Interconnected or Independent

I gasped upon hearing the announcement of Harriet Miers for Supreme Court. No it wasn’t because she is part of the Bush crime family. No it wasn’t because she has absolutely no judicial experience. No it wasn’t because the nomination is a blatant “fuck you” to the notion of the best person for the job. And finally no it wasn’t that this is another unambiguous sign of cronyism and patronage for her service to Bush. A man she once referred to as a “genius”.

I gasped because she stated with vigor that the three branches of government should and need to be “strongly independent”. This is not true, accurate and does not refer to American Democracy. This statement is not even close to the liberal democracy we live in today. That’s right a liberal democracy, i.e. individual rights and the government subordinate to the people, but enough about history and all its priceless lessons. Moreover, to reference the Federalist Papers (particularly # 10) it is clear that the branches of government are interconnected and intimately joined in a sharing of governmental power. They are not rouge branches acting with pure power and no oversight. The only independence they have is to make decisions which can and must be challenged by the other branches.

Miers is lost. She has no clue about the foundation of US government. If she did she would not have uttered such ignorance. At the very least a nominee must have a basic understanding of the government she or he is going to represent. But in this age of a president who is void about the true connection between local and state government and believes that God speaks directly to him, then I should not be surprised that his nominee is under qualified and ignorant.