I don’t want to belabor yesterday’s closed session controversy, but there’s one part of the Republicans’ response that warrants follow-up. As GOP senators rushed to microphones yesterday, most of them purple with rage, the buzz word was “unprecedented.” Harry Reid was closing the Senate without having notified Republicans in advance, which as they explained it, […]
In light of the Scooter Libby indictment, and its description of Karl Rove’s involvement in the Plame leak, Senate Dems called (again) for Rove’s ouster and reminded everyone of Bush’s stated commitment to fire anyone involved with the leak. Yesterday, however, a Senate Republican joined the fun. You might be surprised which one. On MSNBC’s […]
As political theater went, Harry Reid’s closed session of the Senate yesterday was beautiful. Republicans complained that it was a stunt. Of course it was a stunt; it was an effective one at that. Dems had a legitimate complaint, they waited patiently, and Republicans assumed Dems had neither the means nor the courage to do […]
Now here’s something we don’t see everyday. Harry Reid has brought the Senate into a “closed session.” This is a pretty unusual maneauver, and it’s apparently made Bill Frist extremely annoyed. So what’s the point of all this? Reid wants the Senate to discuss intelligence failures with regard to the war in Iraq. But what’s […]
Seven years ago, Ken Starr prepared a lurid report for Congress detailing his case against Bill Clinton. At first blush, it wouldn’t appear to have any relevance to the Plame scandal affecting the Bush White House, but I was reviewing the Starr report recently and something jumped out at me. After he laid out the […]
I’ll admit, I’ve been feeling a little discouraged about Sam Alito’s Supreme Court nomination. To defeat him on the Senate floor, Dems would need to keep the caucus together (no easy task) and peel off six Republican votes. I’m counting moderate GOP heads and I’m nowhere near six. To defeat him via filibuster, Dems would […]
Scooter Libby resigned immediately upon learning about his indictment, creating an opening for a powerful job in Dick Cheney’s office. Who Cheney tapped would offer us some indication about how he plans to proceed in the wake of this of this scandal. By naming David Addington as his new chief of staff, Cheney is speaking […]
After the first indictment against the Bush White House came down on Friday, there have been three national polls. None of them offer the Bush gang much in the way of encouragement. A new SurveyUSA poll asked about Scooter Libby’s perjury and his motivation for lying. A plurality said they believe “Libby lied to the […]
Today’s installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn’t generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers: * In Florida, Rep. Katherine Harris (R) is having considerable trouble rallying support for her Senate campaign fro national establishment Republicans. Harris, who announced her campaign after Karl Rove asked her not to, […]
It hasn’t come up in a while, but whatever happened to the discussion about SF 312? As you may recall, anyone who works for a presidential administration and needs clearance to receive classified materials has to sign something called Standard Form 312, which is a nondisclosure agreement for federal officials. In the context of Karl […]