Lawyer-Wearing-Yarmulka

So it appears that Harriet Miers is pro-life/anti-choice. Woop dee doo! Her personal views are irrelevant. I don't care what her personal views are about social issues. Justice Kennedy, as a devout Catholic, apposes abortion, yet he still upheld Roe in Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

The goal for most conservatives isn't to reverse Roe because abortion is murder, evil, whatever. The goal for most conservatives is to get judges on the SCOTUS who recognize that Roe (and yes, Griswold) was a legal travesty.

You can be personally apposed to abortion and up Roe. You can be personally supportive of abortion and strike down Roe. I'll take choice number two.

And even if Miers strikes down Roe, that doesn't mean that she's qualified.

Or as Ann writes, " without a conservative theory of constitutional interpretation, Miers will lay the groundwork for a million more Roes".

The issue of whether she's "qualified" is a difficult one because there are no hard and fast rules. The question is therefore relative: are there people who would be better suited to take the job? I think most conservatives would argue that Luttig or Garza are more qualified just based on their judicial ideology and their experience on the bench.

The biggest problem is that conservatives have been arguing that the President's picks deserve deference. Hard to change that argument now.

The President's picks deserve deference when it comes to idealogy. The President was elected, and presumably, that means that the country approves of his judicial philosophy.

But when it comes to competence...that's where "advice and consent" comes in.

The WSJ has an excellent editorial today (Friday) - discusses why they were giving deference, but now are speaking against the nomination. Excellent editorial.