Could it be that the Harriet Miers nomination was intended to befuddle the Left?
The quick selection of federal circuit court judge Samuel Alito, Jr. is precisely what the doctor ordered. The perception of the American people is that President Bush has switched his strategy from picking a crony whose opinions were a private secret and who intended to “please” (in a condescending sort of way) a constituency, in this case women, and that he is now picking a serious, thoughtful jurist in the mold of Chief Justice John Roberts.
The Left could not stop Roberts, and, unable to stop Roberts, they will not be able to stop Alito. That leaves Leftists with two unappealing alternatives. First, they can essentially roll over, play dead, allow President Bush to win a victory just when his presidency seemed to be weakening, place a young conservative justice on the Supreme Court in place of an older “moderate,” and demoralize their base.
Second, they can view the Roberts confirmation process as a “mistake” and go all out against Alito. Let us hope they choose this course. Senators who have in the past voted to confirm Alito into high judicial and legal jobs will not have to say that their votes were wrong then (or now.) This is always awkward and sometimes absurd.
Leftists also seem to live in 1964, when America, they believe, forever and utterly rejected “ultra-conservatism” (never mind the fact that Barry Goldwater received a standing ovation from the entire Republican convention in 1968 and was elected to the Senate soon thereafter, with fawning praise even from the Left.)
As I pointed out in a recent article, and as I have pointed out in many articles over the last four years, Question D3 of the Battleground Poll, a periodic and thoroughly bipartisan poll, has shown the number of Americans who call themselves “conservative” or “very conservative” has held steady at between fifty-nine and sixty-one percent of the electorate, while those who call themselves “liberal” or “very liberal” has never bumped above thirty-five percent.
The fastest growing group of Americans, in fact, are those who call themselves “very conservative,” which has increased more than fifty percent in three years. The Left will always lose a battle for the hearts and minds of Americans when the lines are drawn in clear ideological terms, which is not only why Reagan won twice easily but that John Kerry got all misty-eyed in front of the cameras at the funeral of the Gipper.
Moreover, if Americans in general are conservatives, states are even more conservative, and states are the electoral districts of senators. Because so many Leftists are in a few big states like California, New York, Illinois and New Jersey — which have the same number of senators as Alaska, Wyoming and South Dakota — that sixty-three to thirty-seven percent advantage in the general electorate is more like a seventy to thirty percent advantage in states, which translates into a huge advantage in senate seats if the ideological distinction remains clear.
Completing all this more for Leftists is that Alito comes from a federal circuit that has three potentially important Senate races next year — Maryland, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Voting against him will be relatively unpopular in those states, just like voting against a native son is always relatively unpopular.
If Corzine is elected Governor of New Jersey, his successor will be vulnerable and a vote against Alito could make that race very competitive.
Maryland, with Lieutenant Governor Steele, promises to be competitive anyway. Steele can ask any opponent whether he would have voted to confirm Alito or not, and any answer will cost that candidate votes or intensity of support among his supporters.
Casey in Pennsylvania will almost have to say that he would vote for Alito: he and his late father were both pro-life. But that very fact may demoralize some of his supporters, while it will not cost Santorum a single vote. If Casey flips, if he says that he might vote against Alito, then that will cost him even more heavily.
Was selecting Miers a disaster, then? Perhaps. There is another possibility, however: even conservatives may have “mis-underestimated” President Bush. Alito looks so great by comparison to Miers that all the initial news about the qualifications and temperament of Alito will be positive. Could it be that Miers was intended to befuddle the Left? Stranger things have happened.
Bruce Walker's articles can be found at the Conservative Truth.
bwalker2004@cox.net
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