The storm clouds hovering over Harriet Miers’ nomination to the Supreme Court are now beginning to resemble a hurricane.
Two bad developments for Miers:
(1) Is this the final nail in the Miers nomination coffin?
(2) And now Miers has lost the support of top conservative blogger Ed Morrissey, aka Captain Ed, who defended her nomination even though he didn’t like it, on the grounds that he didn’t want to hurt the party. He made it abundantly clear that he thought it was a poor choice — but now he has declared himself “off the fence” after reading a speech she delivered in 1993 in Dallas:
This speech is chock-full of clumsy, unskilled writing, and it doesn’t just apply to the written form, either. Try saying these aloud, along with most of the speech, and you will quickly understand how tin-eared it truly is. Supreme Court justices need to write with clarity and precision; they need to not only explain their decisions, but the better justices write to convince others of their wisdom as well.
Mechanically, this speech reveals a mediocrity in composition that is truly disturbing. What about the content? Unfortunately, that doesn’t improve the picture much at all, either.
He concludes:
I’m off the fence for good now. I oppose the Miers nomination. I have no objection to allowing Miers her day in front of the Judiciary Committee; if the Bush adminstration wants to subject itself to that kind of political damage, let it. The quality of her prepared speech strongly suggests that the White House will deeply regret that decision, but quite frankly, that will be their problem. The Judiciary Committee should reject her, as should the Senate, once her nomination hits the floor.
But if the White House has any sense left, they’ll quickly withdraw her from consideration and spare itself further embarrassment.
Not good. So now, more than ever, Mier’s Supreme Court fate rests on her “performance” during her hearings — if it reaches that stage.