MSNBC.com
Miers exhibits deep dedication to Bush
By Michael Grunwald, Jo Becker and Amy Goldstein
As a private citizen in Dallas, Harriet Miers was a devoted
parishioner and Sunday school teacher at a conservative evangelical
church and donated money to an antiabortion group. As a City Council
candidate, she opposed the repeal of a law against gay sex. As
president of the Texas bar, she led a fight against an abortion rights
plank adopted by the American Bar Association. And as President Bush's
White House lawyer, she helped vet deeply conservative judges...
Her red Mercedes was such a fixture in the West Wing lot that
colleagues called it an abandoned car; she has never married or had
children, and some of her friends believe she has sacrificed her
personal life for work.
Miers has earned respect across the political spectrum for fairness
and especially for diligence. As Bush's staff secretary, she was known
to correct spelling, grammar and even punctuation errors in memos to
the president. But she has no judicial experience and not much
appellate experience...
She was the attorney for Bush's gubernatorial transition team in Texas
and chaired his state lottery commission. She helped recruit
conservative lawyers for Bush during the Florida recount in 2000 and
was reportedly assigned during the campaign to conduct a review of his
National Guard service. She then moved to Washington as his White
House staff secretary, controlling the flow of paper into the Oval
Office, and was promoted to deputy chief of staff for policy and then
chief counsel. She was a frequent guest at Camp David and helped Bush
clear brush at his Crawford ranch.
David Frum, a conservative commentator and former White House staffer,
wrote on his blog that Miers once told him the president was the most
brilliant man she knows...
Hecht, who first met Miers when she interviewed him for a job in the
early 1970s, wields one of the most conservative gavels on the Texas
bench. He said he has attended several antiabortion dinners with Miers
and noted that she has always tithed to the Valley View Christian
Church in Dallas, where antiabortion literature is sometimes
distributed and tapes from the conservative group Focus on the Family
are screened...
At the White House, Miers is one of the few members of the inner
sanctum with ready access to the president. She is known for her
extended workdays, sometimes as long as 16 hours. "She's the first in,
last out," said Reginald Brown, a former associate White House counsel
to Bush. Brown said that within the White House, Miers served as "the
custodian of the president's values," making sure policy decisions
were in line with Bush's agenda...
The Rev. Barry McCarty, pastor at Valley View, described her as a
born-again Christian who was baptized as an adult. When she has
returned to Valley View, she has often greeted well-wishers before and
after services and asked them to pray for her and the president.
<< SNIP
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Does Miers pray to Bush?
Has she swallowed "the most brilliant man" in the world?
Miers' epipath when she croaks: "I wish I could have worked longer
hours"
Excellent spell-checker nominated to Supreme Court...
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