Meirs Update

As the day progresses I'm seeing bits and pieces that have turned me cautiously optimistic. For example, as President of the Texas bar she tried (unsuccessfully) to get the ABA to drop its support for abortion.

Also, while some have criticized the nomination as an affirmative action hire, I think we can all safely agree that she's not getting the job based on her looks.

And the Federalist Society approves.

Now I just wish we could get the Democrats infuriated with her, and I think we'd be ready to go. Darn it, Harry Reid, why do you have to screw up my day like this?

Update: Steel points out three words to comfort panicky conservatives: John Paul Stevens. Well yes and no. It is true that Stevens is extremely old, that he is in poor health, and that he is judicially wishy-washy so if he's replaced with a conservative, that means GWB has a shot at turning two swing votes into conservative votes. From there, the math is simple: Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Meirs and [new conservative guy] is five, so it makes no difference what "moderate" Anthony Kennedy or hard-Lefties Souter, Ginsberg and Breyer do. We might get all 5-4 splits, but they will all split in the same direction, whereas before O'Connor announced her retirement, it split 5-4 all the time, and no one could predict which direction would carry any given day.

Here's the problem with that theory. It suggests that "hey, Bush can screw up the Meirs nomination because he's got one more bite at the apple." But the point of conservative panic is that if Bush screws this one up, who's to say he won't screw up number 3? For crying out loud, we don't even know how reliably conservative Roberts is yet, let alone unknown quantity Meirs. How can we have the least confidence in [new conservative guy] if we're still wondering about the first two picks?