The fix is in

Follow up on my previous post:

How could Harriet Miers be allowed to face questioning by U.S. senators about a Texas lottery scandal sure to raise new questions about the sore subject of President Bush's National Guard service?

That is the question on the lips of many Washington insiders puzzled about the president's insistence on pushing forward with the nomination of Miers to the U.S. Supreme Court.

According to a reliable source close to the Texas lottery scandals, the answer might be that no senator would dare ask the tough questions.

Ben Barnes, the former Texas lieutenant governor and the man at the heart of the National Guard controversy, is pressuring Democratic senators to avoid any references to the lottery scandal because they would jeopardize Democratic Party officials as well as Bush, reports WND columnist Jerome Corsi.

In other words, says Corsi, "the fix is in."

"The corruption surrounding Texas lottery operator GTECH buying political influence in Texas was bi-partisan, reaching across from the administration of Texas Democratic Gov. Ann Richards into the administration of Texas Republican Gov. George W. Bush," he reports in a commentary today. "Texans who were named in the scandals of the 1990s are concerned that if the Senate Judiciary Committee does its job and subpoenas prominent players such as Larry Littwin, many will go to jail."

Littwin is the former director of the Texas lottery – the man fired after only five months on the job by the Miers-led lottery commission – who claims to have tried to clean up the corruption.

"An attempt is being made to convince Democratic senators that since Harriet Miers is the "best they are ever going to get" as a Supreme Court nominee from the Bush administration, they should "keep the lid on" and give Ms. Miers an easy time during her confirmation hearings," writes Corsi.