Bush's female nominee could in the end be more simpathetic to the left wing then the right wing.  But who knows anything can happen.  Afterall this is america.

It all depends on how many people Bush gets to replace.  He has a political agenda, a litmus test, and years to gather the list.  Miers was a particularly bad choice, and I have my doubts that she can survive the heat.  In my opinion, she is a slam-dunk for the anti-abortion movement and those who want to see greater promotion of conservative Christian doctrine by government.  She was picked because she has almost literally no track record to attack.  Conservative Christians, lacking faith in their White House patron, have shot themselves in the foot repeatedly by failing to see the numerous winks and hear the heavily coded language coming out of the adminstration.

Conservatives and evangelical Christians do not need Miers.  They know that they'll get a more reliable candidate next time if Miers fails.  Bush won't make the same mistake twice.  (Or maybe he will.  He makes a fetish of not being flexible.)  Meanwhile, the Democrats are mostly lying low and letting the conservatives squabble and bicker.

To be honest, I was just offering what I read from one Newsday article. I really don't care who's on the Supreme Court, as long as they don't overturn Roe v. Wade. If you think they won't, then I really have nothing to argue with you about. The points were originally Cop's, I'll let him defend them if he wants to.

I think having politicians as judges is a bad idea to begin with.

Well, forgive me if I'm wrong but I always believe Bush's "litmus test" for nominees was having a strict, literal interpretation of the Constitution.  That's all I've ever heard him say.

returning the right of the Senate to conduct foreign policy

I take it you mean the treaty power.  But the President makes treaties with the advice and consent of two thirds of the Senate.  It's in Article II, so it's a Presidential power, with a senatorial limitation on that power.  Hardly an example of the Senate having the right to conduct foreign policy.

It's not a matter of "smart."  That's way too Machiavellian.  We're talking about a close friend of Bush's.  Intentionally subjecting someone to ridicule is not being a particularly good friend.  I think Bush miscalculated at the reaction he got.  It's possible that he didn't miscalculate but was determined to push her through if at all possible.  But intentionally offering her as a sacrificial lamb does not seem at all likely to me.

"Right now, Bush is desperately trying to save the nomination."

Actually, I suggested to a friend on the first day that the nomination was meant to fail.   I thought it might be an effort to test the total will of the Republican party to see if they would really do what it would take to put on and confirm a contentious candidate (Janice Rogers Brown?).  This seemed to me to be something the Pres could not count on.  However, now that its the Republicans doing the rallying, they'll be compelled to support someone that really is much more conservative, since by appearances they'll have been the ones to instigate it.  So, I thought that her withdrawal was inevitable from the start.

On the left, conspiracy theorists are already claiming that Bush cleverly proposed an incompetent candidate as a "rope-a-dope" strategy.  Tire the opponents out with an obvious loser, and then hit them with the real choice.  They'll be in no position to resist.  Today, one of my liberal friends predicted that he will nominate Bork next.  Personally, I don't put any credence in such paranoid fantasies.  

I think that Bush and his inner circle  really thought that they could sneak Miers through more easily as a stealth candidate with no paper trail.  They ended up with egg on their face because the lack of the paper trail backfired among their own political base--whom they were counting on for support.  Conservative Christians didn't trust the winks, and the winks just inflamed the moderate and liberal opposition.

According to the current elitists, Bush could never do something that smart, but people constantly underestimate his tactical abilities and his willingness to press on with what he thinks is right no matter what the critics say.  If she is as loyal as many Bush folks are, she'd do it, too.

I am among those "elitists" who think that Bush isn't that smart.  I think that the man is great at clearing brush on his ranch, but he is clueless as a chief executive of the most powerful nation on the planet.  Miers followed something of a pattern in his crony-laden administration.  She didn't have any special credentials for the job, but she was loyal to him personally and she came with good recommendations from his other cronies.  Like Cheney, she was put in charge of the talent search for the office he was grooming her for.  Like Cheney, she ended up being offered the job, instead of the other candidates she was supposed to be evaluating fairly.  (I can only imagine how that exercise went.  She knew that she was a top contender, but she was in charge of interviewing potential candidates.)  

Bush will now proceed to nominate someone who will be more partisan.  Pat Buchanan has said that Bush will stick it to the right-wing Christians, because he will want revenge for their disloyalty.  I disagree.  They raised the most visible stink.  He'll choose someone that more clearly toes the Christian line.  The Democrats, who were less aggressive about Miers and who have no real power, will complain publicly and acquiesce privately.  It may not have been a conscious rope-a-dope strategy, but that is how it will play out in the end.  If Democrats become too obstructive, the public will lose patience with them.  So Bush has a much freer hand to promote the interests of his more extremist supporters.

Looks like Miers is down for the count:

Miers withdrawal

Let the speculation and conspiracy theories begin!