You know you've lost the intellectual Conservative crowd when they don't even present an argument, they just riff on you.
Justice Miers? Get Real [P6: Beware the financial firewall]
By JOHN TIERNEY
The contrarian in me has been trying to find a reason to defend Harriet Miers against her critics, but it's too much of a stretch. We need a new nominee - or at least a more entertaining way to choose a nominee.
...To choose a nominee, we should do more than rely on the president's word or on a confirmation hearing in which Miers will be determined to say nothing of interest. We need the best process available today to determine the nominee's real-world credentials.
That, of course, would be a reality TV show. Pit Miers against other would-be justices in "Road Rulings," which would test their real-worldliness as they traveled the hinterland in an RV. They'd cope with the arcana of daily life. Do they know what a gallon of milk costs? Can they pump their own gas?
They'd emerge in small towns and large malls to test their legal skills. Can they help someone beat a speeding ticket? Can they arbitrate a divorce settlement? How will they apply the Supreme Court's definition of obscenity when they hear a case by a church group demanding that a newsstand stop selling Hustler and Barely Legal? Can they explain to a family why it would be a "public use" for the government to take its home to make room for Costco?
If this competition seems too time-consuming - I realize we have a vacancy to fill - then we could instead quickly replace Miers with a nominee who already has the perfect credentials, starting with her sex. She's an experienced judge yet hasn't ruffled feathers with rulings on constitutional law, and no one can accuse her of living in a judicial monastery.
Just this week she has dispensed justice to a tenant accused of making $3,000 in 900-number calls, a woman battling with her nanny over a loan for back surgery, and a 9-year-old girl accused of popping wheelies and wrecking a motorized minibike at a birthday party. If real-world experience is what the Supreme Court requires, all rise for Justice Judy.
