price for engaging in that sort of tactic.

would be a good start.

"Pleased to meet you, hope you guess my name." (The Rolling Stones - Sympathy for the Devil)

I'm playing 'Devil's Advocate' here. We could both probably link to about 100 blog posts with great arguments/analyses on both sides.

I think one of the major lacking arguments here (not this post or RedState, in the total Miers debate) is WHY? Not why from my perspective, nor yours, nor anyone else's except for the President. From the President's point of view, why did he choose Harriet Miers, what are his reasons, what information did he have, what did he hope to gain (or calculate gain/loss)? And then starting from that point, analyze the choice.

The bell rung was the nomination. The only ones who can stop ringing it are the President or Miers, with a withdrawl, which would not undo the ring which has occurred.

This piece is not about what the reaction to the nomination should be. It is about what the reaction to the nomination has been, and probably will continue to be.

Perhaps you think the administration should ignore what they are seeing, and instead just push to get what they want to see. It does seem to be the path they are taking. It might work. The evidence suggests it won't be that easy.

Here is what it was.

It was panic.  He knows he's had five years to be ready for this moment.

He doesn't want to let the cat out of the bag.  He is ready to fight for a nominee he believes in.

He knows who that is.  He's known who that is for the last five years.

So he waits and waits and waits... for Roberts to be confirmed.

Now, he absolutely MUST have the next nomination ready to go in a week or less so he looks strong and bold.

Roberts nomination passes and he places a call to his nominee ... Priscilla Owen .... who turns him down.

He's in shock .. now what.. he's promised a nominee through the grape vine by Monday.

Okay .. stop .. think .. breathe deep.  Priscilla Owen is a woman I trusted.  I know her from Texas .... let's see ... my people love me .. .they will understand somehow if I choose another conservative woman from Texas who I trust ....

Picks up phone and calls Harriet.

He should have sent in the Ents.

The Presidential Oath of Office:

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.

Nothing at all about making movement conservatives happy....

I suspect the President's response to us all is, "Harriet Miers is the nominee. Get over it."

His job. His choice. Get over it.

I'm not convinced that President Bush is looking for a legacy.  I think he'd be content to get done what he can and go back to Crawford to clear brush for the rest of his life.  I'd be surprised if he opened a presidential library and even more surprised if he wrote a book or hit the lecture circuit.

Think about it, when has President Bush shown that he cares one wit what people think about him?  He cares not for polls, holds a hostile view of the Washington press corps, pursues unpopular initiatives, sticks to his decisions in the face of criticism, and (if the anti-Miers POV is to be believed) betrays his political base.

The War on Terror came with the job in the president's way of looking at it.  He takes it seriously.  He'll do the best he can to manage it and hand it off to the next guy.  Judicial appointments are also a part of the job description.  He will take them seriously, nominate the best people he can by his criteria, and let the chips fall where they may.  

My dime store psychological assessment is that legacy seekers are inherently insecure (Clinton, Carter, Nixon).  I don't view this president as that type.

I did get the Stones reference, although I never cared for their music.  And I do recognize that we could play devil's advocate to one another all afternoon.  But, in the end, there are certain facts which lend credence to my claims, and against me I find, once all of the sense and nonsense about her education, credentials and competence are laid aside, the assurance that she is the real deal because Bush knows her about as intimately as it is possible for anyone to be known without that party being known in the Biblical sense of the term.  For obvious reasons of history and recent controversies, I don't find that argument or assurance very comforting.  So, while we can play duelling links until Miers is seated on the Court, I believe that the evidence trends in my favour.

As to the question of why Bush nominated her, I believe that the answers are already floating around in most of the debates over the nomination: some combination of, in no particular order, Schumer, the Gang of 14, sagging poll numbers, a ham-handed attempt to pander to evangelicals, true belief, on Bush's part, in his ability to see into another's heart, Bush's desire to avoid controversial battles with Democrats (sounds of the new tone thing), cynical realpolitik ("where else are the conservatives going to go if they think that Miers is not acceptable as a payment on the promise of more Scalias and Thomases?"), the influence of certain advisors and family members, and... who knows?  Pique at being informed that Gonzales would not be acceptable to the base?

The reality is that most of these factors were likely in the mix, albeit with what intensities and relative strengths we cannot determine, unless someone should someday disclose everything in the course of providing the usual, tired, "insider's history" of the Bush adminstration.

to impose their beliefs on anybody.  If anything, people like me just the Supreme Court to let us live the way we want to.  Why cant the state of Kentucky put up a display of the 10s if they so choose to? Why do the courts feel that they have god-like powers to determine how others ought to live their lives?

It could get better than that as the FBI's investigation into that credit report continues.  Kind of hard for Chuckie to do things if he gtes sent to a Federal penitentiary on a felony rap.

Something smells when the people responsible for that credit report got paid time off, and the DSCC is paying the legal fees as well.

I have a problem with that contention and with the blurb of this article: politics is not war, and the manner by which we carry out politics should not be to use the same tactics as we use in warfare. In warfare we are trying to defeat an enemy, period. In politics there is no enemy: we are all citizens of the same nation seeking what is best for that nation (and, of course, for ourselves too), about which goals we do however have disagreements. So the political endeavor ultimately needs to be a cooperative endeavor, not an inherently aggressive one. Politics is not a zero sum game, any more than economics is. Warlike sentiments and tactics in politics do great damage to the nation in the long run, rendering it ungovernable and perhaps, at the extreme, making it prone to real warfare (the very object lesson of our 1850s, followed by you-know-what). The goal of politics is not to destroy others, but to persuade others that your ideas are the best.

According to Scott M the names withdrew while the list was in double digits.

He could have called Alberto and what kind of debate would we be having now?

Pretty much the same.

This is all well and good at a certain level of theoretical abstraction, but on the level of concrete policy disputes, there are not only those who are amenable to persuasion, but those who will never be persuaded, regardless of the rational superiority of any arguments that might be marshalled against them.  And in thoselatter cases, yes, the object of political debate is to acquire power and implement one's policies in the teeth of their obstinacy, else we must subscribe to the absurd notion that, for example, abortion must not be outlawed until every last citizen assents, rendering the proposal redundant.

An excellent summary.

Pro Business is the big thing, if she's pro life that's an added benefit. He gets what he wants and puts himself in the middle of popular opinion, with 10 or less confirmation votes on either fringe.

when every attempt to increase one's power produces the opposite reaction from one's political opponents, and at that point one risks doing real damage to the culture of the nation itself, which is not infinitely elastic. This are lessons from history, including our own, which show this quite starkly. I condemn the extremists of both sides for this behavior, though I suppose if I had to choose sides I do like you guys better than the irrational ranters on the Left. I do believe however that rightwingery has reached its limits and any attempt to pull the country any further right risks major and severe harm to the nation. This is especially reprehensible when we have some real, and truly dangerous, enemies, abroad and perhaps they should be the focus of our attention, not inconsequential sideshows about school prayer and 10 Commandments monuments. Now is indeed the time for consolidation and healing and reunion, not for any increase in anger or bitterness or (let alone!) violence.

First, the possibility of such tensions and conflicts is inherent in the human condition; we cannot engineer, or even theorize as possible, a politics in which this possibility has been eliminated.  Civil conflicts have occurred, are occurring, and will occur again, until the eschaton.

Second, there really exist no rational arguments in favour of the proposition that conservatives should moderate their policy demands, and that precisely because it is the liberal end of the spectrum which embodies the deviation from the American tradition.  For conservatives to assent to what liberals have wrought, whether it be in regards to Church-state relations, the metastases of privacy jurisprudence, and on and on all the way through the litany, would be for them to concede that it is tolerable for America to be faithless to her heritage and origins, and for them to be faithless towards the higher law (natural law for most philosophical conservatives).  It is manifestly irrational to demand of conservatives such capitulation, such an embrace of cognitive dissonance and the steady leftward ratchet of the past several generations.    To make the request is to ask of conservatives that they embrace injustice, unreason, and in some cases, outright evil.

Oh, there is a third thing.  We don't want violence; such talk is the province of the leftish fever swamps: they predicate of us the desire, whereas they are more inclined, as some of their rhetoric and protest conduct demonstrates.

So basically you are saying that this administration can't walk and chew gum at the same time.

No. I'm saying they chose which problem to focus on. Business people do this every day, and the President (God love 'im!) is a biz guy.

You can watch, help or hinder, it won't make a difference. Choose the one that makes you feel good about yourself.

I will watch, help where I think it is right to do, and hinder when I think that is the right thing to do. And all the while, I will try to provide a relatively clear picture of what is likely to occur when certain strategies are engaged, so that (if I agree with the strategy or not) there is some perspective beyond people thinking what they want to have happen will happen.

Tbone is right on the money. Miers is pro-life, and President Bush needed a quick confirmation before the two abortion cases in December, without a "bloodbath" in the Senate.

If Bush does know that there will be another vacancy soon, he is probably saving the fight for later.

He knows that he was weakened by the poor performance of Michael Brown after Katrina, and also needs to focus his attention on Iraq, where there's the ratification referendum next Sunday, and parliamentary elections in December. As a "biz guy", he needs to think about replacing Alan Greenspan as well, and get Senate confirmation.

If another SCOTUS vacancy occurs next summer, Bush could be in a much stronger position than now to appoint a strong, controversial conservative to replace Stevens or some other retiring liberal. By then, the rebuilding from Katrina will be nearly complete, and if it goes well, Bush will get some of the credit. If Iraq votes for the constitution, and the new Parlia-ment can keep the peace, some troops will be coming home, depriving the anti-war left of an issue. It will also be a Senate election year, and red-state Democrats will have to watch their right flank, unlike this year. And we will still have 55 Republican Senators, who might be more willing to fight after all the uproar (from the right) about Miers.

Bush took the plum that Harry Reid offered him now, when things were looking dicey. He will probably be in a much stronger position next summer, and more willing to fight for a SCOTUS nominee, which would tip the balance of the court toward the conservatives.

I've come around to support Miers, but the apparent belief that we have to hide our philosophy still rankles me.

of either side, say the Earth Firsters or the Christian Reconstructionists (or Communists and neo-Nazis, etc.), both Left and Right, are quite solidly contained within the catholicity of the American (perhaps even Anglo-American) tradition and one can find their ancestors and antecedents in the debates and disputes of Hamilton and Jefferson, Lincoln and Douglas, FDR and Hoover. And there is the beginning of wisdom in this matter: that we are all Americans and that fact alone should subsume our policy differences, for indeed if you could lay us all out on an ideological grid representing the whole spectrum of human politics and practice over the ages, you would find that almost everyone (again, saving those few fringers among us) is within no more than arm's length from you.

Don't religious conservatives want to prevent gays from marrying, or pregnant women from terminating the lives of their unborn?

if and only if large swathes of the left are excluded from the ideological grid.  For example, the belief of many on the left that all traces of Christian religiosity must be expunged from public places and political discourse will find no exponents among our Founders, nor among public intellectuals in successive generations who sought to elaborate or modify the American tradition.  The novelty of the proposal is evidenced by the fact that such secularist principles were never terribly influential until they appeared in Supreme Court decisions aroung the middle of the last century.  Certainly, they were debated and discussed by some intellectuals and pseuds prior to that time, but always with at least the tacit assumption that Actually Existing America was in some respect unjust or unworthy, and must give way to this or that, usually utopian-themed, Ideal/True America.  The very rhetorical wrappings of such ideas in those times gives the lie to the notion that they were present at the Founding in the sense required to make them a part of our common ideological storehouse.

One could say the same of the rather extreme doctrine of individualism and privacy that has become rooted in our society over the course of the last 50 years; it is a novelty, as our legislative histories, Federal and state, demonstrate.  

Thus, I find it well nigh impossible to conceive of any sort of ideological grid which would demonstrate some sort of kinship, affinity, or relationship other than that of antagonism, between a natural-law conservative such as myself and, say, Richard Rorty.  We're both Americans, we both profess a belief in ideals and concrete traditions such as the freedom of speech, but there the similarity ends; the relationship is nominal, as there exists only minimal overlap, if indeed there is any, between the sense I can assign to the phrase and the sense he would assign to the phrase.  And this is still to say nothing of the concrete practices that constitute an American culture, or of the philosophical gulf separating natural law from the idea that while there may be truth claims within differing discourses, we will acknowledge this fact and yet ignore it practically.  

In other words, the fringe on the left is relatively.... huge.

And I must say one thing about a certain rightist fringe, because it is a pet peeve of mine.  Christian Reconstruction, which likely counts fewer than 20,000 adherents, represents an extreme, theologically, politically and philosophically, not in its proposed methods, but in the substance of the political ideal it seeks to establish.  CRs are postmillenialists; a deduction from this conviction is the idea that, with the passage of time, persuasion and the work of the Holy Spirit (I cringe to write these words in connection with their "movement", but this is what they teach.)  will result in an increasing embrace, on the part of the masses, of their programme.  Their notion of "taking dominion" means just this - persuasion and participation in the political process, not top-down, Taliban style theocracy - a democratic, participatory theocracy.    They would even recoil in revulsion from the very thought of a coercive imposition upon a majority because this would represent a human attempt to supplant the work of God.  Of course it's nutty.  Of course it misrepresents Christian tradition, and Jewish tradition as well, in its substantive proposals.  It is actually more influenced by modernity than its adherents would ever dare to concede, particularly by certain elements of social contract, even libertarian thought.  But it does profess to be democratic.  And it is profoundly delusional.  

Forgive the digression; there was a shibboleth that needed slaying.

And i don't think he'll back down on Miers, either, and she won't unless he wants her to..  But it's an odd choice and we need to know why he chose her, and apparently he didn't just want her or he wouldn't have offered it to others first.

is that it leaves out a factor: Time, which changes all things.

I was certainly not saying that anyone on the Left (or the Right) is a perfect mirror for the opinions and beliefs and practices of the Founding Fathers. That's impossible. The Founders are nearly two centuries dead and they took their world with them: there is no going back. I was saying that you can trace the beliefs and opinions and practices of today's mainstream politics (left and right both) back to firm antecedents in our history from which they have evolved quite naturally. Just as I am not a dead ringer for my New Hampshire ancestor who signed the Declaration in 1776, but nevertheless carry a protion of his genes, so too today's politics is not a carbon copy of the politics of the 1780s (or whenever) but you can trace the lineage back to there (and further back still). Today's secularism, which you mention, has its roots in the Enlightenment anti-clericalism of men like Jefferson and Paine.  The genesis of today's privacy doctrine can be traced all the way back to the Magna Carta (and recall that there was rather famous peroration in the British Parliament in the 1600s as to how the King of England was forbidden entry to the most humble cottager's abode). The liberation of the citizen from the state is an ongoing revolution, one to be lauded since it overthrows a most pernicious idol, that of the Allmighty Sovereign masquerading as God. But in the mainstream of both left and right (unlike the fringes) there are no true innovations. You are myopic on this, believing in your own rightness so much that you must tar your opponents not just with being wrong but with being illegitimate. This is political hubris and this attitude defines what I despise most about today's politics: the arrogant refusal to see the common ground beneath us all, and to reach across it, and to work together (and make no mistake, I hold the Left every bit as much to blame here).

As for the Christian Reconstructionists I did not imply that they were anything but a tiny radical fringe group and I do not mean to tar anyone who is not a follower with their extremism. But unless we are talking about two different groups, you are very wrong about them. They are indeed an American would-be Taliban, steeped in strange heresies, desirous of replacing the Constitution with some queer construction they call "Biblical Law" and this would indeed involve compulsion (what law does not?)-- indeed, you and I would have the crown of martyrdom set before us as they are hard-core Calvinists and would name us idolators and persecute us accordingly.

I really haven't even the meagerest inclination to pursue the dispute over Christian Reconstruction much further down its inherent rabbit hole.  I knew a goodly number of Christian Reconstructionists during my days as an undergraduate, owing to the fact that they attended a Presbyterian (OPC) church of which I was part, and I immersed myself in the literature of their movement with the objective of coming to an understanding of their movement and its genesis.  To put the matter baldly, you are wrong.  Yes, they are steeped in strange heresies, and while the majority of them accord the Constitution a fair degree of respect, the normative status of that document is a matter of dispute, with some regarding the document as a workable expression of some of their ideals, and others taking the opposite position, on the grounds that the Constitution forbids religious tests and/or is influenced in certain respects by the philosophy of the Enlightenment, albeit of the Scottish branch.  What can be said is that they would revise the Constitution in much the same way that liberal jurisprudence has revised it by reading into it things consistent with their ideology, and reading out of it things which would tend to thwart the implementation of their conception of "biblical law".  Of course this would involve compulsion, in the largely nominal sense that all law involves compulsion, but they are persuaded, on the basis of certain exegetical maneuvers not inheretly related to their notion of biblical law, that people will come to desire their legislation; that the social and economic benefits of such statutes would become so manifest that even unbelievers will be willing to offer external consent for the sake of such blessings.  As to the status of Orthodox in such a regime, while there are CRs who would disenfranchise those regarded as idolaters under Calvinist dogma, many, if not most would be content to restrict the franchise and civil rights to all Christians who can, without dissimulation, affirm Trinitarian doctrine and the first few Ecumenical Councils.

The point being, that you are eliding differences within the movement and painting it as more authoritarian that it is; it is not necessary to depict them as Christian Taliban in order to dismiss them as a band of nutters.  As the deconstructionists say, differance...  I not only own several dozen of their works, I have read most of those I own, and I would be mortally offended if I had to reread any of them now in order to prove what I have long since seen for myself.  I can, however, provide citations for everything I claim.

In the second place, you really ought to refrain from accusing me of myopia.  My objection to the line of analysis you have proposed is that it rests on a series of equivocations, which are quite easily demonstrated.  Was Jefferson in some sense a secularist?  Sure.  Was privacy of some sort an ideal in the common law tradition America inherited?  Sure.  But neither his secularism nor that concpetion of privacy logically required, on the one hand, the extirpation of religious influences from the public discourse, nor, on the other hand, a public law in which it is affirmed that since at the heart of liberty is the right to define for oneself the meaning of existence, life and the universe, it is illigitimate to regulate consensual sexual conduct.  The secularism of Jefferson required disestablishment, not the naked public square; earlier conceptions of privacy required, for example, that husband and wife be left to themselves, but didn't necessarily protect even them, let alone people claiming other sexual proclivities, if they engaged in nonprocreative sexual activity.

These are, plainly, equivocations.  They elide the momentous changes in intellectual life and philosophical doctrine, not to mention the obvious revolutions of our own jurisprudence, that have brought us to our current state.  Your conception - of the liberation of the individual from the state - is simply a version of the Whig theory of history, and, modified as it is by the notion that this has something to do with the de-devinisation of the state, is one that those CRs, who refuse to acknowledge the influence of social contract theory upon their thought, would acknowledge as their own.  For my part, I do not believe that there exists any such movement in history; what we observe is a process of associative descent: each age has its own conceptions of certain political ideals, and draws upon what preceded it, yet, in the elaboration of these ideals, they are seen not to be logical, inevitable outworkings or developments; the development of an idea from seed to tree, as it were; but a discontinuous process of descent with conscious, volitional modification - each generation adopts what it approves, and alters in accordance with its own ideas to realize what would be more desirable given present prejudices.

There are certain ideas which attain a state of fixity from one generation to the next, such that what is left to each succeeding generation is the outworking of the implications of the original idea, but that is a result of the nature of those specific ideas, such as nominalism, which, by reason of their formation and relation to other ideas, have, inherently, substance, scope, reference and limitations.  Such ideas have specificity.  Ideas, on the other hand, such as privacy and freedom (from religious imposition), are not inherently related to other determinate ideas, and only receive determinate content when they are deliberately qualified by, or set in opposition to, other ideas, such as communal solidarity or public morality, which are themselves susceptible of variation.  These latter ideas are best understood as sublimities, which, in modern philosophical discourse, following (mostly) Kant, are those ideas in which reason discovers its capacity to conceive of ideas which cannot be encompassed in any concrete scheme of representation; they are a testament to the power of reason to surpass nature, to master it by opposing to the infinite.  In other words, ideas such as privacy and freedom are, in themselves, shapeless, void and negative; only by being limited by other ideas or concepts not inherently related to them do they become usable and meaningful.  Unlike ideas in the previous class, they are not inheretly related to those ideas which can given them shape and determinate content.  Hence, for me to observe that the secularism of certain of our Founders is other than the secularism of contemporary liberals, or that the privacy understood by a medieval Englishman, or by virtually all Americans prior to the middle of the twentieth century, is other than the notion of privacy as understood in contemporary liberalism, is simply to explicate the nature of the case - that the modern understanding of privacy or freedom from religious coercion cannot be continuous with earlier notions of privacy, save in the limited sense of associative descent specified earlier.  The modern conceptions differ precisely in that they have been formed by other ideas, external to the numinous abstractions themselves and not inherent in them.  More succinctly, for the reasons given, "privacy" does not entail the regime of personal autonomy imposed by the modern Court; "privacy" is the rhetorical form of a philosophical ideal seeking justification for content that ideal itself supplies.

This is not myopia, it is simply philosophy and the history of ideas.  Neither is it an unfounded assertion of the illigitimacy of certain ideas; it is the observation that certain ideas are illigitimate with respect to the Founding ideals of America.  Such ideas may or may not possess some other source of legitimacy, but modern doctrines of privacy and secularism are not the outcomes of an epochal dance of the disclosure of the Idea of history.