Harriet Miers Will Give Absolute Power to Hillary Clinton!

This is Andrew Card's defense of Harriet Miers?

War and Piece: : Don't miss Harold Meyerson's account of Andrew Card's talk on Harriet Miers and Article II of the Constitution last night at the Hudson Institute:

...Among the various defenses of Miers advanced in recent days, Card's achieved new heights of peculiarity. Before a crowd that was dense with conservative intellectuals, Robert Bork among them, Card defended the nomination as a breakthrough for women. Miers, he said, "was breaking glass ceilings before most people realized glass ceilings were even there."... He testified to Miers' intellectualism by reminding listeners that Miers had majored in math ("something Herman Kahn would have liked") and has counseled the president on any number of challenges -- "and by the way, that includes constitutional challenges."

At which point Card himself turned constitutional scholar. As White House chief-of-staff, he found the most intriguing article, he said, to be Article II, which established the presidency and the executive branch. Miers, he continued, understood Article II as well, and would defend it "when challenged by those given the power to challenge it by Article I [i.e., the Congress] and Article III [i.e., the courts]."

Thus ended Card's constitutional disquisition -- not a moment too soon, as he had managed to conflate Miers' duties as White House counsel with what he seemed to be saying was her judicial philosophy on executive power. He could not have meant to imply that Miers would see her first duty on the bench as defending Bush against all enemies, legislative and judicial, but that's what he managed to convey. At minimum, he suggested that Miers would be the staunchest proponent of executive power over that of the other two branches that the Court had seen in a very long time... Wonder if everybody got the message.

Stupidest administration ever.

Comments

[coriolis]

Another blog makeover?

This administration shows a rare bit of honesty and you complain? :-)

[Mary Ann]

Do you agree that "He could not have meant to imply that Miers would see her first duty on the bench as defending Bush against all enemies..."? The scariest thing about this administration is the systematic effort to increase executive power and circumvent Congress and co-opt the court. The prospect of an ever increasingly powerful executive branch is particularly scary in view of the stupidity of this administration.

[Stormy]

Open Letter to President from Concerned Economists

http://www.openlettertothepresident.org/

[matt]

"The scariest thing about this administration is the sytematic effort to increase executive power and circumvent Congress and co-opt the court."

The effort to cirumvent Congress and co-opt the court has been going on since Nixon and reached one of its high points under Reagan/Bush. It's no surprise that Roberts was elevated to the Supreme Court; his hand is in much of what happened during the 80s when the Reagan/Bush team was subverting the will of the American people. Why do you think his papers were withheld from the public?

These people believe that Article II of the Constitution is as sacrosanct as the Second Amendment. While elevating the presidency to imperial status, they would relegate Congress and the Court to mere water-carriers for the executive. But we have no one to blame for that except ourselves.

If you voted for Reagan even once, or for Poppy Bush, you are complicit in the disgrace that is fast becoming America.

[paulo]

The timing of Miers' "breakthrough" in the glass ceiling only tells us how far Texas is behind the rest of the country. Women were making those strides in other states much earlier. And what did it get her? The job as W's secretary! Maybe the Texas "ceiling" was plexiglass.

[anne]

Likely I just do not understand what could be thoroughly reviewed in a Congressional setting when the appointment of Harriet Miers is considered. What I find now however is a decidedly class and sex driven critique.

[anne]

Paulo

As far as I can tell, young male lawyers far north of Texas would suddenly find Republicanism a wonderous calling were they able to become such a secretary :)

[Karlsfini]

Anne: "What I find now however is a decidedly class and sex driven critique."

Do you mean "sexist"? Or do you see some dark Freudian motivation behind the criticism?

Now you've got me thinking. Could Bush's, intent be to castrate (sorry, declaw) the supreme court, subdue, defile and dominate it, tame it, so that when the executive snaps the whip the court will grovel and gush about the greatest chief executive ever?

[Karlsfini]

Anne: "What I find now however is a decidedly class and sex driven critique."

Do you mean "sexist"? Or do you see some dark Freudian motivation behind the criticism?

Now you've got me thinking. Could Bush's intent be to castrate (sorry, declaw) the supreme court, subdue, defile and dominate it, tame it, so that when the executive snaps the whip the court will grovel and gush about the greatest chief executive ever?

[Karlsfini]

Hmmm.. sorry about the double post. I must be getting excited.

[Derelict]

Yeah, as long as Dubya is president, the office of the president MUST have absolute and complete supremacy over the other two branches of government. If we don't give Bush the powers of a dictator, then the terrorists will have won!

However, once the office of the president is occupied by a Democrat, we will hear instant howls from the Republicans about presidential over-reach, about how the executive really must be subordinate to the other two branches, about the need for the most strict and overwhelming oversight by Congress, and about the danger to the republic inherent in an imperial presidency. For if we give a Democratic president the powers of a dictator, then the terrorists will have won!

[Karlsfini]

"As far as I can tell, young male lawyers far north of Texas would suddenly find Republicanism a wonderous calling were they able to become such a secretary :)"

Anne, I'm not sure I follow you, but Jeff Gannon wasn't a lawyer.

[euzoius]

The unifying strand of Roberts and Miers is deference to executive power, and heightened scrutiny (read denigration) of all Congressional judgements.

The executive cannot be interfered with, the legislative is not to be followed.

Republicans have been working to exalt the Presidency above the Congress for decades, and the Congress appears unaware of the ongoing battle over their constitutional diminution.

[sm]

I find the makeover hard to read.

[anne]

Karlsfini

Thank you :) I am not feeling terribly well, for some reason, but will think carefully of your complaint. The superficial reason for using "sex driven" as a complaint is that the conservative grumbles strike me as decidedly so.

[anne]

What stood out for me during the hearings on Judge Roberts, was the extent to which Roberts refused to tell of his judicial philosophy and the lack of concern about this of a large majority of Senators. Why should I have decided that there is any more significant intellect behind Roberts than we might guess so far with Miers?

What, by the way, does this headline mean? "Harriet Miers Will Give Absolute Power to Hillary Clinton!"

[anne]

Imagine, here was a judge....

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/29/nyregion/29motley.html?ex=1285646400&en=305a0af728de6a8d&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

September 29, 2005

Constance Baker Motley, Civil Rights Trailblazer
By DOUGLAS MARTIN

Constance Baker Motley, a civil rights lawyer who fought nearly every important civil rights case for two decades and then became the first black woman to serve as a federal judge, died yesterday at NYU Downtown Hospital in Manhattan. She was 84.

The cause was congestive heart failure, said Isolde Motley, her daughter-in-law.

Judge Motley was the first black woman to serve in the New York State Senate, as well as the first woman to be Manhattan borough president, a position that guaranteed her a voice in running the entire city under an earlier system of local government called the Board of Estimate.

Judge Motley was at the center of the firestorm that raged through the South in the two decades after World War II, as blacks and their white allies pressed to end the segregation that had gripped the region since Reconstruction. She visited the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in jail, sang freedom songs in churches that had been bombed, and spent a night under armed guard with Medgar Evers, the civil rights leader who was later murdered.

But her métier was in the quieter, painstaking preparation and presentation of lawsuits that paved the way to fuller societal participation by blacks. She dressed elegantly, spoke in a low, lilting voice and, in case after case, earned a reputation as the chief courtroom tactician of the civil rights movement.

Gov. George C. Wallace of Alabama and other staunch segregationists yielded, kicking and screaming, to the verdicts of courts ruling against racial segregation. These huge victories were led by the N.A.A.C.P.'s Legal Defense and Education Fund, led by Thurgood Marshall, for which Judge Motley, Jack Greenberg, Robert Carter and a handful of other underpaid, overworked lawyers labored.

In particular, she directed the legal campaign that resulted in the admission of James H. Meredith to the University of Mississippi in 1962. She argued 10 cases before the United States Supreme Court and won nine of them.

Judge Motley won cases that ended segregation in Memphis restaurants and at whites-only lunch counters in Birmingham, Ala. She fought for King's right to march in Albany, Ga. She played an important role in representing blacks seeking admission to the Universities of Florida, Georgia Alabama and Mississippi and Clemson College in South Carolina.

She helped write briefs in the landmark school desegregation case Brown v. Board of Education in 1954 and in later elementary-school integration cases.

Judge Motley was a tall, gracious and stately woman whose oft-stated goal was as simple as it was sometimes elusive: dignity for all people. Her personal approach was also dignified. When a reporter wrote that she had demanded some action by the court, she soon corrected him:

"What do you mean 'I demanded the court'? You don't demand, you pray for relief or move for some action."

Charlayne Hunter-Gault, whose admission to the University of Georgia was engineered by Mrs. Motley's legal finesse, described her courtroom cunning.

"Mrs. Motley's style could be deceptive, often challenging a witness to get away with one lie after another without challenging them," she wrote in her book "In My Place," published in 1992. "It was as if she would lull them into an affirmation of their own arrogance, causing them to relax as she appeared to wander aimlessly off into and around left field, until she suddenly threw a curveball with so much skill and power it would knock them off their chair."

As a black woman practicing law in the South, she endured gawking and more than a few physical threats. A local paper in Jackson, Miss., derided her as "the Motley woman."

In 1966, President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed her as a judge on the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York at the urging of Senator Robert F. Kennedy of New York, a Democrat, and with the support of Senator Jacob K. Javits, a Republican. The opposition of Southern senators like James O. Eastland, a Mississippi Democrat, was beaten back, and her appointment was confirmed. She became chief judge of the district in 1982 and senior judge in 1986.

Constance Baker was born on Sept. 14, 1921, in New Haven, the ninth of 12 children. Her parents came from the tiny Caribbean island Nevis at the beginning of the 20th century.

Her father worked as a chef for various Yale University student organizations, including Skull and Bones. She attended local schools in what was then an overwhelmingly white community.

One of her first experiences with discrimination came at 15, when she was turned away from a public beach because she was black.

She read books dealing with black history and became president of the local N.A.A.C.P. youth council. She decided that she wanted to be a lawyer, but her family lacked money to send their many children to college. After high school, she struggled to earn a living as a domestic worker.

When she was 18, she made a speech at local African-American social center that was heard by Clarence W. Blakeslee, a white businessman and philanthropist who sponsored the center. He was impressed and offered to finance her education....

[clayton]

Didn't David Frum say Miers once told him Bush was the most brilliant man she had ever met?
hehe i'm curious to how this will play out. Is she a nitwit or is it an act to get on the court? Maybe she is a liberal and a great actor.
Seems like she is highly suggestable but maybe thats not a bad thing, especially for a bush nominee. Could ocassionally bode well for the little guy, or an attorney arguing a technical commerce clause case wearing a neck brace and asking "can i get an amen?"

[David A. Spitzley]

I may be wrong, but I don't think the current layout is what Brad was going for; I've done a comparison between the current layout and a Google-cached version, and Brad seems to be trying to set up a two-column layout (as shown by the body tag now having the class="layout-two-column-left"). I suspect that the css isn't working quite right to achieve the two-column layout.

[David A Spitzley]

Well, >that< was a fast fix!

[dogfacegeorge]

anne,
Evangelicals have given their votes to Republicans on the understanding that supreme court justices would be appointed who would overturn Roe. Evangelicals realize, however, that it is in the Republican party's interest that Roe NOT be overturned. Thus, they suspect that a "stealth" supreme court nominee is designed to fool THEM, not the Democrats.

Evangelicals do not oppose Miers because she is a woman; they oppose her because they suspect she is too liberal on social issues.

[JR]

The most worrying part of Miers nomination is her deference to the president, which has obvious implications for GWOT. "Trust me" is no way to run foreign policy.

But what about the title of this post? Will Miers similarly defer to the next president, Republican or Democrat? Are her stealth views of Art II reserved for Dubya alone?

[lise]

Anne has offered an important criticism. We knew and learned very little of the Judicial views of Justice Roberts. Similarly we know little of the judicial views of Harriet Miers. The criticism directed against her seems largely prejudicial and inane. We have a a conservative set of attacks that mean nothing to me, other than reflecting the wish for a fire breathing conservative appointment. There is nothing wrong with Miers showing respect for her White House client. The idea that a Constance Baker Motley could be nominated for the Supreme Court is of course impossible.

I too have no sense of why Brad DeLong chose to mention Hilary Clinton in the headline, though the may be a sarcastic comment about Clinton.

[Karlsfini (the Prophet)]

Anne, no complaint meant.

Today Josh Marshall links to a NYT story reporting Bush said he chose Meirs because of her religious beliefs.

How humiliating is that? Not chosen because of her legal knowledge, her judgement, her wisdom or keen mind, but because the president likes the church she attends.

On that note, if she had any self-respect -- her sappy letters indicate she doesn't -- she would immediately withdraw her name and go back to Texas.

Hope you get to feeling better. Maybe it's the rain.

[paulo]

Anne: That's the point, in a way. Those sex-driven young male lawyer types -- the ones who really want to push policy -- would want the job, but Bush would never want them. (Already got a few A-types in Card and Rove.) He'd rather have a docile Harriet in the job, no thoughts emitted on policy, just real top notch secretarial/doorkeeper work. It's what Bush really appreciates. And Bush can feel that putting her there is emblematic of how high women have risen (Rosemary Woods?). Glass ceiling? Shoot, even TV now has a woman president. If Miers' career breakthroughs qualify her for the Supreme Court, well Condi Rice is qualified for Queen of the World.... on second thought, that's what she is now.

[Dale]

The argument for strong executive power would apply to Dems- even Hillary. Is that something Repubs really want? Or, are they not planning on losing any future elections?

[dogfacegeorge]

lise,
Brad mentions Hillary because he expects that Miers will be ruling upon the scope of President Hillary's power.

[Karlsfini]

Just saw on AmericaBlog that John Fund says in the WSJ today that both Cheney and Gonzales tried to block Meirs' appointment.

If that's true, then we must assume Bush has broken loose and has somehow gotten in the driver's seat -- or maybe everyone with any sense has simply bailed out.

Check your seatbelt and hang on. The country's in for an exciting ride.

[almostinfamous]

kaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahn!!

sorry, i had a trekkie lapse :-p

[johne]

I think Brad's headline is nothing more than playful irony: as many have pointed out, if one thing is known about Meirs' philosophy, it seems to be that the other branches of government owe deference to the executive. Therefore, if Hillary wins the 2008 presidential contest, she may have much more power than otherwise would have been the case, using the foundation unwittingly laid for her by a Justice Meirs and her Republican colleagues.

[Buce]

Recall:

"I want to die quietly in my sleep, like my grandfather. Not screaming in terror like his passengers."

[anne]

Remember, we have before us the results of extreme conservative policy and programs and not merely the result of George Bush's conservative agenda. When conservatives complain, they are afraid, but with this President and this Administration they have precisely what they wish in policy and programs though they are wishing for more popularity. This is an Administration and Congress set to turn aside the New Deal, and with the exception of the Medicare drug program which many conservatives abhor, they have had wish after wish granted.

[Movie Guy]

"Stupidest administration ever."

Any others come to mind?

[obscure]

Lise: "We knew and learned very little of the Judicial views of Justice Roberts. ...The criticism directed against her seems largely prejudicial and inane."

Roberts struck me as clearly very intelligent and sharp on the law. David Brooks provides numerous examples today of Miers content-less, flatulent writing. I'm no fan of Brooks, but his point was well made re Miers.

[lise]

David Brooks is as mean-spirited a columnist as I can imagine. I could care less what he thinks. Suddenly are we are supposed to be taking the conservative lead in how to think? As I look to the comments, I realize how much "class" and "gender" are the issues with this nomination. Yuch.

[obscure]

Lise,

You sound like a person afraid to look at actual facts, hiding behind ad hominem instead. Take a look at Brook's column, take a look at your own biases.

[lise]

George:

"Brad mentions Hillary because he expects that Miers will be ruling upon the scope of President Hillary's power."

Thank you, but if you are right the headline is in many ways a weak joke. Conservatives wished a nomination to the court of extreme views, and would have relished a pitched battle over confirmation which they would have won. As Anne, I am quite content to find what the hearings tell us of Harriet Miers. And, Miers is not a "secretary," she is the President's attorney as was the current Attorney General. Following the lead of arch conservatives is always always self-defeating and harmful.