{"id":5331,"date":"2005-10-03T19:33:46","date_gmt":"2005-10-04T02:33:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/proteinwisdom.com\/?p=5331"},"modified":"2005-10-03T19:33:46","modified_gmt":"2005-10-04T02:33:46","slug":"revisioning-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/proteinwisdom.com\/?p=5331","title":{"rendered":"Revisioning History?"},"content":{"rendered":"

John Resnick emails me a reprint of a Dallas News profile <\/a>on Miers from 1991 (login required).  A bit:<\/p>\n

\n

The answer is elusive. For Harriet Miers essentially is a shy person with a protective layer of quiet, unassuming reserve.\n<\/p>\n

\nOver time, she also has developed a lawyerly caginess that enables her to play her cards—personal, political and professional—very close to the vest. She weighs her words judiciously, seldom allowing an incautious phrase to escape.\n<\/p>\n

\n“People who see Harriet as a litigator don’t see her tender, personal side,” says Nathan Hecht, a Texas Supreme Court judge and a close friend. “And family and friends don’t see her going into the courtroom to duke it out.”\n<\/p>\n

\nThe vast difference in perception is most marked when Ms. Miers’ council career is the subject.\n<\/p>\n

\n“I know her less today than I did the day after she was elected (in 1989),” says Jerry Bartos, a City Council colleague who frequently has been Ms. Miers’ opponent. “I’d say she is the consummate loner.”\n<\/p>\n

\n“She’s independent. She’s a thinker, not a clone,” counters council member Al Lipscomb, who also has had run-ins with Ms. Miers.\n<\/p>\n

\n“She’s a very independent thinker,” echoes Mayor Annette Strauss. But, in acknowledging Ms. Miers’ “loner” status, the mayor gives a Zen-like answer: “It is difficult—because the right answer is not right for everybody.”\n<\/p>\n

\nFor Harriet Miers in particular, two years in political office seemed to hold few right answers. She regards her council service, as she does most things in life, as an educational experience. But she admits it’s been frustrating.\n<\/p>\n

\n“The most disappointing aspect about being in public office has been observing the impact of politics,” she says. “You see decisions that are more political than what I might view as the right result.”\n<\/p>\n

\nMs. Miers, 45, gives the impression she might have been happier if the City Council had worked more like a courtroom. She is most comfortable within the legal system, within its codified precedents and presentations of fact-based logic.\n<\/p>\n

\nBut on Dallas’ City Council there were, as she puts it, “Eleven different people with 11 different agendas.” Personalities clashed, and questions of fact and logic often surrendered to raw emotion and ego.\n<\/p>\n

\nAs an at-large representative, Ms. Miers says, “I’m committed to make decisions based on the facts of the particular issue, and what I believe is in the best interest of the city.” She pauses, firmly setting her small, square jaw: “Not one part of the city, but the entire city.” <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nThis profile seems to suggest that, in 1991, at least, Miers found politics almost distasteful, and brought a judicial temperament to bear on her political work, which she found wasn’t always easy.\n<\/p>\n

\nA nod in her favor if that same ideology holds today, it seems to me—and provided we can be assured her thinking is rigorous, and that her judicial philosophy is in line <\/a>with the constructionist philosophy Bush has suggested (but never promised) his nominees will hold (which is hardly manifest<\/a>, in this case).\n<\/p>\n

\nHer hearings, then, will prove crucial to conservatives—if only that they’ll give us some insight into how her mind works.\n<\/p>\n

\nIn the meantime, though, we’re likely to continue to read things like this, from NRO’s Rick Brookhiser:<\/a> “The Good News on Miers:  It’s not as bad as Caligula putting his horse in the Senate.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

John Resnick emails me a reprint of a Dallas News profile on Miers from 1991 (login required).  A bit: The answer is elusive. For Harriet Miers essentially is a shy person with a protective layer of quiet, unassuming reserve. Over time, she also has developed a lawyerly caginess that enables her to play her cards—personal, political and professional—very close to the vest. She weighs her words judiciously, seldom allowing an<\/p>\n

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