I’ve now received about a billion e-mails from lawyers explaining that there’s nothing wrong with the fact that Harriet Miers only participated in 16 courtroom cases in a career spanning more than 25 years — that 90 percent of all legal matters are settled, that’s what lawyers are supposed to do, and so on. That’s all nice, but it’s beside the point. Miers’s defenders, the brilliant Beldar among them, have praised her choice because her career as a working lawyer will supposedly provide her with unique and valuable experience when it comes to the Court. The clear implication of this line of argument is that she knows the law from the other side of the judge’s desk. Sorry, but that won’t wash. It’s one thing to argue that courtroom experience as a lawyer prepares you for the back-and-forthing on the Court. It’s quite another to argue that a career spent settling cases prepares you to rule in matters that have been adjudicated by lower courts. If Miers has spent her career helping people and corporations avoid courtrooms, that doesn’t suggest she has any judicial legal skills whatsoever.