From Supreme Court nominee to the chopping block

April 21, 2006

How far will [tag]White House[/tag] Chief of Staff [tag]Josh Bolten[/tag] go in adjusting [tag]Bush[/tag]’s staff? Far enough to take a good, long look at [tag]Harriet Miers[/tag].

Joshua B. Bolten, the new White House chief of staff, has raised the possibility of moving [tag]Harriet E. Miers[/tag] from her job as President Bush’s counsel as part of a continuing shake-up of the [tag]West Wing[/tag], an influential [tag]Republican[/tag] with close ties to Mr. Bolten said Thursday.

The Republican, who was granted anonymity to talk openly about sensitive internal White House deliberations, said that Mr. Bolten had floated the idea among confidants, but that it was unclear whether he would follow through or if the move would be acceptable to Mr. Bush, who has a longtime personal bond with Ms. [tag]Miers[/tag].

To date, Bolten’s staff changes haven’t amounted to much, but sending Miers packing would be a rather bold step.

Not incidentally, it would also be very difficult to spin. Last fall, the president believed Harriet Miers was such a spectacular jurist, she was the most qualified person in the country to serve on the Supreme Court. Six months later, according to the NYT, the White House chief of staff believes Miers is “indecisive, a weak manager and slow in moving vital paperwork through the system.”

The NYT added that that Bush “has been unhappy and on edge about the staff changes.” If the president is feeling dour about a few subtle and substance-less personnel shifts, Bolten would really be pushing his luck by throwing Miers overboard.

My hunch is this won’t happen. Miers is too loyal to Bush and her dismissal would be too embarrassing for the White House. Instead, Bolten probably leaked this to the NYT so she’d consider “spending more time with her family.”

Bush needs his ‘office wives’ like a boy needs his mommys. He’d be lost without them, and he knows it. Harriet’s weakness also means she, like so many others on the staff, are no threat to George’s limited grasp of reality which is a real plus in his eyes. She does her job very well: she dotes on him, agrees with everything he says and facilitates anything he wants to do. From his perspective, she’s perfect!

Same with our Attorney General, but that’s a rant for another day.

He knows that anyone Bolten brings in will be stronger and more professional, so the risk that he might hear disagreeable words would be high and that is not something he would welcome gladly.

And frankly it wouldn’t matter who is speaking, he’ll still do the same things in the same way he’s always done, he just won’t enjoy it as much. Phooey.

  • I agree with Curmudgeon. If Miers goes, what “work spouse” does he have left? Rice and Hughes are both at State. Unless he’s opt for a same-sex work spouse… no, probably not.

    The question is, is Miers loyal enough to resign? Would Bush even accept her resignation?

    Once again, though, we shouldn’t be discussing this too much. The White House wants us to focus on this staff “overhaul” in order to distract us from the real issues. The Rove/McClellan story was dominant for a day or so, and now there’s this… and there’ll be more. Thankfully, the realities on the ground in Iraq, or in Iran’s nuclear labs, are too significant to be overshadowed entirely by this latest wag-the-dog strategy.

  • Ok, so Miers leaves, she gets replaced. Replacement then tells the Decider bad news or disagrees or something that ruffles the Royal Feathers. Now the Replacement is fired or, like John Snow, is ignored and shunted aside until the Replace quits.

    Rinse, repeat. The revolving door of assistants will spin so fast that the DC summer won’t be able to keep up and they’ll need to open the windows to warm the place up…

  • If Bolten leaked this on his own initiative, he may be treading on some very thin ice here. Unless of couse, Bush agreed to it in private.

    Either way, gotta believe Harriet is very much chagrined at this turn of events.

  • Well, this is interesting. Bush always traded on his loyalty to staff who are loyal toward him. Loyalty was the glue that held the bubble together.

    But if he allows Bolten to churn his staff then what incentive is there to, oh, not leak a few damaging things to the press? And what incentive is there for anyone with any sense to agree to work for the Bush administration when he can’t be counted on any longer to protect his own? I guess Bush had no choice, but I predict that formerly loyal staff are going to make sure he pays for it down the road.

  • Funny.

    I still like that editorial letter that was in the form of a White House letter replacing the twins with Chelsea Clinton.

  • Following up on knobboy’s comment — couldn’t this be a leak by someone seeking to get Bolten in trouble?

    Then again, I think it’s painfully true that going after an intellectual/policy flyweight like Miers represents “an insight into the scale of his ambitions for overhauling the White House staff,” as the NYT story says.

    Good thing there’s no on in a Cabinet-level (or higher) position who needs replacing, huh?

  • Dumping Miers might be precieved as a sop to the ‘Competence’ conservatives who opposed her nomination to the Supreme Court. I think George Will should write them and explain that it would have no such effect.

    If she is not doing the ‘formal’ duties of her position, I can see why Bolton would want to remove her. But as others here have written, her job as Chief Sycophant to the President is her really responsibility. After all, W.’s ego would implode and he wouldn’t be able to tell PhDs that he is better than them if it weren’t constantly inflated by the hot air coming out of Miers and like lackies.

  • What difference does any of it make, anyway? Cheney and Rove are running the show.

    Might as well keep Miers there is she keeps Bush in his ‘happy place.’ I would have thought that would be Job One for Bolton — keep Bush from imploding while the destruction of America continues unabated.

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