I don't know what to think. On the one hand, Bush AG appointee Michael Mukasey seems to be a stand up guy with a great resume and a solid career in civil service. On the other hand, Charles Schumer likes him. Phil reported earlier that there isn't likely to be much resistance to Mukasey, but conservatives still aren't sure whether they like this or not. On the anti- side we have Calabresi at Time:

But in dropping Olson and going with Mukasey, Bush has opened himself up to attack from the right. Conservatives are worried about Mukasey's 1994 denial of asylum for a Chinese man who said his wife had been forced to have an abortion under that country's one-child law, which they say indicates he's weak on pro-life issues. And though he has consistently ruled with the Administration on a number of important and high-profile terrorism cases, Mukasey broke with them in an early, crucial ruling, saying that American citizen Jose Padilla had a right to a lawyer, no matter what his status in the war on terror. Mukasey is also very close to former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, whom social conservatives distrust.

On the pro- side we have Peter Wehrner at the Corner:

In case you haven't heard, President Bush announced the nomination of federal judge Michael Mukasey as his next (and hopefully last) attorney general.

Mukasey was appointed by Ronald Reagan, has a rep as a law and order guy and yet the Dems will probably not oppose him. Why? Because they likely suggested him among others to the White House as being acceptable. Highly unlikely the WH is looking for yet another fight with the Senate and looked for a compromise candidate.

How could Mukasey, a strict law and order guy, a right winger in most things, be a compromise candidate? Well, as a judge in the Jose Padilla case he stood up to the Bush's then AG (that would be Alberto Gonzales) and told them they needed to follow the law in prosecuting people. He was apparently suggested by Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and since Schumer would be a key senator in the confirmation process, that is the telling clue.

The fact the WH is avoiding a fight over this nomination is telling as well. They really don't have the forces to take on a unified Dem team but fortunately for them, they don't have to. The national Dems keep backing away from the big fights: defunding the war and/or impeachment because they don't have the votes in the Senate. Maybe they're right but some people think they should try. There's still 16 months of this Administration and so far they have reduced America to being something less than a super power, ravaged the military, the treasury, and can't even clean up after a hurricane. They're so incompetent it boggles the mind but at least they've stopped fighting over the AG. Let's hope this one can restore some professionalism at the Justice Department. It's long overdue.

According to the AP, it would appear that President Bush may have settled on his choice for Attorney General and it is possibly (nothing is official yet) Michael Mukasey. Bush's previous top choice was the former solicitor general Theodore Olsen, the man who had become famous for successfully representing Bush before the Supreme Court in 2000 to settle the contesting of the presidency. Olsen's name, however, was pulled off the table after Democrats in the Senate threatened to block the nomination.

Mukasey would replace Alberto Gonzales, an Attorney General whose tenure was not exactly a dynamic one. In fact, many grass roots conservatives were happy to see him go as they generally considered him a fairly weak Attorney General without a clear agenda.

Mukasey is a moderate and would probably be more acceptable to the Senate, although there is some grumblings in the conservative base about his possible selection. Generally, the conservative base is lukewarm about moderates in positions of power, but there needs to be a bowing to reality on this issue. Without the votes to successfully confirm a candidate, the candidate will not be confirmed. This process of Senate confirmation was devised by the founding fathers as a means to limit executive powers and that is the way the system works.