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Rove Guided Career of Judicial Nominee in Filibuster Fight


— May 15, 2005

Karl Rove: He’s like Newman from “Seinfeld” (except that, unfortunately, he’s effective):

Justice Priscilla R. Owen of the Texas Supreme Court declined a chance to be the court’s first female chief justice last year so she could remain one of President Bush’s nominees to a federal appeals court, Texas lawyers and political figures said in recent interviews.

The decision was one of three crucial moments in her judicial career in which she seemed to have been guided by the hand of Karl Rove, Mr. Bush’s chief political strategist. . . .

[J]ustice Owen was, by all accounts, a respected but little-known lawyer in Houston in 1994 when she was first elected to the State Supreme Court with Mr. Rove’s support and tutelage. Her experience up to then largely involved obscure legal cases involving pipelines and federal energy regulations.

At the time, Mr. Rove was helping to make over the Texas Supreme Court from a bench populated by Democrats widely viewed as favorable to the plaintiffs’ bar – the lawyers who sue companies – to the business-friendly Republican stronghold it is today. . . .

[M]r. Rove, who had helped select her as the Republican candidate, helped raise more than $926,000 for her campaign, almost half from lawyers and others who had business before the court, according to Texans for Public Justice, a liberal group in Austin that tracks Texas campaign donations. Mr. Rove’s firm was paid some $247,000 in fees.

. . . almost half from lawyers and others who had business before the court . . .

I’m speechless. Where’s Ken Starr when you need him? Where are all the conservatives who had their panties knotted up over “whitewater” and “monicagate”? Want to see a stained blue dress? Take a look at what Karl Rove is wearing. He makes Spiro Agnew look like a fucking saint.

Details here from the New York Times.


Karl Rove: He’s like Newman from “Seinfeld” (except that, unfortunately, he’s effective):

Justice Priscilla R. Owen of the Texas Supreme Court declined a chance to be the court’s first female chief justice last year so she could remain one of President Bush’s nominees to a federal appeals court, Texas lawyers and political figures said in recent interviews.

The decision was one of three crucial moments in her judicial career in which she seemed to have been guided by the hand of Karl Rove, Mr. Bush’s chief political strategist. . . .

[J]ustice Owen was, by all accounts, a respected but little-known lawyer in Houston in 1994 when she was first elected to the State Supreme Court with Mr. Rove’s support and tutelage. Her experience up to then largely involved obscure legal cases involving pipelines and federal energy regulations.

At the time, Mr. Rove was helping to make over the Texas Supreme Court from a bench populated by Democrats widely viewed as favorable to the plaintiffs’ bar – the lawyers who sue companies – to the business-friendly Republican stronghold it is today. . . .

[M]r. Rove, who had helped select her as the Republican candidate, helped raise more than $926,000 for her campaign, almost half from lawyers and others who had business before the court, according to Texans for Public Justice, a liberal group in Austin that tracks Texas campaign donations. Mr. Rove’s firm was paid some $247,000 in fees.

. . . almost half from lawyers and others who had business before the court . . .

I’m speechless. Where’s Ken Starr when you need him? Where are all the conservatives who had their panties knotted up over “whitewater” and “monicagate”? Want to see a stained blue dress? Take a look at what Karl Rove is wearing. He makes Spiro Agnew look like a fucking saint.

Details here from the New York Times.

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