03 Oct 2005 Manny Miranda on Miers
Only minutes after Bush appeared at the White House Monday to announce the nomination, Manuel Miranda, a conservative strategist and former aide to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist issued a scathing statement: ‘The reaction of many conservatives today will be that the president has made possibly the most unqualified choice since Abe Fortas, who had been the president’s lawyer. The nomination of a nominee with no judicial record is a significant failure for the advisers that the White House gathered around it.’
While cautioning that ‘the president deserves the benefit of a doubt,’ Miranda added, “Something has been left unachieved by the Miers nomination. A Republican president has yet to erase the stigma of the (1987) Robert Bork hearings and the David Souter nomination. The nomination of Harriet Miers has not rid us of the repugnant situation that a jurist with a clear and distinguished record will not be nominated for higher service. The nomination did not rid us of the apprehension of stealth nominees.
It would be nice to get the verb “bork” out of the dictionary, or at least get it relegated to “archaic” usage status.
That won’t happen if the presidents elected by conservatives find ways not to fight.
Harriet Miers may be great, for all I know, but it would be better if we didn’t have to guess.