The “withdraw” word was mentioned several times this morning on CNN. Will Harriet Miers’ nomination mark “The End of the Conservative Dream?,” as Patrick Lang considered yesterday (buttressed by a Chicago Tribune story that blames Republican leadership‘s failure to stand up to filibuster threats)? Or, will the conservatives stay alive, and force Miers to withdraw?
The repeated use of the word “withdraw” today on CNN could mean nothing. It could be among the first indications — including yesterday’s Forbes magazine piece, “Conservatives to Bush: Withdraw Miers” (via Raw Story) — that pressure is growing for Harriet Miers to do the “right thing.” Toss in today’s report of Tony Perkins’ alarm over Harriet Miers’ sponsorship of a 1990s forum at her alma mater Southern Methodist University that, Perkins e-mailed to supporters, featured “an unbroken string of pro-abortion speakers.”
As Josh Marshall points out, “[T]he key issue [for nominations encountering opposition] is whether and how quickly they can find some committed group to mount a defense.”
Who does Harriet have to defend on her side besides Dubya, few administration apologists, and some Swift Boat spin-cycle artists (quoted but not vetted by the NYT)?
Our question: Do we prefer the devil we are getting to know, or the next one if Miers withdraws? What are we gambling with?
From CNN’s American Morning transcript:
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well good morning, Carol.
Harriet Miers was in Dallas this weekend. That is where she was gathering records of really trying to bring forward her resume of accomplishments, past posts, as well as with the Dallas City Council. But of course the big question here, Carol, is whether or not Harriet Miers and the White House can convince conservatives that she does indeed deserve that position. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): While Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers was attending Sunday morning church services in Dallas; in Washington, conservatives were declaring all-out war over her nomination, directing much of their anger at the president.
PAT BUCHANAN, FMR. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Much of the conservative movement is at war with their own president.
GARY BAUER, PRES., AMER. VALUES COALITION: The problem that we have is that when you make a mistake with a Supreme Court appointment, it’s a 20-year mistake.
MALVEAUX: As some conservatives ratcheted up their rhetoric, calling for Miers to withdraw her nomination, others urged their fellow Republicans to cool down, saying Miers would be faithful to Mr. Bush’s agenda. Continued BELOW:
DR. RICHARD LAND, SOUTHERN BAPTIST CONVENTION: If someone is disloyal, if someone betrays a trust in Texas, they’re right down there with child molesters and ax murderers.
REV. PAT ROBERTSON, CHRISTIAN COALITION FOUNDER: I think what the president wants is a vote that reflects his point of view. You know some of these great, brilliant scholars go off the reservation.
MALVEAUX: One of the first issues the Senate Judicial Committee will tackle is whether the White House provided anyone with information about how Miers might vote on hot button social issues, like abortion, gay marriage and the role of religion.
Conservative activist James Dobson created a stir on his Wednesday radio broadcast when, after being briefed about Miers by Mr. Bush’s top political aide, Karl Rove, Dobson suggested he had special insights.
DR. JAMES DOBSON, CONSERVATIVE RADIO SHOW HOST: When you know some of the things that I know, that I probably shouldn’t know, you will understand why I have said with fear and trepidation I believe Harriet Miers will be a good justice.
MALVEAUX: Since then, in meetings with Senate committee members, Miers has tried to clear up the controversy.
SEN. PATRICK LEAHY (D-VT), JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: So we at least start with the fact that she says she has not told anybody or assured anybody how she would vote.
MALVEAUX: But senators say they are still considering calling on Dobson and Rove to testify before their committee.
SEN. ARLEN SPECTER (R-PA) JUDICIARY CMTE. CHAIRMAN: If there were backroom assurances and if there are backroom deals, that’s a matter that ought to be known by the Judiciary Committee and the American people.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MALVEAUX: And getting information, of course, is expected to be difficult. It’s anticipated that there is going to be quite a fight ahead when it comes over releasing those documents with the White House — Carol.
COSTELLO: So, Suzanne, is the president surprised by this?
MALVEAUX: Well, you know the White House is somewhat surprised by this backlash and the conservatives coming forward. But one of the things that happened in this process is, because it was so secret, Harriet Miers being a part of that search committee, they had to keep it from people who they would normally talk to, that being some of the conservatives who had signed on earlier on with John Roberts.
This one stands out. Someone not brilliant and is willing to stay enslaved. Pat’s always the forward thinker.
I think Miers will through in the towel before the hearings.
If I were Miers, I’d give it up. She already has an important job, for pete’s sake.
She doesn’t have a base of support.
And all the conflicting stories about her background will not win her a base.
I saw we let her “twist in the wind” for a while. Frankly, it is refreshing to see conservatives say things like ‘Bush is no better than a child molester’. After all, we heard that about Clinton for what? The last 13 years?
Let the conservatives continue their diatribes and hope that they have enough “clout” with the kool aide gang to force the repugs into filibustering Miers…wouldn’t that be sweet?! It would completely invalidate the “filibuster deal” that the earlier appointment battles created…now, where’s that smilin’ frog?
Peace
John at American Blog found a Christian Coalition child-molester, but he’s in Oregon.
I want to watch them twist in the wind, too ;0
I agree… Let her twist in the wind as it rips the GOP’s base apart. It increases the possibility of the Dems getting more pull in the Seante in 2006. But in the end the Dems will have to do everything they can to end this candidates nomination as a show of strength, and to show that they don’t accept the cronyism involved.
Just stretch it out long enough to make it too late for the rpublicans to do much later. It all plays in to a long term strategy of stalling until bush is too lame to get a radical appointed after Miers is history.
The worst thing that can happen is that Miers withdraws now instead of later. Bush may be lame now, but he will be even weaker as time goes on. His weakness grows even more the longer Miers (and the bush admin.) twists in the wind over her nomination. Especially when coupled with the GOP’s likely indictments in the future.
BUT Dems will have to put their foot down eventully to gain some strength form the issue when it comes to “credibility”. Just not quite yet.
Again I ask:
How many procedures are available, and how long can we drag this out under the Senate and committee rules?
This is a time to use every trick in the book to slow down the process.
I don’t want her to withdraw, it’s too much fun watching the Repugs bicker amongst themselves over her nomination…
I hope Specter actually calls on Dobson and Rove to explain their little “pillow talk”, as SecondNature called it.
Specter calls Rove to testify, but federal marshals from Fitzgerald’s office come arrest him in the committee room, and read him his rights on C-SPAN. Oh yes.
he can pull his raincoat over his head.
I’m sure the conservatives would love to deny everyone their fun by forcing her withdrawal. Hopefully Bush will be so stupid and bull headed that he’ll keep her in the fight. Then everyone can enjoy watching the fireworks.
She probably will withdraw if it’s obviously going against her (well..obvious to Republicans, anyway) Otherwise, I would bet that ego’s making her stay the course up til now.
Did you see West Wing last night, where Alda’s character has the whole Judge appointing dilemma (+Roe) and he gives a nod to the Evangelicals that his judge pics will overturn Roe. in exchange for their voting block.
That was extremely well crafted drama.
When Alda (what’s his character’s name? Vinnett?) meets with the evangelical, he picks up a piece of old cold pizza to eat … and it is OBVIOUS that the evang. is very insulted …
Alda doesn’t give him his due. He chomps on the old pizza, quipping that a campaign is the only excuse for an old man to eat junk food (“junk food” is a reference to the evangelicals, who Alda’s character abhores)…
When it’s his turn to speak, his mouth is full. He chews and swallows, then does a number on the evangelical. The Drudge leak happens ….
and then the VP candidate lowers the boom on the evangelical. (Another great scene.)
But I think that Alda is just playing the evangelicals. If he is president, he won’t listen to his VP’s advice on judicial nominations only. And the cornered evangelical knows it.
I meant to mention that the Chicago Sun-Times a couple of weeks ago did one of those perennial “Alda is the president” pieces in the entertainment section. Got me thinking, what if he ran for real? I hate celebrity politics, but Alda is a smart, informed, decent guy near as I can tell, and in this media dumbed society, the difficulty of separating the real from the fiction might just have a good outcome for once.
More and more I think the Miers’ nomination and ensuing GOP spectacle is a set up. Miers will withdraw and Bush will nominate a real wingnut.
And what’s the setup? Well, when the Dems finally start to object to the new nominee the Gops will have made an arena for themselves. They’ll start chastisising Dems for wanting to enroll a Bush crony on the Supreme Court and not a real judge.
By that they accomplish several things. Evolving the narrative of Bush as the Manchurian candidate (smearing the label liberal all over him) and post-facto painting the Dems as the behind-the-scenes promoters of an increasingly unpopular war.
When Cokie said that dems may not vote her down he sputtered to the effect that but-but-but that means you’re supporting incompetence and cronyism.
Personally I don’t think Miers was a purposeful setup nomination. She was a lifeboat for a troubled admin.
If they decide they can’t get her launched, then her demise will be the revival of the conservative dream.
I don’t think Bush would willingly abandon Miers. Bush is the frat boy president — he wants to be president ’cause its fun to be prez.
If he is forced to abandon Miers he will throw a little boy tantrum — then nominate a loony bird wingnut and let the Republicans in the Senate do the best they can.
I believe this would be great news — and the only hope for the Democrats.
Win, lose or draw, only an all out fight for the heart and soul of the party can turn things around for the Democrats. I do not take any joy over the current infighting of the wingers because has not translated into action from the Democrats. Only a divisive fight over something major like allowing a wingnut on the SC can force the Democrats to choose whether they will continue to be the Republican-light party, or a real alternative.
Resignation would make it pretty hard for Bush to keep wanting “us” to trust his judgement. He nominated someone who couldn’t make the cut even with his own base.
Still, I’d rather see the nomination go through the confirmation process. I think Dems should resist any and all GOP attempts to short-circuit it. For one thing, it’s imperative that Dobson be subpoenaed and grilled on his “special secret” whispers from the White House. Either the Regime has been withholding crucial information from Congress (possibly illegally?), or Dobson is a damned liar.
I say let this go on and on and on. If we had a real opposition party, we’d be hearing from them EXACTLY why Bush’s “trust me” whine is ridiculous, with his history.
–Since there’s no prayer of getting rationality.
The only reason we still have a shot at retaking democracy is that the particular Republican president we got in 2000 was George W. Bush. Any other Republican would have been enough more competent and less alarming to Dems and to the rest of the world that, following 9/11, the Y2k election would prove to have been the last national election for the Democratic party.
This guy has the merdes touch–everything he touches turns to crap. And his appointees do too, as a general rule.
IF we have to have a conservative, it seems to me that incompetence (especially in the oldest possible appointee) is the least worst thing we can look for.
I think Miers will be incompetent, and I also have a gut feel that she doesn’t have a long future ahead of her.
Well, you know the White House is somewhat surprised by this backlash and the conservatives coming forward.
A prime example of the arrogance in the WH.
Forget whether or not bush will try and appoint someone that is even more radical down the line. It is not important in the overall scheme.
What is important is drawing out this nomination as long as possible.
Why?
Look out how lame this “Duckling in Chief” is already. Rove, DeLay, and all of the other indictments likely to come out soon will render this duck completely impotent leading up to 2006.
Stall the nominee until it is apparent that the GOP will lose it’s grasp on the Senate, or at least be weakened even further, and you eliminate the possibility of the next candidate ever gettiing to the floor for a vote if they are more radical.
There is no “next candidate that is even worse” on the horizon.
The importance is to draw out this nomination as long as possible, and then throw up the roadblocks to end it.
A slow painful process here is the winning strategy. Unless you think the GOP will keep their “trifecta” after 2006?
Of course, this comment implies that the Dems will actually strategize and implement as a unit in a fashion that it is supported by it’s base.
There can always be a first time, huh?
I hope the Dems listen to the voices of strategy and reason for once. I suppose it will depend on how the polling goes.
Apparently the “national leadership” has a problem with following the grass-roots idea of what a candidate should be, and what the leadership should be doing:
And there is the real problem. Leadership that does not represent the base of the party…
I think it’s just about cronyism trumping strategic intelligence. Maybe I’m missing something here, but everything I know about the history of this district says Hackett has a good shot of winning this time around. The mood has changed all over America. Are there polls matching Hackett and Brown that show Brown having a significantly better chance? “It’s his turn” is not an acceptable reason. Nobody gets a turn.
Did you diary this? It raises a lot of questions that won’t get discussed in this thread.
What you are saying is exactly the point I am making about Hackett. The base wants candidates like Hackett. But the leadership is still in denial about the fact that this is the winning way to go. They would rather say that it is “so and so’s” turn, and ignore the real winning issues.
Your statement says it all about getting the point I was making…
Maybe my last statement was not so clear? lol
As far as polls? I think there are enough out there showing all of America’s views concerning the Iraq war to prove that the Dems need candidates that are willing to say things the way Hackett was.
In fact I think they could go even farther than Hackett and say “Pull them out NOW!” and gain even more support. But that would be pure speculation when compared to Hackett’s “limited success*”. (*limited sucess as in: “a close election in a conservative stronghold”)
Unless you think the GOP will keep their “trifecta” after 2006?
I personally don’t think there is one chance in a million that the Republicans don’t keep their trifecta after 2006: no Presidential election; too few Senate seats up for grabs; and redistricting will keep Repubs in power for quite some time in the House.
2008 is another issue. If the Dems can not take back the WH or Senate in 2008 the Democratic Party may pass into history just as the Whigs did after failing to win in the 1850’s.
You have to consider that it is becoming pretty clear that the most likely losses in 2006 will be their most “farrr right wing radical” voices up for re-election.
They will be weaker regardless of the outcomes.
And there is enough evidence to support the possibility of one or two of the moderate right wing GOP candidates losing to any candidate the Dems throw out there.
I would not put the odds for success being as low as you do, but success can be measured in many ways.
Hackett lost in Ohio, but he lost in a GOP stronghold by a very narrow margin. That is a sign of success, and a clear sign of the possibilities everywhere across the nation.
The GOP support is weaker everywhere.
By 2006 this fact will have to be addressed in their policies and “appontments” by the GOP regardless of the final outcomes. The GOP is obviously not “BUSH” and has to plan for 2008. Bush is lame already, and they know it.
They have to start addressing the future for the sake of their own political party. No appointment, and no issue, is worth the complete dismantling of their base just to preserve the image and legacy of an already lame duck.
Now it is up to the Dems to hold them accountable for that. Without the needed strategy from them to support this the GOP will continue to skate on this issue and go ahead and do whatever bush wants.
Are you prepeared to let the Dems capitulate to a lame duck? Not a very strong hand to play with in 2006 and 2008 if they capitulate now.
Are you prepeared to let the Dems capitulate to a lame duck?
Why would you ask ME that question — I have consistently been against any compromise with the wingers — especially the May compromise that Markos so famously applauded and resulted in three wingers added to the bench and Roberts getting a free pass.
But I disagree with you on the core question of Republican weakness. I see the Hackett result, for instance, as another example of Democratic weakness — here they ran a veteran against the worst possible candidate and could not win. Why? Because the electorate in red districts still responds to “low taxes, pro-life, anti-gay” rhetoric. In other words, while the nation as a whole may be tiring of Bush and his crew, red districts are still red — they have not turned in such a way that they will come into play in the next election. And as long as the Republicans can hold onto these districts they will maintain their majority in the House.
I hope to God that you are correct and that I am wrong about this. But until I see electoral victories I will not be convinced.
Because the electorate in red districts still responds to “low taxes, pro-life, anti-gay” rhetoric.
Not really,… They respond to the promise of low-taxes (an obvious fallacy), and the rest of it is pure rhetoric. The beuty of it all is that the “low-tax promise” is being exposed and recognized as a fallacy now.
Honestly, with only 12% (+ or -) of Americans supporting a complete ban on abortions, do you really consider that a GOP stronghold for political positions?
Yeah right!
And NO! (Not just no, but “HELL NO!”) I am not attacking your personal position particularly. I have yet to meet a Dem voter in the trenches that believes in this “capitualtion” and that isn’t questioning the tactics of reaching across the isle now. Just a failure of the entire slate of Dem candidates and the national party to look at the possibilities in “over-all strategy” for the long run.
And yes, there are a handful of bloggers that think that grabbing their ankles on certain issues is a plausible tactic… Might work in the short run, but will destroy the real base of the left in the long run (IMHO). I don’t need to point fingers there. lol
The only weakness in the Hackett campaign loss was the failure of the Dem party to recognize that he should have had national support from more than just the grass-roots from the get-go. They jumped in at the last minute and that was a good part of the difference between winning and losing there.
Meanwhile the republicans were there on the national level from day one…
As a point of strategy:
Just how many procedures are available to slow down a nomination other than just a flat out filibuster? One’s tha can be legitimately used to slow down procedure as much as possible?
Use every single one of them. Make it crawl along, and then slam it shut with the filibuster as the very last one when no other procedure is available to the minority.
I assume some of you understand procedure better than I do. I haven’t had time to read all of the rules and procedures in US government. (YET! lol) Hey! I have only lived here 12 years, adn only seen a real need for real political action since a few months after bush was (s)elected.
Yes, I am behind the curve big-time when it comes to procedures in US politics…
This entire situation is a gift from on high. If Sen. Harry Reid helped set this up then buy the man 2000 roses.
Right now the Republican side of the fence is heading for full self-destruct mode over the nomination of Harriet Miers. Good. It is truly a time for standing aside and letting them do it to themselves.
If… Harriet Miers nomination proceeds then:
If… the conservatives force a withdrawl of the Miers nomination then:
A withdrawl of Meirs due to pressure from the right immediately brands the next guy as an extremist bent on legislating the far right wings agenda from the bench. The story line will have been handed to us gift wrapped on a platter.
Robert Bork just told Wolf that this is the “final straw.”
Assuming Miers withdraws–and since, as has been pointed out, she has no base of support beyond her 39% approved boss, she very well might—then the Dems being relatively quiet, just sniping at how the Repubs are beating on one of their own–puts them in stronger position to defeat the nomination of a rightwing-approved nominee to be named later.
The question will be whether the White House wants this Miers fight. They may want it as a distraction from other bad headlines. Or maybe at this point there is no unified White House to make that decision.
The big money groups behind the Grover Norquist, Bill Kristol type extremist wingers are not going to let the evangelical zealotry of creatures like Dobson or Land have a victory based solely on Miers presumably being a vote to overturn Roe. (Even though leading religious wingnuts like Buchanan, Robertson, Bauer, Perkins and the like are expressing their disapproval ostensibly on “she’s not qualified” grounds, to a man each one of these crazies would vote for her in a heartbeat if they knew she’d vote against Roe.
But the money guys don’t give a rat’s ass about the evangelicals, and for the most part the rightwing money guys likely believe having Roe vs Wade as the law of the land serves them better because it’s always a strong issue around which to rally support for rightwing candidates who will also support their odious economic agenda.
I predict Miers will ultimately withdraw her name under pressure and Bush will then nominate Luttig, a real wingnut on both fronts. This will challenge the Dems to mount a filibuster but they most assuredly will not do so because there are too many Dems willing to compromise on Roe vs. Wade if they think they need to in order to help their own political careers.