Senate Democrats still seem a little peeved about the fact that Republican staffers stole thousands of Judiciary Committee memos and leaked them to conservative news outlets. Dems believe the thefts are a criminal matter and should be investigated as such; the GOP believes this was just an incident from some over-eager staffers who can be disciplined in-house.
Sen. Rick “Man on Dog” Santorum (R-Pa) has his own take on the matter. He’s resisting calls for a criminal investigation, of course, but Santorum also believes he can intimidate Dems with a new approach.
“If we’re going to investigate it, we’re going to investigate it,” Santorum told The Hill. “We want to see all the Democratic memos. The facts that we are aware of show some fairly disgusting activities. They want a full-fledged investigation — bring it on.”
I’m pretty used to Santorum saying dumb things, but this is truly bizarre.
Republican staffers stole thousands of Dem documents. Dems think this warrants a criminal probe. To hear Santorum tell it, a criminal probe should offer the Republicans access to the other secret Dem documents that they didn’t get around to stealing in the first place.
This is silly, even by Santorum’s very low standards. It’s like saying the Watergate burglars should have had access to the files they didn’t steal as part of their criminal defense.
Of course, since this is Santorum, it won’t surprise you to know he wasn’t done there.
“If there’s anything criminal, it’s the behavior of the Democrats in trying to rig cases and work with outside groups,” Santorum insisted.
So, let me get this straight. Stealing documents, in Santorum’s mind, isn’t a big deal. Working with outside groups on legislative priorities — a practice that is as old as Congress itself — is, to hear Santorum tell it, “criminal.”
What’s truly “criminal” is that this fool has been elected twice to the U.S. Senate.