Eminent Domain

I was alerted by a link on Confirm Them that Former White House Chief of Staff Andy Card is the subject of a three-part interview with Newsmax. This part of the interview is especially interesting to me. Card talks about the failed Harriet Miers Supreme Court nomination. Card says that Bush wanted to nominate a woman to the Court...

"And then when William Rehnquist left, you know, 'What do you mean you're not going to nominate a woman? You've had two opportunities, and you haven't nominated a woman.' And so he was looking to nominate a woman - not blindly, not any woman, not just to nominate a woman."

This doesn't make sense to me. He was looking to nominate a woman... but not blindly, and not any woman, and not just to nominate a woman. It seems a little contradictory to me, especially the last part that I bolded. Maybe Card means that Bush wanted to consider gender as an important quality, just not the only quality. But if that is the case, then I don't see how Miers' gender could outweigh the other qualities and qualifications of other potential nominess.

I think that this part is very odd...

As the search committee kept suggesting female candidates who did not seem right, Bush pushed for more selections.

What was not right about Judge Karen Williams? What was not right about Judge Diane Sykes? There are other female judges (Batchelder, Owen, Brown, Corrigan, Jones, Clement) too. Many of them have some kind of strike against them, whether it is age or controversy, but none of them have questionable qualifications. That is what should matter about a Supreme Court nominee. I hope the President remembers that if he gets another vacancy.