The dragon-slayer casts historic first vote & Harriet Miers says "you can take this job..."

Today was a great day for watching CSPAN. Didn't see, but heard Congressman McNerney enthusiastically cast his first vote for Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House. On this same historic day for American women, Harriet Miers' resignation from her position as White House counsel was announced. Suspect there may be a message in the timing.

Her [Miers] sharpest critics were not liberal Democrats but conservatives eager to see the Supreme Court shift to the right. Conservatives were delighted when Mr. Bush chose Judge John G. Roberts Jr. of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to succeed William H. Rehnquist as chief justice of the United States, and they wanted another conservative judge to succeed Justice O’Connor.

The conservatives got their wish when Ms. Miers withdrew her nomination after three weeks, giving Mr. Bush the opening to nominate Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. of the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit to succeed Justice O’Connor.

Source: Harriet Miers Plans to Leave the White House (D. Stout - NYT)

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