Change of heart?

By Aussiegirl

As chairman of a 1998 American Bar Association committee, Harriet Myers recommended legalization of homosexual adoption and the establishment of an International Criminal Court. Now we are asked to believe the president when he reassures us that he knows her "heart" and that she will be the same 20 years from now as she is today. This is of course, on the face of it, an absurd statement to make about even the most intimate of associates, much less about a person who 10 years ago was a Democrat and a Roman Catholic and who since then has undergone two conversions -- one to the Republican party, and another to her Evangelical Faith. As such she left behind the faith of her childhood and entire adulthood and also her political affiliation. I would say it is highly unusual for a person in their 50's to undergo two such complete changes of heart, and even though conservatives and Evangelicals would like to persuade themselves that this is because she "finally saw the light of truth", what it more accurately describes is someone who late in life is still looking to define herself. Is this the kind of person who can withstand the pressures she will undoubtedly face on the court.

Townhall.com :: Bush's unpleasant surprise by Robert Novak

Two questions were asked in conservative circles Monday when it was learned President Bush had nominated his lawyer, Harriet Miers, for the Supreme Court. Question No. 1: "Is this what we fought for?" Question No. 2: "What was he thinking?"

The conservative Republican base had tolerated George W. Bush's leftward lunges on education spending and prescription drug subsidies to re-elect him so that he could fill the Supreme Court with conservatives and send it rightward. But the White House counsel hardly looked like what they had expected.

Miers hardly seems the true believer the Republican base was anticipating when the president's agents spread the word last week that his choice would please conservatives. In 1988, she was contributing to Al Gore's presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee. She is listed as chairman of a 1998 American Bar Association committee that recommended legalization of gay adoptions and establishment of an International Criminal Court.

Assuming those assurances are well founded, Miers's qualifications for the high court are still questioned. Members of Congress describe Miers as a nice person but hardly a constitutional scholar. Indeed, she might trip over questions that Roberts handled so deftly. People who have tried to engage her in serious conversation find her politely dull.

In singing Miers's praises, Bush agents contend her every thought is of the president's best interests, not her own. That may be a desirable profile for a White House counsel, but it hardly commends a Supreme Court justice who will be around long after George W. Bush is gone.

The question recurs: "What was he thinking?" Bushologists figure the president was irked by repetitive demands that he satisfy the base with his Supreme Court appointments. He also was irked by the conservative veto of his Texas friend and Miers's predecessor at the White House, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. So, Bush showed the critics by naming another close aide lacking Gonzales's track record to draw the ire of the party's right wing.