Greg Palast reports that this is not the first time Harriet Miers fired investigators to protect her god, George W. Bush. In 1997, Ms. Miers was responsible for granting a contract to handle the Texas Lottery. Even though a winner (via bids) was already announced, Miers gave the multibillion dollar contract to GTech--- at the secret request of then Governor George W. Bush. G-Tech didn’t even submit a bid. In order to carry out this little deed, Miers fired the director of the Lottery who had discouraged GTech from bidding because of its history of corruption.
More below...
“Governor Bush thru [name withheld] made a deal with Ben Barnes not to rebid because Barnes could confirm that Bush had lied during the ‘94 campaign [for governor of Texas]. Bush was asked if his father … had helped him get in the National Guard. Bush said no he had not, but the fact is his dad call then-Lt. Gov. [Ben] Barnes ….”
It is worth reading the whole article at: http://www.gregpalast.com
The reason Miers knew why Bush desperately needed the bid to go to GTech was because of the successful cover-up of Bush’s family using its influence to get George W. out of the draft and Vietnam, and into the Texas Air National Guard.
Palast obtained this memo from the US attorney in Austin:
Looks like Ben Barnes more or less blackmailed Bush.
By using his influence to get and keep the lottery contract for GTech, Barnes picked up quite a nice fee: over $23 million. With those millions in his pocket, Barnes kept a happy and lucrative silence about his saving little George Bush from the draft.
This information was known to the US attorney in 1997, yet no action was taken because, according to Palast:
...they discovered that Barnes, a Democrat, had not only manipulated the system to get George Bush into the Texas Air Guard, Barnes did the same for the sons of Democratic big wigs including Congressman (later Senator) Lloyd Bentsen and Governor John Connolly.
Palast concludes:
In other words, control over a US Attorney and what is called their “prosecutorial discretion” is worth its weight in gold to politicians. They can provide protection for cronies and exact punishment on enemies. And no one knows that better than “Justice” Harriet Miers and her boss, fighter pilot George W. Bush.
I sent the link of Palast’s article to Senator Leahy, and asked that he issue a subpoena to Harriet Miers. Another case where loyalty and cronyism trumps the law.