I was disgusted by some of the things they said about Miers. Personally, I thought she should have had a chance to have her say in the hearings, but even if people wanted to prevent this from happening, they certainly didn't have to be so vicious and crazy-sounding. It did not leave me with much respect for some of the pundits (Coulter, Kristol, Noonan, etc.), and the things that came from Freepers - who I daresay were all going on 3rd hand "information" gleaned from these same pundits - really shocked me.
Conservatives objected to Miers because we are not looking for a hope and promise. We demand that Bush USE the advantages we gave him in the last election to FIGHT the liberal bias on our nations highest court.
The battle is almost as important as getting a demonstrated conservative and strict constructionist on the court. W tried to be clever about it, and asked us to 'trust him'. After his boondoggles on illegal immigration, welfare reform, tax reform, and so on, we cannot take it on faith that George is a conservative.
We have to fight liberals, not the wussy approach used by Republicans now.
I agree with what you have said. I ultimately am relieved she withdrew herself, because I don't think it was a good appointment. But I do believe that conservatives have ultimately hurt themselves in the way they handled it. I do not think everyone treated her fairly. Even if they were right that she wasn't the best qualified, and her views were not really very clear after learning more about her - they started in on her right out of the box because she wasn't on their preferred list. I believe it would have been better if they had waited and then expressed their concerns after learning more.
I am sure there are differences in how Bork was treated vs. how Miers was treated. But really, they are probably fine distinctions that most are not going to make the effort to understand. In the end it does make it more difficult for Republicans to complain about how Dems treat judicial nominees.
Now that Rebublicans have entered that fray, IMO, the best they can do is fight the same way when we have the next Democrat president and try to make his nominee be "moderate".