Happy Rosh Hashana Stephen!

I'm sorry that it is OT, but wanted to say it anyway.

"Pliancy". Such a great word. I like this Hamilton guy already.

Best ever post about a topic that's got me wicked bored -- big time -- with just about all my favorite bloggers.

Hamilton was indeed correct about cronyism which he defined as the appointment of an individual who was incompetent to fullfil the duties of the office to which he/she was appointed. No such argument exists concerning Harriet Miers. Hamilton himself was a confidant of George Washington who used his influence to promote Hamilton in the early stages of his political career, and he was competent in all the positions he held. Cronyism did not apply to him nor does it apply to Miers.

The problem with too many legal elites like Barnett is they think only people like themselves are qualified for these lofty judicial positions when what is needed is a more common-sense approach to the law.

The complaint about Roberts was that he was not a known quantity. In contrast, Bush certainly *knows* Miers -- which one would think is a good thing. Miers has worked with and for Bush for a long time, has proposed people for nomination, etc. One would suppose that if one agreed with Bush on many topics, then the fact that Bush chose someone whose views he knows intimately would be a good, not a bad thing.

Instead, we now have conservatives complaining that he is not nominating someone he does not know.

I think it's a win-win situation for consevatives. Either a fellow conservative makes it onto the court, or the Democrats use up their remaining firepower on rejecting Miers and Bush can appoint the next Scalia.

Looks like tony snow read barnett

Before everybody gets too worked up about the Miers nomination, I'd suggest that some of the disappiontment, and subsequent critism coming from the right, is merely sour grapes. I've heard too many conservatives pay lip service to the anti-judicial activism movement when in fact what they really want is conservative judicial activism.

Well Bush has now nominated 2 judges that are NOT conservative. They arent liberals but they are not conservative. And he wonders why conservatives are up in arms!@#$?!?
He promised to nominate someone like Thomas. These 2 are closer to Ginzburg than they are to Thomas. They are not Ginzburg clones; just more like her than him.
Gee W I refuse to believe that you really do not understand! I think you are not really dumb; just not honest!

Ah, yes. A prominent member of the professorate (J.D. Harvard) condemning cronyism. How unexpected!

"Hey, Harriet, you are doing a heck of a job!"

The Twit-in-Chief has done it again.

Lat us check Bush's criteria to nominate someone to the Supreme Court (in no particular order):

1. Never clerked for a judge. Check.
2. Never pled a case in front of the Supreme Court. Check.
3. No legal scholarship whatsoever. Check.
4. Be an Evangelican Christian intent on imposing Taliban-like values on the unsuspecting public. Check.
5. Be a political hack. Check.
6. Be a crony. Check.
7. Kiss his Bushiness's ass, hard, long, and often. Check.
8. Believe that DeLay is a hapless victim. Check.
9. Believe that Cheney has nothing to do with handing out taxpayer's money to Halliburton, Shaw, and assorted thieving corporate cronies. Check.
10. Believe that the U.S. went to war with Iraq because of non-existent WMDs. Check.
11. Believe that the U.S. went to war with Iraq because, because, because, we did it, damn it! We must have had SOME good reason to do it.Check.
12. Believe in cuttting taxes for the super-wealthy, and spend, spend, spend, into oblivion. Check.

Well, I declare, this Harriet woman is perfect for the position!

Just visiting from the left-blog-osphere to enjoy a little local color.

I can't believe how little you guys care for facts! On the other hand, I love the intellectual honesty of admitting only a lujewarm attachment to Hamilton, who stands (in my view at any rate) as the founder of the idea of modern government: that the government should be a vehicle to serve the needs of the people.

As opposed to, say, the idea that government is some foreign disease grafted onto the American public by crazed liberals and the French.

Thanks for the wonderful visit! There's always room in left-wing-nuttia if you ever want to drop by!

And of course, when the you-know-what hits the fan, we know you'll put aside your juvenile antics and show up on our doorstep asking how you can help. Hey, man, thanks in advance.

I'd be interested in an essay on Hamilton, because my impression so far is that he was among the best of the Founding Fathers. Granted, founding the Treasury could be construed as non-libertarian and anti-states-rights, but I think in this case it was the right move. Really the only problem I have with him is that he didn't shoot Burr.

For the record, I think Jefferson is overrated; and some say Adams was an eighteenth-century Rick Santorum (not that there's anything wrong with that).