This may have a bigger stink than anyone first imagined:

October 10, 2005
Endorsement of Nominee Draws Committee's Interest
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK

WASHINGTON, Oct. 9 - Senator Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who
is chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and several Democrats on the
committee said Sunday that they were considering calling the evangelical
conservative James C. Dobson to testify on what he has been told about
Harriet E. Miers, the president's Supreme Court nominee.

"If Dr. Dobson knows something that he shouldn't know or something that I
ought to know, I'm going to find out," Mr. Specter said Sunday in an
interview with George Stephanopoulos on the ABC News program "This Week."

In response to a later question, Mr. Specter added, "If there are back-room
assurances and if there are back-room deals and if there is something which
bears upon a precondition as to how a nominee is going to vote, I think
that's a matter that ought to be known by the Judiciary Committee and the
American people."

Mr. Dobson, the influential founder of the conservative evangelical group
Focus on the Family, has said he is supporting Ms. Miers's nomination in
part because of something he has been told but cannot divulge. He has not
disclosed the source of the information, but he has acknowledged speaking
with Karl Rove, President Bush's top political adviser, about the
president's pick before it was announced.

On his radio program last Wednesday, Mr. Dobson said, "When you know some of
the things that I know - that I probably shouldn't know - you will
understand why I have said, with fear and trepidation, that I believe
Harriet Miers will be a good justice." He added, in a reference to aborted
fetuses, "if I have made a mistake here, I will never forget the blood of
those babies that will die will be on my hands to some degree."

Dana Perino, a spokeswoman for the White House, said Sunday that Mr. Rove
did not provide Mr. Dobson "any insight into how Ms. Miers may rule on any
particular case." But the attention to the private reasons for Mr. Dobson's
endorsement underscores the delicate problem the White House faces in trying
to quell conservative dissatisfaction with Ms. Miers without arousing the
ire of liberals or, for that matter, the handful of Senate Republicans like
Mr. Specter who support abortion rights.

Even as liberal groups were raising questions last week about Mr. Dobson's
sources, the White House put him on a conference call with conservative
activists around the country to try to reassure them that Ms. Miers shared
their views of the law.

Senator Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary
Committee, said Sunday on the same program as Mr. Specter that he, too,
would consider calling Mr. Dobson to testify. Senator Charles E. Schumer of
New York, another Democrat on the committee, said in an interview on the CBS
News program "Face the Nation" that he already believed the committee should
call Mr. Dobson as a witness. "This is not a game of wink and whisper," Mr.
Schumer said. "This is serious business."

Senator Richard J. Durbin, an Illinois Democrat on the committee, said
Sunday on the CNN program "Late Edition" that the possibility that the White
House might have given "inside information" about Ms. Miers to Mr. Dobson
was "reprehensible." Senator Ken Salazar, Democrat of Colorado, has called
on Mr. Dobson to disclose whatever he knows.

Mr. Dobson has not been invited by the Senate to testify and will wait to
respond until he does, his spokesman, Paul Hetrick, said Sunday.

Conservatives continued to debate over Ms. Miers's legal qualifications and
conservative credentials. Robert H. Bork, the former Supreme Court nominee
who is a hero to many on the right, said in an interview on MSNBC on Friday
that her nomination was "a disaster," and some conservative publications and
columnists are calling for her withdrawal or rejection.

But on CNN on Sunday, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican
whip, called her "an outstanding lawyer" and predicted, "at the end of the
day, the support in the Senate for Harriet Miers in the Republican
conference in the Senate is going to be rock solid."

On Fox News, Justice Nathan L. Hecht of the Texas Supreme Court, a friend of
Ms. Miers who has become her de facto spokesman, said there was "no chance
at all" that she would withdraw her nomination. Although he said he had not
heard it from her, he said, "it's outside the bounds of possibility."

* Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company