Month: October 2005

When in doubt, throw out a trial balloon by using a leak followed by a staunch denial. The Washington Times signals that the White House is getting very nervous about the friendly fire they’re receiving over the Miers nomination to the Supreme Court. Rumours of her withdrawal abound. They are, of course, being denied. That’s how trial balloons work. Let one go. Gauge the reaction. Make a decision.

“White House senior staff are starting to ask outside people, saying, ‘We’re not discussing pulling out her nomination, but if we were to, do you have any advice as to how we should do it?’ ” a conservative Republican with ties to the White House told The Washington Times.

The White House denied making such calls.

“Absolutely not true,” White House spokesman Trent Duffy said.

But the conservative political consultant said that he had received such a query from Sara Taylor, director of the Office of White House Political Affairs.

Miss Taylor denied making any such calls.

A second Republican, who is the leader of a conservative interest group and has ties to the White House, confirmed that calls are being made to a select group of conservative activists who are not employed by the government.

The fact that this appears in the Washington Times is, of course, significant. It’s the paper of record for hard-line conservatives (she said, nicely).

According to the Times:

A conservative political consultant with ties to the White House said the president and his political team once thought Democrats would go easy on Miss Miers, a friend of Mr. Bush’s and his personal counsel. The theory was that Democrats see her as the best they could expect in the way of Bush appointments to the high court.

In other words, Bush was so confident that his base would support his decision, no matter what, that he didn’t even give a second thought to screwing over his rabidly fundie fans. No wonder “hubris” is the word now being used in conservative circles to describe their president. It sure took them long enough to take their blinders off. Welcome to the reality-based community. Find a chair. Sit down. And shut up.

The criticism from the right is fast and furious. Read on…

Or, if you prefer:

Harriet’s Hairballs Raise Eyebrows

MSNBC was mentioning the “w” word this morning (that’d be withdraw). And, Harriet Miers’ tenure as the first female president of the Texas state bar association “could provide new fodder for conservatives opposed to her nomination,” reports the WaPo (photo source). The article, “Miers Backed Race, Sex Set-Asides,” mentions that “the types of policies pursued by the Texas bar association amount to reverse discrimination.” Not popular with conservatives!

The Los Angeles Times finds that the few questions that Miers did answer have “left many constitutional experts shaking their heads.”

At one point, Miers described her service on the Dallas City Council in 1989. When the city was sued on allegations that it violated the Voting Rights Act, she said, “the council had to be sure to comply with the proportional representation requirement of the Equal Protection Clause.”

But the Supreme Court repeatedly has said the Constitution’s guarantee of “equal protection of the laws” does not mean that city councils or state legislatures must have the same proportion of blacks, Latinos and Asians as the voting population.

“That’s a terrible answer. There is no proportional representation requirement under the equal protection clause,” said New York University law professor Burt Neuborne, a voting rights expert. “If a first-year law student wrote that and submitted it in class, I would send it back and say it was unacceptable.” (Emphasis mine.)

You know, I’m enjoying this FAR too much to step in and add my opinion about Ms. Miers. The conservatives and legal scholars are doing quite well on their own!

And now increasingly desperate conservatives — dizzyingly picking daisy petals (“I love the president, I love him not, I love him despite his jaw-jerking, I love the numbskull not”) — are left telling PlanetOut that they don’t mind that, in 1987, Miers’ helped out the Dallas chapter of Girls, Inc., “a youth organization that supports abortion rights and acceptance of lesbians.”

Miers chaired the advisory committee of Girls Inc., a non-profit organization dating to 1864 that serves about 800,000 girls a year, many from low-income families, according to the questionnaire she submitted to the Senate Judiciary Committee. Miers received an award for her work with the local chapter and the Dallas Bar Association. […]

Questioned about Miers’ past involvement with the group, Tim Wildmon, president of the AFA, said it was not an issue.

“That’s been so long ago,” Wildmon said in a telephone interview. “I don’t think that factors in with her current situation. It was 18 years ago, people change, organizations change.”

What kind of moral compass does Tim Wildmon have that he buckles in to Miers’ record if it suits his purposes, but is sending his association after Girls Inc.? You bastard:

I just got off yahoo chat with my Iraqi friend Diva and she informed me she has been selected for the Fullbright scholarship and will be coming to America to study for her Masters Degree.
She was just informed and I had to rush to get this out to you all who have followed my stories about her.
I have to tell you she is over the moon with excitement.
She and about 16 other have been selected for 2006 program.  She doesn’t have more info about when she will be coming, but I am hoping sooner rather than later.
What great news for me to hear this morning and I just had to share with all.

Democracy Now!
Friday, October 21st, 2005

EVENING UPDATE: Thanks everyone for your wonderful participation today. Please look for a follow-up diary tomorrow.

Welcome to the first meeting of BooBooks, the online book club sponsored by The BooMan Tribune. We have two goals: to read together and then discuss books that illuminate current events and to benefit this site by purchasing our books from Powells book store. You are welcome here, though, no matter where you got your copy and even if you haven’t read it yet.

Our first book is BAYOU FAREWELL by Mike Tidwell, subtitled, “The Rich Life and Tragic Death of Louisiana’s Cajun Coast.”

Let’s get to it.

    “Katrina was not a natural disaster,” Tidwell says in a post-hurricane interview. “Human activity set the table.”

    Because we have an usual opportunity to view this disaster both from a historical and current perspective-as if we were sitting out somewhere in space/time looking at the last 300 years-I suggest we use his book to approach the whole thing chronologically and work our way forward to the future.  

    In this first diary, let’s concentrate on pre-Katrina.