Non sequitur and unresponsive.

After visiting various sites like the corner and galleyslaves, the above pretty much sums up my reaction.

Maybe those of us who don’t know anything about her ought to wait until after she has a hearing before deciding anything.

Again, the best defence of this I’ve seen is “father knows best.” Didn’t work with Haynesworth or Fortas (for CJ), and it won’t work now.

And even as a (partial) defender of Miers, you gotta admit: there’s no way in hell she’s more qualified than Janice Rogers Brown, who was a current district court justice, former state Supreme Court justice, a hell of a legal scholar and writer. As a justice, Brown would have been a position to shape law; my initial hunch about Miers is that she will simply wind up being a voter.

Populous is a word describing an area that has a large population (relative to its size).

Populace is a word meaning the people who live in an area.

[D'oh! And "populus," which I wrote, is a word meaning "A glycoside, related to salicin, found in the bark of certain species of the poplar, and extracted as a sweet white crystalline substance," which I obviously didn't mean, either. It's fixed now. -X]

What’s with all the [expletive deleted]s when there were no expletives in my quotes?

Sure there were, “there” and “it,” to be exact. Both were used in contexts where perform purely syntactic functions and have no semantic content, and are thus textbook examples of expletives. What did you think I meant?

I think someone who has been a partner at a law firm, a state Supreme Court Justice, and has had time as both White House Counsel and AG is marginally more distinguished than someone who has been a co-managing partner at a firm and White House Counsel (oh yeah, and the Lottery Commission head – don’t forget that!) – but only just.

Add to that what you did forget – namely city councilwoman, president of the Dallas Bar, and first woman president of the Texas Bar, not to mention her current and past positions with the White House – and at some point “only just” starts to cut the other way. Of course, Gonzales has some additional qualifications, too, such as being a board director of the Texas Bar. I don’t know if he served under her or not. I do know that John Roberts didn’t serve under Harriet Meirs, but only because they served in different administrations.

Bottom line: I do think having been on the Texas Supreme Court means a good deal.

Why on earth? It’s one thing to tout Janice Rogers Brown because of the wonderful things she has done on the state Supreme Court. It’s quite another to give anyone brownie points simply for being on it. AFAIK, Gonzales’s principal accomplishment on the Texas Supreme Court was to write an idiotic and completely unnecessary concurring opinion that came back to haunt his then-colleague, Priscilla Owen. If simply being on a court were some great accomplishment in its own right, then what’s your beef with Miers? She may not have any experience on the court now, but that problem will cure itself in a year or two. Unless there’s somethign special about the Texas Supreme Court in particular that makes it more impressive than its federal counterpart, I can’t see why anyone would be more impressed by the guy whose biggest accomplishment was getting nominated by George W. Bush to sit on the Texas Supreme Court than he is by the woman whose biggest accomplishment was getting nominated by George W. Bush to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court six years later.

I don’t have to imagine, I live in Washington state.

Imagine the state of US justice if the courts were packed with political cronies.

Then look south of the border. Compare and contrast.

I think someone who has been a partner at a law firm, a state Supreme Court Justice, and has had time as both White House Counsel and AG is marginally more distinguished than someone who has been a co-managing partner at a firm and White House Counsel (oh yeah, and the Lottery Commission head — don’t forget that!) — but only just.

Bottom line: I do think having been on the Texas Supreme Court means a good deal.