Miers nomination...more hubris or incompetence?

The Washington Post reports that the Senate Judiciary Committee was not impressed with Harriet Miers with the written responses they received from Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers.

Barely concealing their irritation during a 35-minute news conference at the Capitol, Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) and ranking Democrat Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.) called the lobbying on Miers's behalf "chaotic," and said the answers she provided Monday to a lengthy questionnaire were inadequate. "The comments I have heard range from incomplete to insulting," Leahy said.

While this may not bode well for Miers, of even more interest is a commentary by Republican hack Robert Novak this morning. The title says it all, Vulnerable Miers might not survive. Being a political hack he blames the Democrats up front for inevitable nastiness.

President Bush's agents have convinced conservative Republican senators heartsick over his nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court that they must support her to save his presidency. But that does not guarantee her confirmation. Ahead are hearings of unspeakable ugliness that can be prevented only if Democratic senators exercise unaccustomed restraint.

Will the Judiciary Committee Democrats insist on putting under oath two Texas judges who are alleged to have guaranteed during a conference call of Christian conservatives that Miers would vote to overturn Roe vs. Wade? Will the Democrats dig into Miers' alleged interference nine years ago as Texas Lottery Commission chairman intended to save then-Gov. Bush from political embarrassment?

But then he gets to the meat of the problem, White House incompetence (hubris?).

Officials charged with winning Miers' confirmation told me neither of these issues is troublesome, but in fact they suggest incompetence and neglect by the White House. To permit a conference call with scores of participants hearing close associates of the nominee predict her vote on abortion is incompetent. To nominate somebody implicated in a state lottery dispute in the past without carefully considering the consequences goes beyond incompetence to arrogant neglect.

Bush was not prepared for the negative reaction from the GOP base when he nominated White House Counsel Miers. Former Republican National Chairman Ed Gillespie, leading the confirmation campaign, over two weeks convinced skeptics that Miers is conservative enough. Whatever her qualifications, after hearing from Gillespie, dubious GOP senators decided they could not deny his chosen court nominee to a president on the ropes. Bush has solidified Republican support not because he is strong but because he looks weak.

Support the President because he's down and weak? Is that a good move for a Republican Senator that faces reelection in a year?

It was said by many that Harriet Miers knew where all the skeletons in Bush's past were burried. Could the confirmation hearings unearth some of those skeletons?

The possibility of the Lottery Commission controversy being the subject of confirmation hearings is even more daunting for the White House. The story now is only being printed in alternative publications, such as the Dallas Observer of Oct. 13. These reports recalled the lawsuit brought by Lawrence Littwin alleging that Chairman Miers fired him as the Lottery Commission's executive director because he had uncovered corruption involving Gtech, the lottery management firm.

Littwin's federal suit claimed Miers protected Gtech because its lobbyist, former Lt. Gov. Ben Barnes as Texas House speaker, had pushed Bush ahead of other applicants for the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam War. Democrat Barnes had been silent until a 1999 deposition by him said he had pushed young Bush to the head of the line. Barnes, who received from Gtech $3 million a year and $23 million in separation pay, told me that the Bush air national guard story has "absolutely nothing" to do with his settlement. Littwin is silent under terms of a $300,000 settlement ending his suit. Former Texas Chief Justice John Hill, a member of the Lottery Commission at the time, told me: ''There is no substance at all to these charges.'' Miers handled the case ''with care and judiciousness," Hill added.

Whether Barnes and Littwin will be subpoenaed to rehash these charges is in the hands of Judiciary Chairman Arlen Specter. The White House saved him from defeat in the 2004 Pennsylvania Republican primary and did not try to keep him from becoming chairman this year. But nobody expects Specter to grant forbearance for the president's lawyer.

Now that could be big. What was he thinking or not thinking? Does the nomination of Harriet Miers gives us an idea of what the rest of the Bush presidency will be like without "Bush's Brain", Karl Rove. As a side note I read somewhere yesterday that there is a joke going around that Bush plans to nominate his personal accountant to take Alan Greenspan's place at the Fed.