THE CROWD MIERS RUNS WITH

USA Today had a background article on Miers and one name popped out at me: Merrie Spaeth. Here are all the Spaeth mentions:

Despite her high-profile career as a Dallas lawyer and a second career as a counselor to President Bush, the 60-year-old Supreme Court nominee keeps personal details to herself like the "Southern lady she is," says longtime friend Merrie Spaeth.

Miers also underwent a more gradual conversion, from Democrat to Republican. Spaeth, White House director of media relations in President Reagan's first term, arrived in Dallas in 1985 and founded a communications firm. She and Miers became friends and co-founders of what Spaeth's late husband, Tex Lazar, jokingly called the "pushy broads' club" — hard-charging professional women on the rise in male-dominated Dallas.

Miers, Spaeth says, was notable for never indulging in backbiting or humorous putdowns — unless she was the target. "I used to joke, 'Hey, you know all the legal precedents from the last century because that's when your clothes were designed,' " Spaeth says. "That kind of thing, she would laugh at."

Soon, Spaeth noted, Miers began to upgrade her wardrobe with "clothes that commanded respect."

I recalled that Spaeth has something to do with the Shifty Vets' smear campaign against Kerry but according to MediaMatters, she has other ties to the GOP:

Merrie Spaeth, a public relations executive who has "helped coordinate the efforts of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth," was married to the late Tex Lezar, who was Bush's running mate during the 1994 Texas gubernatorial race. (The governor and lieutenant governor are elected separately in Texas; Bush won and Lezar lost.) Spaeth has also said she is close friends with Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), who is one of Rove's top clients. [The New York Times, 8/20/04]


So, Meirs is deeply connected to the Texas GOP and that is one of the main reasons Bush nominated her.