Oh no! A moderate! What will the crazies do?

The new Supreme Court justice nominee, Harriet Miers, was chosen, I believe, in the same way as Chief Justice Roberts. To the rather odd surprise of those on the right and left, Bush mentioned "there is no litmus test" on whether or not Miers was pro-choice or pro-life. "What matters to me, " he said, "is her judicial philosophy. What does she believe the proper role of the judiciary is relative to the legislative and the executive branch?"

That might seem like a lot of hot air coming from Bush, but if you take it at face value, what does it mean? It means that Bush chose someone he trusted to have great intellect, integrity and character who was a woman, and did not have a public opinion about hot-button issues. Those three aspects alone give anyone a head start in my book as long as they are true. The problem that many of the crazies on the left and right have is this: they can only see the justices from the standpoint that they might vote against their own narrow interests, whatever they may be.

Of course, abortion is always the big one, but there are many others which should be considered, but the point here is this: Bush is saying that there is a difference between being a congressperson that votes for a certain bill that might ban something and a justice who interprets the Constitution according the intent of the Founding Fathers. A justice's beliefs on a certain issue that comes up in the Supreme Court should have little bearing on cases, because judges are supposed to be as impartial as possible, and should not try to change laws they disagree with (morally speaking), which is where the "legislating from the bench" comes in. They are merely there to interpret the Constitution and protect citizens from overzealous government.

In the end, the Supreme Court can best be viewed this way: far from attempting to represent the beliefs and wishes of the masses, which is the explicit responsibility of Congress, the Supreme Court exists to interpret laws of the United States in relation to the Constitution, so that an overzealous Congress or Executive does not infringe on the rights of the majority or the minority.

Also, Bush's nominee shows us that Bush really isn't as staunchly conservative in every area - he gets beat down for his war in Iraq, but many people seem to forget that a lot of conservatives and libertarians never really liked Bush's more moderate stances on a variety of issues, including abortion rights, welfare, and the size of government.