More on Harriet Miers...

I haven't seen this wholly articulated anywhere, so I don't have any links. But it seems to me that this nomination might turn out to be the biggest mistake of the Bush Presidency, in terms of electoral consequences.

As best outlined in What's the Matter With Kansas, the Republican Party has ridden to electoral victory over the past decade by fanning the flames of outrage among evangelical Christians. The number one accelerant is abortion, and the number one source of outrage for abortion activists is Roe v. Wade. These people are willing to die to overturn Roe v. Wade. We all heard Bush promise to appoint Scalia-Thomas types to the Supreme Court, and we all heard the plaintive cries from both sides that the next president would get to appoint four nominees to the Supreme Court.

Well, this president hasn't gotten his four nominees, although given the ages of some of the sitting justices, he might still get one or two more. But he's gotten two nominees, and he's punted on both of them - and in doing so, he broke his promise to the Right, and he deprived abortion activists of a long-awaited righteous battle between Good and Evil, between a Christian justice and the Hated Left.

Ok, so he pissed off his base by breaking his campaign promise. Why should that matter so much? Clinton pissed off his base all the time. The difference here is, evangelical Christians aren't activists you can take for granted. They could just as soon hold their noses and walk away from the political process altogether, just like they did back in the seventies and eighties. Remember Karl Rove's 4 million missing evangelical voters in the 2000 election? They could go missing again if, after all their work and sacrifice in getting a conservative into the White House, they come away empty-handed on the one issue that matters the most. If the White House mishandles this thing, I think it could break the political will, semi-permanently, of many rank-and-file members of the Christian right.

This goes way beyond the 2006 elections. It could arguably have a much greater impact on the 2008 presidential election, when Christians are wondering whether it's worth their while to work for another presidential candidate who promises them the world. That said, the White House and the Republican party aren't stupid, and they'll do all they can to keep evangelicals on board - maybe by rescinding Miers, maybe by bringing up some other issue, like gay marriage, to crusade against.