In a surprise move, the White House announced the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court, just days after the headlines were all about a major investigation into their political dirty tricks. Suddenly, the headlines aren't! Well, played.
In his speech announcing the nomination, Bush was also strangely emphatic about Alito's judging experience, as if that had been an issue with his last nomination.
Experience... A novel approach to appointing extremely powerful officials, I didn't expect him to go there, but we'll see how that plays.
As predicted, the sinking of the Miers nomination doesn't really help the progressive cause at all. It looked bad for the White House, sure, but the public has an extremely short memory, and we're just going to end up with a much more staunchly and unambiguously conservative nominee. Someone like Alito.
