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Saturday, Jul 4, 2009
Ed Morrisey put it simply:
Instead of appointing Ted Olson, the apparent first choice of the White House, Schumer pushed for Mukasey as a "consensus candidate" -- and won.
If the Democrats had left it at that, they could have claimed a significant victory over the White House. Instead, they engaged in a fruitless colloquy over whether waterboarding was illegal -- when Congress has the power to make it explicitly illegal at any time. Not only did that irony escape them, but towards the end of the debate, the White House announced that only three detainees had ever been waterboarded, and the practice was forbidden after 2003 in any case.
Leading Democrats demanded the withdrawal of Mukasey anyway. All of the Democratic presidential candidates insisted on it. The Bush administration made clear that the AG post would get filled in the recess if Mukasey didn't win confirmation, and likely by someone a lot less palatable than Mukasey. Schumer, who pushed Mukasey in the first place, had to find a wingman in Feinstein to get the Democrats out of the large hole in which he'd placed them.
Instead of looking like they control the appointment process, this exercise just confirms for the Democratic Party base that their Congress has assumed a mostly-supine position vis-a-vis George Bush. What an absurd piece of political theater. As Casey Stengel once said of the Mets, can't anyone in the Senate Democratic caucus play this game?
The Wasilla soap opera just gets weirder as Palin complains critics are "picking apart a good point guard"
The media outlet's use of Bush euphemisms sparks a much-needed debate on journalistic standards.
And so are his Fox News pals, who lambasted Sen. Al Franken's "stolen election"
An inflexible right wing is allowing the Golden State to drown in debt. But it's not alone
Thanks for sharing, Governor. Now please take a cue from Norm Coleman, and go away
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