After Miers
IT WOULD be nice to think that the withdrawal of Harriet Miers from consideration for the Supreme Court is a victory for competence over cronyism. Unfortunately, it is more likely a triumph of politics.
The president's personal lawyer was unqualified for a seat on the high court. But she doubtless would have proceeded to Senate confirmation hearings had it not been for the furious right-wing backlash that greeted her nomination.
Conservative activists who were mounting petition drives and an advertising campaign to scuttle the Miers nomination were not shy in saying they had worked for a generation to reverse direction on the court and demanded an unambiguous true believer. ''President Bush desperately needed to have an ideological fight with the left to redefine himself and reenergize his political base, which is in shock and dismay over his big-government policies," opined the movement veteran Richard Viguerie earlier this month. A White House badly unnerved by failures in Iraq, grand jury investigations, and the deadly incompetence revealed by Hurricane Katrina cannot afford another high-profile defeat.
The danger to the country now is that a flailing president will grasp at shoring up his base, quickly placating social conservatives with the Supreme Court prize they seek. There is no rush. Sandra Day O'Connor, the crucial swing vote whom Miers would have replaced, has said she will delay her retirement until a successor is chosen. A panicky process will do nothing to reassure or reunite the country.
Bush is at the weakest point of his presidency, with polls showing historic lows of public trust and confidence. As if his credibility weren't damaged enough, yesterday he tried to blame the Senate for the collapse of the Miers nomination, claiming that its insistence on seeing internal memos that the White House refused to provide was the deal-breaker. But the Miers nomination was in trouble long before the recent call for more documentation, and had Bush chosen someone with more-obvious qualifications in the first place, the memos never would have been an issue.
Amid all the recriminations, it is important to remember what is at stake in this nomination. The Supreme Court is closely divided -- by a single vote in many instances -- on issues of immediate and direct consequence. Constitutional fine points such as the balance between state and federal prerogatives may seem like remote matters, but a tilt one way or another can profoundly affect the rights and freedoms of all Americans.
His administration unmoored and his presidency unstable, George Bush should take his time. If he does reach for an extreme ideologue with his next Supreme Court appointment, the Senate really will have to say ''No."
