Bush loyalist Harriet Miers did what political loyalists do when they're hurting their boss: she removed herself. With his Supreme Court nomination withdrawn, will George W. Bush learn from his mistake and nominate a judge who will unite the coalition that elected him? Or, will he seek vengeance against Miers's conservative opponents by again nominating a political crony and/or activist legal mind? We'll soon find out.

My money is on the latter, and since someone like Alberto Gonzales had already been mentioned as a candidate for the SC, I could see Bush nominating him as a way to 'stick it' to the conservative opposition.

Considering how the whole Bush-cheering machine turned on a dime against him in response to Miers, I wonder whether the machine will fall in place again, no matter who he nominates.

I doubt even Bush is that stupid. With indictments looming, the last thing Bush wants to do is anger the only people who would defend him (for the right price, i.e., a constructionist intellectual), the conservative base of the party.

Scenario: indictment are issued tomorrow, or next week. Bush endures a couple of bad news cycles, and then drops Michael Luttig on the Democrats. All of the sudden, the story is a bitter, nasty confirmation battle between conservatives and liberals. And Bush, in one swoop, unites conservatives in support and defense of his administration.

There's no way they planned it, but it is arranging itself to be quite a well-timed, shrewd move.

With Bush's current standing with the public, his party, and his base, he will be desperate to rally support for himself. If he picks Gonsales then he is nuts. Picking a federalist judge or law professor will earn him points, and he needs points badly now.

I was baffled by Miers' nomination in the first lace. I thought Roberts was the 'moderate' nominee who left the door open for a more socially conservative one. Guess not.