Bush has repeatedly said there would be no "litmus test" for his nominee.
When Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) asked Chief Justice John Roberts whether his
religious devotion would impede his ability to follow the rule of law,
"conservatives accused Mr. Durbin -- who is Catholic -- of having a
religious 'litmus test' under which he would oppose any nominee to the high
court who is Catholic and follows the church's teaching on abortion."
But Bush's comments yesterday indicate religious devotion may be a
precondition for the selection of a judicial nominee. Even the conservative
editor of the National Review, Rich Lowry, has noted that Bush's allusions
to religion "display a touching faith in the power of hypocrisy, double
standards, and contradictions to see his nominee through."
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) said during Roberts's confirmation, "We have no
religious test for public office in this country." Roberts himself claimed,
"My faith and my religious beliefs do not play a role." As conservative
writer Andrew Sullivan has noted, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote in one
of her opinions, "the separation of church and state as guaranteed in the
Constitution "is infringed when the government makes adherence to religion
relevant to a person's standing in the political community."
The Drudge latest is fascinating, isn't it?
http://www.drudgereport.com/flash4hmn.htm
Miers - as recently as 1990 - was pretty much a skeptic of the conservative
movement culture. Her dissing of the Federalist Society is final
confirmation of her distance from the conservative legal establishment. Was
Bush aware of this? Maybe.
Was this really Laura's appointment? Fund suggests that even Cheney was a
doubter. All of which leads to a fascinating question: what's the smart
thing for the Dems to do now? The shrewd advice would be to stay quiet and
let the GOP rip itself and the Bush dynasty to shreds. More radical advice
would be to rally behind Miers. Why not? It seems highly unlikely she'll be
a Scalia, and even if she is a Scalia vote, her intellectual firepower will
scarcely affect the Court.
What if her "religion" were more a fanatical
political movement bent on the destruction
of liberty? Does that matter at all?
Meyers history suggests the likelihood that
she would be a corporate toady. Would she
be a Pat Robertson toady as well?
That's too scary a thought to dismiss.
~S
The problem is, Bush's record of appointing cronies and incompetents who are
loyal to Bush but are questionable to the rest of America. Then the fact
that Bush is a pathological liar which makes Americans wonder about his
ulterior motives and no one knows much about Miers except she was Bush's
legal advisor, she's supposedly hyper-religious and she dated Bush.
Bush thinking he's trumping the Supreme Court with religious maniacs is
enough to get every decent American riled up and the impeachment of this
Kook underway.
Little good that would do if Meyers is confirmed.
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