Following Up: Miers, Alito, and the Democrats

Several commenters seemed skeptical last week when I asserted that Miers' withdrawal was not a loss for the Democrats.  And now that Samuel Alito, Jr., aka "Scalito," has been nominated, those commenters may feel vindicated.  "Ah ha!" they might be remarking, "Bush didn't turn on his base.  He gave them/us exactly what they/we wanted!  There go the Democrats' chances of getting a moderate on the court."  Even with the Alito nomination, however, I still think the whole Miers' debacle ends up helping the Democrats.  Here's why.

1. Miers was too much of an ideological wild card to be trusted as a moderate choice.

Sure, a lot of conservatives hated her.  And yes, there were inklings in her speeches and her experience that indicated she might be more moderate on issues like abortion and affirmative action.  But there were also clear signs that she had undergone a conversion experience that radically changed her positions on these issues.  James Dobson endorsed her and said that the "blood of those babies who die" would be on his hands if he was wrong.  So I don't think either side could safely say what her ideology was.  Given the uncertainty, it was impossible for Democrats to support her prior to the hearings.  Yes, they said nice things, but they were waiting for the hearings to see what she was all about.  If she had tacked to the right in the hearings, Democrats would not have supported her.  If she tacked to the left, Republicans would have voted her down.  And frankly, if she had stayed mysterious, I don't think either side would have felt comfortable supporting her.  Neither side wanted to look like idiots after she voted on the first abortion case.

2. After the Miers debacle, Bush was "forced" to nominate a strongly conservative judge.

Now, this is a victory for conservatives, at least in the short term.  But is it a victory for Bush?  With Roberts and then Miers, he seemed to prefer the stealth candidate approach.  Maybe he was worried that a very conservative nominee couldn't win and/or would support Democrats' efforts to paint Republicans as extremists.  But apparently he felt that he had to respond to his base with this pick.  If you believe that American politics is all about reaching out to the middle, this is a bad thing.  Think about it: what if Clinton had nominated a conservative, crony pick, and then had been forced to nominate Mario Cuomo or Lawrence Tribe to appease the base?  Could you say for sure that the nomination in and of itself was a long-term victory for liberals?  Even before the hearings?

3. After the whole Miers debacle, Democrats are much better positioned to challenge this nominee on ideological grounds.

Counterintuitive, you say?  After all, Miers was brought down by her qualifications.  Well, that's true, but there's a myth out there that it was all based on her ideology.  Now that conservatives are happy with Judge Alito, he's solidly established as more conservative than Miers -- perhaps extremely conservative.  If Bush had nominated Judge Alito in the first place, Democrats would have had to establish that he was an extreme conservative.  (And this might have been hard to do.)  But thanks to the Miers scenario, the theme had been established: Bush tacks to the (far) right to please his base, and Democrats (justifiably) hop up to challenge the nomination.  You'll hear a lot today about how "The fight is on!"  Well, that wouldn't have happened without Miers.  Democrats (and the MSM) can paint this as a "right vs. left" battle (or "conservative base vs. the rest of America" battle, natch) without having to establish that Alito is very conservative.  Democrats are expected to challenge Alito -- the media is primed for a fight.  This is a very different situation than the Roberts confirmation process.  I think that's a big difference, especially when most of America isn't interested in parsing Third Circuit opinions too closely.

We'll see what goes down in the upcoming weeks.  But even if Judge Alito becomes Justice Alito, the Harriet Miers nomination and then withdrawal have changed the landscape in ways that, long term, help the Democrats.