Preliminary thoughts on Miers

First, mea culpa: I predicted Janice Rodgers Brown, and was wrong.

My first thoughts aren't really about her, but about what her nomination says about the guy who picked her.

In the end, loyalty was all; it trumped every other consideration. As the rest of the world begins to chant "you suck" ever louder in the ear of our dry drunk president, it makes perfect sense psychologically that he would give even greater weight to the sycophancy of his retinue.

Second, it showed that they are worried about repeating their own filibuster, despite the fact that it worked with Roberts. To me, the strongest reason for stopping the brilliant cypher Roberts was the tactic, not the man (and, as the Preznit reminds us, we declare war on tactics): the fact that the White House withheld documents and Roberts himself danced away from answering questions he should have answered. That approach simply should not be rewarded. Now there will not be much to withhold; my guess is that all the documents the White House releases this time will fit in a FedEx envelope, and the Senate will have exactly nothing to go on.

When you look at what her primary qualification says about her, it should give pause. Loyalty is not an inherently bad thing, but hero worship of a horribly flawed creature like Geoprge Bush is truly frightening. And it makes me wonder what personal problems Dubya might reasonably expect to come up before the Supremes in the near future.

There is also potentially explosive stuff here about the coverup of Shrub's Natrional Guard past (which kinda suggests a whole 'nother reason for nominating her).

The fact that the wingnutosphere is pissed is a bonus, no doubt. But the enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend.