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October 27, 2005
Be Careful What You Wish For...
... you just might get it. Harriet Miers today withdrew her nomination for Supreme Court justice. Almost immediately, the Christian Taliban began, in between screeches of glee eminating from their visceral depths, began clamoring for George W. Bush to nominate someone further to the extreme right -- someone who will do their bidding on the Court and do their best to turn the American judicial system into a policy arm for the evangelical Christian right.
And you know what? The forces of good just might not have the votes to stop it. Of the 55 Republicans in the Senate, only 8 are pro-choice, meaning the Christian Taliban has etched 47 carved-in-granite, lockstep, carry-out-your-orders votes for whatever extremist right-wing loony they want to throw at us. Think it's going to be all that hard to capture four more votes, between those eight Republican mavericks who will be threatened with exile from their party if they stray, and the dozen or more Democrats who represent Republican states (Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Tim Johnson of South Dakota, Evan Bayh of Indiana, or Bryon Dorgan of North Dakota, for example) and whose constituents will be bombarded by pressure ads from extremist right wing groups around the country?
I was worrying about this three weeks ago; and as much as I don't want to have been, I think I might have been right. Face it, friends. Miers, as underqualified a Bush toadie as she may have been, was the safest choice we were going to see. Forced to pander to the extremist base that installed him in office, Bush is now going to nominate an "acceptably" extreme candidate who will represent a grave danger, both in their principles and in the swing vote they'll represent, to the most basic freedoms that too many Americans have taken for granted. And unfortunately, there may be little that anyone can do to stop it.
Sometimes, the devil you know really is better than the devil you don't. Let the evangelical theocracy begin, America.
Comments
I dunno. Remember that Bush doesn't like being thwarted; he might nominate someone else who's got more of a trail but still wouldn't be a howling lunatic, just out of spite.
Posted by: Linkmeister at October 28, 2005 03:21 AM
Filibuster
Posted by: Seadogs at October 28, 2005 08:41 AM
There was nothing good to come out of putting an unqualified crony in the nation's highest court.
Honestly, I wanted this to drag out a few more weeks just so Miers would get completely ripped in a hearings process.
But when you hear this woman and the almost paternal reverence she has for Fredo, you'll know that any other choice is a little better.
Posted by: Corey at October 28, 2005 10:33 AM
