Strong Grounding

WaPo reported One evening in the 1980s, several years after Harriet Miers dedicated her life to Jesus Christ, she attended a lecture at her Dallas evangelical church with Nathan Hecht, a colleague at her law firm and her on-again, off-again boyfriend. The speaker was Paul Brand, a surgeon and the author of "Fearfully and Wonderfully Made," a best-selling exploration of God and the human body. When the lecture was over, Miers said words Hecht had never heard from her before. "I'm convinced that life begins at conception,"

Of course life begins at conception. The embryo begins growing, does it not? And for something organic to grow, it must be alive.

Hecht recalled her saying. According to Hecht, now a Texas Supreme Court justice, Miers has believed ever since that abortion is "taking a life." "I know she is pro-life," said Hecht, one of the most conservative judges in Texas. "She thinks that after conception, it's not a balancing act -- or if it is, it's a balancing of two equal lives."

Precisely

Hecht and other confidants of Miers all pledge that if the Senate confirms her nomination to the Supreme Court, her judicial values will be guided by the law and the Constitution. But they say her personal values have been shaped by her abiding faith in Jesus, and by her membership in the massive red-brick Valley View Christian Church, where she was baptized as an adult, served on the missions committee and taught religious classes. At Valley View, pastors preach that abortion is murder, that the Bible is the literal word of God and that homosexuality is a sin -- although they also preach that God loves everybody.

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino declined to comment on Hecht's recollection yesterday but said President Bush did not ask Miers her personal views on abortion or any other issue that may come before the court. "A nominee who shares the president's approach of judicial restraint would not allow personal views to affect his or her rulings based on the law," Perino said.

CQ blogged We need to put an end to this line of inquiry about Miers. If this is all we get in terms of evidence on which to support her candidacy, then the White House and the Miers cheerleaders need to acknowledge their error. Otherwise, we will hand the Schumers all the ammunition they need to keep evangelicals and Catholics off the Supreme Court for the next generation. Either come up with more substantial and appropriate evidence for supporting her nomination, preferably some exceptional scholarship or casework, or withdraw her nomination.

Betsy blogged I'm not one of these people who use abortion as my touchstone as how I feel about politicians or judicial nominees. I think it's a sorry state of affairs that we've come to when everything seems to resolve on this one issue. There are so many issues that the Supreme Court is involved in, and I happen to believe that they will never strike down Roe but just chip away at the edges.

AstuteBlogger has a poll. At the time I voted, there were 176 votes total

• BETTER than Roberts 78 votes 27% 47
• THE SAME as Roberts 78 votes 8% 14
• LESS THAN Roberts 78 votes, but will be confirmed 45% 80
• She will not be confirmed - and will get less than half of the GOP Senators 6% 10
• She will not be confirmed, but will get most of the GOP Senators 1% 2
• She will not get the endorsement of a majority Senate Judiociary Committee and will withdraw her name from nomination 13% 23