Posted on 10/12/2005 2:52:26 PM PDT by Theodore R.
Miers to withdraw
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted: October 13, 2005 1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2005 WorldNetDaily.com
Harriet Miers is never going to be grilled by the Senate Judiciary Committee.
She is going to withdraw her name from consideration before such hearings ever begin.
You can take that to the bank.
Why? Because, even though Democrats in the Senate seem more pleased with the choice of Miers than do Republicans, the questions that must be asked of the nominee for Sandra Day O'Connor's Supreme Court seat would be among the most embarrassing ever raised about her boss, President Bush.
Most of the attention on the nomination so far has focused on her lack of experience, her track record, her opinions on abortion, etc.
But the silver bullet that will do in the nominee is her cozy relationship with Bush – one that likely placed her in a position of covering up scandals in the Texas Lottery to keep secret the preferential treatment the president received as a young man to enter the Texas Air National Guard.
All it will take is a subpoena or two to get the whole sordid story on the public record – in front of a national television audience.
I don't think George W. Bush, already experiencing unfavorable public opinion ratings, will allow that to happen.
Democratic senators will overcome their apparent enthusiasm for the Miers pick when they realize they have an opportunity to embarrass Bush over the way he avoided Vietnam service.
All they would have to do is to subpoena two witnesses – former Texas Lt. Gov. Ben Barnes and former Texas Lottery director Lawrence Littwin.
It was Barnes, also a former House speaker in the state, who testified under oath in 1999 in a lawsuit brought by Littwin that he called the head of the Texas Air National Guard to put in a good word for Bush. Barnes later parlayed that favor into multimillion-dollar leverage as a lobbyist-consultant with a company called GTECH that won the business of running the scandal-plagued Texas Lottery.
After Littwin was hired by the Texas Lottery Commission, he made the unfortunate decision of questioning why GTECH should get Texas' business without facing competitive bids. He also questioned why the company should be paying former state officials like Barnes and contributing money, perhaps illegally, to other Texas politicians.
As a result, the commission headed by Miers fired Littwin. GTECH paid him off with a $300,000 settlement and bought out Barnes' contract for $23 million. The unusual settlement required Littwin to destroy all of his lawsuit documents, and Harriet Miers, the chairman of the Lottery Commission and future White House counsel and Supreme Court nominee, avoided testifying as to her knowledge of the whole sordid affair.
Does anyone really expect President Bush will allow this can o' worms to be reopened in Senate hearings?
No way!
In fact, every day Bush allows this nomination to remain on the table is another day he risks embarrassment over a scandal everyone thought was dead with the retirement of Dan Rather as CBS anchorman.
Can you imagine John Kerry's friends in the Senate passing up an opportunity to revisit the high-water mark of the Democrats' 2004 presidential campaign? I don't think so.
Frankly, I'm amazed the Democrats have been able to keep still as long as they have. They are keeping their powder dry for a reason: They want Harriet Miers to testify.
Somehow, this story has remained largely below the radar screen of the national press. Maybe they, too, can't wait for the real fireworks to begin in televised hearings.
So, now it's back to the drawing board for President Bush. Maybe Harriet Miers will decide she can't put her favorite client through this ordeal. She may suddenly decide she doesn't really want to be on the Supreme Court, after all.
In any case, mark my words, Bush is looking for his third choice to fill Sandra Day O'Connor's seat right now.
Is his source DEBKA?
No one Dubya nominates for SCOTUS would surprise me -- not even Gonzales.
He IS going to go back to the drawing board for a "safer" nominee.
"Damn it, I was hoping she would withdraw, but now that Joseph Farah says she will there's obviously no chance of it actually happening."
Yup, and you can take that to the bank!
Can we say "executive privilege"? Bush will not release any documents, and Miers will not talk about any of this. They can subpoena documents all day. They will be met with dead silence.
If that's how Democrats want to use their time, instead of actually questioning Miers, I predict every GOP Senator will vote for her, as will some disgusted Democrats.
Okay, I stand corrected. But I know there was something about Barnes that also made his story shady. I'll have to look it up in my files.
Two can play the "scandal" game.
Gee, why can't I find this article on WND.com?
>> ... preferential treatment the president received as
>> a young man to enter the Texas Air National Guard.
This author obviously didn't read the research done on
this during the campaign. Sinks whatever credibility
the article might have had.
> I can say without hesitation that, at that time, there
> were open slots for pilots such as the one Bush secured.
But not for penguin slots, I hear (non-flying). Signing
up for TANG pilot was not a hide-out, like, say, signing
up for USNR*
Up to about that time, flying that particular jet in
peacetime was more dangerous than being combat infantry
in Vietnam.
* USNR - Did Kerry pull strings to get in?
Was his transfer to Swift boats a mistake on his part?
I suspect he didn't know about Market Time when he
jumped from blue water to what he thought was safe
off-shore PT-109 duty.
I oppose the Miers nomination, but this is a load of nonsense.
Remember in TX, the lt. governor has power because he presides over the 31-member state senate. It's a parttime post that pays only $7,200 per year.
George,
I agree with you. I thought from the very beginning that the Miers nomination IS a Rope-A-Dope. Why does not anyone else see this? She is absolutely a "light-weight" while there are far more qualified women AND men lawyers AND judges that could be nominated for the O'Connor vacancy. I believe the Miers nomination will end in a week or two with a more qualified nominee.
In the spring of 1968, Barnes was the outgoing speaker of the TX House and the projected Democrat nominee for lieutenant governor, running with Preston Smith of Lubbock.
Ben F. Barnes
Ben Barnes (1938-), who was chosen speaker of the house in 1965 at the age of 26, was the youngest occupant of that office since Ira Evans had presided over the House of Representatives during the 12th Legislature of 1870 to 1871.
Born on April 17, 1938, in Gorman, Texas, Barnes attended The University of Texas School of Business and the university's School of Law. He became interested in politics while working for the state health department as a student and ran successfully for a seat in the House of Representatives following his graduation. As a resident of De Leon in Comanche County, Barnes served in the 57th through 60th legislatures.
While a representative, Barnes served as chairman of the house rules committee and vice-chairman of the banks and banking committee, in addition to serving as liaison between Governor John Connally and Speaker Byron M. Tunnell. Barnes backed Tunnell's campaign for a second term as speaker in 1965, planning to seek that office himself in 1967. Just before the opening of the 59th Legislature, however, Tunnell accepted a position on the Railroad Commission of Texas, and Barnes became speaker ahead of his intended schedule.
In 1967, Barnes won a second term as speaker in the 60th Legislature. The following year, he was elected lieutenant governor. Winning a second term in that office as well, Barnes presided over the senate in the 61st and 62nd legislatures.
I'm going to make a prediction. I think that the Dems on the committee during the hearings are going to focus their questions on Miers' relationship to her boss, President Bush. They're going to ask some uncomfortable questions about what they talked about, if assurances were made, if she promised him any control over her decisions even after he was out of office, etc. etc. They're going to make this as embarassing as they can for Bush.
Ben Barnes never has been popular in Texas. Give us credit for recognizing this flim-flam jerk for the AH he is.
Barnes was so popular in the 1960s that people in TX would engage you in a fistfight if you said he was overrated. His fall from grace in 1972 was a result of the Sharpstown bank scandal, which also unrailed the career of Governor Smith and sitting Speaker Mutscher.
Hey Teddy..... you have a working link to this piece? If so please post it or let us know from where it came.....
I posted it about 5 p.m. It was dated for Thursday on WND.com. Now it is missing. Could the article have been a hoax, or was it pulled for release on Thursday morning? I don't know.
Why is stuff from WingNutDaily, NewschMuck, Debka, or Miss Morford even allowed to be posted? At the very least a warning should be mandatory for any posting by these tools.
He's parroting Coulter's foolishness.
A percentage of these people have to be democrat plants. Certainly not all, but more than some would think, I'm sure.
They sound more like Farrah than they realize.
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