By Selwyn Duke
Well, we knew it was coming. After having the unmitigated gall to appoint to the High Court that odious creature known as a white man, President Bush has redeemed himself before the altar of baal with an affirmative-action nominee.
Oh, don’t misunderstand me, I don’t care a whit that Harriet Miers isn’t a judge. You won’t find this scribe building a mystique around formal education (which she possesses), political or judicial experience, or “esteemed experts.” Truth be known, our civilization was far better off before the Dr. Spocks started issuing parenting prescriptions, the sickologists began formulating curricula and usurping the role of the clergy, and the liars . . . er . . . I mean lawyers started making intelligence (not synonymous with “intelligent”) decisions (read: “Able Danger”). And in this I would echo Bill Buckley, who sagaciously proclaimed that he would rather be governed by 435 people out of the phonebook than the whole faculty of Harvard.
Sadly, though, such a choice was inevitable, given our twisted quota-mentality. After all, if you think Harriet Miers would have been chosen had her name been Harry Miers, I have some land in the Whitewater Development to sell you. The only question is, is she the right affirmative-action nominee?
Now, I’ll concede that the President might know something that we don’t, because he knows the woman and we don’t. But since it has become painfully obvious that we know a lot that he doesn’t, I feel none too sanguine. After all, Bush doesn’t know enough to stop the budget from growing to unprecedented proportions, close down the borders, defend the primacy of English or realize that Islam is a religion of peace like it’s a religion of pork. But let’s look at what we do know.
Harriet Miers donated money to Senator Lloyd Bentsen and the Al Gore campaign in 1988, which to me sounds much like a stomach-turning challenge on a reality TV show. Now, in all fairness, her recent contributions have gone to entities that have been solely Republican and often conservative, and it’s also true that wisdom occasionally attends age. Why, I’m certainly not the same person I was fifteen years ago; I’m far more handsome and charming now. But really, a no-no like donating to Plastic Man? I know not what kind of conversion she underwent, but methinks the expiation of this barely-pardonable sin requires at least a twenty-year exile in a desert.
Then, I remember my mother’s oft-uttered pearl of wisdom, “Tell me who your friends are and I’ll tell you who you are.” This bears mentioning because when you hear a leftist radical like Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid shower Miers with praise, which he did, you have to ask, “What’s wrong with this picture?” She is either the greatest stealth nomination in the nation’s history or Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s long-lost gentile twin.
But there’s a larger issue here. I cringe every time I hear the we-must-appoint-a-woman mantra or the-fairer-sex-will-save-the-day schtick, but it’s not just blind chauvinism. Call it informed chauvinism. You see, the governing principle here is that finding a traditional woman in the political arena is a little like finding a NOW member in a full-length burka.
Think about it: generally speaking, where do you find good, conservative, traditional women? The answer is in the home, not the House. Traditional women are usually devoted to traditional endeavors, such as raising their children and tending to hearth and home. And when they are forced by necessity into the workaday world, they’re usually doing merely what is required to put three squares on the table. They’re not seeking to exalt themselves through careerism.
At the other end of the spectrum you find the Hillary Clintons, Barbara Boxers and Diane Feinsteins of the world. These women drank deeply of the cup of feminist Kool-Aid, imbibing its precept that fulfillment can only be found through worldly pursuits which, as we all know, were selfishly reserved for men, by men. Simply put, a traditional woman’s greatest dream is to raise a family; a feminist woman’s greatest dream is to create a village that can raise a family.
To those who would dispute me, I throw down the gauntlet. Please name five prominent women currently in politics who possess genuine conservative credentials. Okay, we can forget the aforementioned Three Bobbitteers (I won’t explain that reference) and the rest of the Femocrats, as they’re all cut from the same stone. But what of the Republicans, ostensibly the party of conservatism? Surely they must boast some conservative women.
Well, who would they be? Senator Susan Collins of Maine? The woman bearing the most picturesque name in politics, Olympia Snowe? At best they’re moderates. And what of Condoleeza Rice? Perhaps, but her job is to do the President’s bidding, so I consider her politics to be somewhat of an unknown quantity. Of course, she may be as conservative as Bush himself, to which I can only say: exactly.
Now, I realize there are exceptions to this rule; the “Iron Lady” Margaret Thatcher is a sterling example. Another is Janice Rogers Brown, a black jurist who seems to be a true, bona fide constitutionalist. In fact, I thought that she might be Bush’s selection, and she would have been a good one because, despite her unfailing respect for the Constitution, the liberal hit squads would have found it difficult to “Bork” the first ever black female nominee to the High Court.
Regardless of whether a given affirmative-action nominee is qualified, we should all be alarmed and dismayed by our embrace of the quota-mentality. You see, when you dispense with meritocracy and discriminate based on chromosome configuration, epidermal melanin content or whether or not someone’s name ends with a “z,” you end up with mutations such as Joycelyn “Safer Bullets” Elders, Janet “Waco” Reno, and Ruth “Foreign Law” Bader Ginsberg holding the levers of power. And with a Supreme Court Justice’s lifetime tenure making him a gift that keeps on giving, this is a risk we can ill afford to take.
Since the Court can shape the nation for decades to come and the President has an opportunity to shape the Court, I can only hope that Bush’s critics are misunderestimating him once again. But I won’t get my hopes up – pleasant surprises go down far easier than bitter disappointments.
The only thing I know for sure is that Harriet Miers is an affirmative-action nominee. I just hope to God she’s the right one.
