I'm Disappointed 

Well... it finally happened. Like a good soldier, Harriet Miers withdrew her nomination instead of forcing Bush to do it. I was never anything but luke warm about her nomination, and I know that most people in the TTLB world wanted her gone, but frankly I'm a little disappointed. Why you ask? I wanted to see if the Senate could actually do what it's supposed to do.

Most of the time when a confirmation hearing takes place, the person is generally qualified for the position, and so the Senate simply takes advantage of a free press opportunity, and stakes some political ground to bring in campaign contributions. The folks on the left scream about Roe v. Wade, and the folks on the right scream about... well... Roe v. Wade. But in the end, the person gets confirmed, or we'll get a poorly planned filibuster along with the media debate about its long and valued history, while ignoring the historical fact that Democrats used it to block civil rights legislation decades before. Unless of course it's the Republicans filibustering, in which case they're trying to block the obvious will of the majority.

Finally we had a case where quite possibly the nominee just wasn't up to snuff, and the Senate could actually do its job, and not vote for this person not because of some stupid political ideology, but because the person just wasn't generally qualified. I wanted to see if they could do it! I know its risky... because... well... what if they didn't? Democrats seemed content to just sit back and let the Republicans bloody their nose in a fight. While politically safe for them, how would they have voted in the end?

Yet still... I wanted to see if the Senate could actually reaffirm some tiny amount of hope in me, that as a body of government, it's not entirely useless. I wanted to hear the questions, and hear them debate about it. I wanted to see if they'd just stake the same old political ground, or take actual questions of qualification. Now I fear that opportunity is gone forever. Well... maybe not. Who knows who Bush will nominate next. Any bets on Gonzalez? Decision '08 has a pretty good round up of coverage and other reactions.