Why Don’t You Want Miers To Have A Chance To Speak?

17 Oct, 2005 by John Hawkins

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One of the things we’ve heard frequently repeated by Harriet Miers supporters is some variation of: “It’s wrong to call for Harriet Miers to withdraw before her hearings because she should have a chance to speak!”

Sorry, don’t agree. Here are 4 reasons why…

#1) Harriet Miers has every opportunity to speak right now. She can give a press conference a day or for that matter five press conferences per day, and all of them will be fully covered by press. Now, maybe that’s not the typical procedure for a Supreme Court nominee, but the opportunity is there if she wants.

#2) Even if Harriet Miers isn’t out there speaking for herself, she has plenty of advocates inside the White House, outside the White House, and in the Democratic Party making a case for her. Whether we’re talking about Hugh Hewitt, Karl Rove, or Harry Reid, Harriet Miers has plenty of supporters willing to publicly stick up for her.

#3) Part of the reason the pro-Miers crowd wants the anti-Miers crowd to shut-up is because the more conservatives who complain and the louder they complain, the harder it is to make a case that Harriet Miers making the Supreme Court is inevitable…and that’s their greatest weapon — inevitability. If people who are anti-Miers keep their lips buttoned, the White House can try to convince Republican Senators that there are only a few dissenters complaining, so it’s nothing to worry about. Instead because conservatives are speaking up, these Senators know that it will cost them money, campaign workers, and perhaps even support in the 2006 elections or 2008 presidential primaries if they vote for Miers and thereby prove that they’re not serious about putting conservative judges on the bench.

#4) Keep in mind that Harriet Miers has never been a judge, they’re not releasing documents about her time as a White House counsel, and she’s not going to be expected to tell anyone how she’d rule on specific cases at her Senate hearings. Plus, whatever happens, Miers will still be a 4th tier crony candidate with no conservative credentials or a paper trail, and hearings aren’t going to change that.

So, what’s the point of waiting until the hearings to form a judgement? To see how poised she is when she tells Joe Biden she can’t answer his question about Roe v. Wade? Isn’t that a pretty low bar to set for a Supreme Court Justice?

“Oh, but John, she’ll tell us what her judicial philosophy is!”

And why should we trust what she says even though she has no paper trail? Do you really think she is going to sit down in front of the Judiciary Committee and say: “I’m going to be another David Souter when I get on the bench!” How about: “Constitution, Smonstitution, I’m just going to go with my gut.” Of course, not!

So while the hearings could reveal negatives or hurt her performance if she bombs, there’s nothing she can do there to prove her fitness for the Supreme Court.