Cruising around the blogosphere lately,* I've been amazed that there seems to be something approaching a consensus choice among conservatives and libertarians (at least those who blog and who contribute to comments sections of blog) for the Supreme Court: D.C. Circuit judge and former California Supreme Court justice Janice Rogers Brown [eds. acknowledgement: but for confirmability issues, Brown would certainly be among my top choices]. She's popular with all wings of the movement, from libertarians to social conservatives. She's also extremely outspoken, controversial, and likely not confirmable.

This illustrates the disconnect between the White House and its most intellectually active potential allies. In terms of her record, her outspokenessness, her visibility, her willingness to court controversy in defense of her principles, her independent-mindedness, and just about everything else, Harriet Miers is basically the anti-Brown (or, if you prefer, the Brown of the Bizarro universe). The only thing they seem to have in common is that Miers--as dull as Brown is interesting, as moderate-seeming as Brown is radical, as untested as a judge as Brown is experienced, as fiery a rhetoritician as Miers is a mouther of platitudes, as establishmentarian as Brown is individualist--may not be confirmable, either. Oh, and either woman energizes the Republican base; only that Miers has energized them to oppose the president, while Brown would have united them in support.

*The links are just very recent examples compiled from Technorati, I've seen quite a few other expressions of support for Brown over the last couple of weeks elsewhere.