Bush is setting the religious right up

Now that we've entered the post-Harriet world, it's time to analyze what this means.

Yes, it means that Bush will pick a far-right nutjob for the next nominee. That makes me happy. Here's why.

1. Harriet Miers' nomination was killed by the Republican party because they didn't think she was conservative enough. That means that Democrats can kill the next nomination if they think it's not liberal enough.

2. The GOP just lost all of their Supreme Court talking points. Who in the GOP is going to be able to stand up with a straight face and say "every nominee deserves an up or down vote"? Kiss that talking point good bye.

3. And who is going to be able to argue that there should be no "litmus test" on abortion and other issues? Harriet was killed because last night a report came out that she was sympathetic to a woman's right to choose. She failed their litmus test on abortion, and she was killed. That means if the next nomination fails our litmus test on abortion, we can kill the next one.

4. The Harriet debacle shows Bush to be incredibly weak. That doesn't help him at all, in anything. It will only further the public perception of him as a failing president of a failing presidency. And the weaker Bush is, the less trouble he can stir up.

5. The Democrats had the power to filibuster Bush's handful of wacky lower court nominees with impunity, there is no way they're going to have a problem filibustering those same nominees when the wacko is appointed to the Supreme Court. It will be a cake walk.

6. If Bush thought he could get a wack-job confirmed, he'd have appointed a wack-job instead of Harriet in the first place. He didn't. Nothing has changed to put Bush in a better stead now to get such a wack-job confirmed, and in fact, he's worse off because now he appears even weaker and all his talking points have been blown out of the water. So let him appoint the wack-job, and let the fun begin.

7. The religious right and "conservatives" in the GOP have shown their cards. They're nasty, vindictive, extremists who want the entire pie or nothing, and they're willing to destroy their own president if he doesn't give them 110% of everything they want. They've burned their bridges with this president, and this president is going to be around for 3 years. This should be fun.

8. Bush has shown his cards to the far right. He's not a real conservative. He doesn't like their agenda. He's embarrassed to publicly embrace it. No matter who he appoints next, they now know Bush isn't one of them and that impression - that realization - will linger for the rest of his term.

8. And finally, Bush is setting the religious right up, and that makes me smile. Yes, Bush will pick a wack-job for the next nominee, even though he knows the wack-job won't be confirmed. Bush will fight for his nominee, blah blah blah, and the nomination will fail. Then Bush will say, see, I tried - then he'll nominate Alberto Gonzales, who the religious right hates, and get him confirmed. Bush will be able to argue that he gave the religious right want they wanted and it just didn't work. Oh well, time for Alberto.

So that's why all of this makes me very very very happy. It's a big mess, and messes provide opportunities.