Dana Lithwick at Slate.com talks about one of my pet peeves; intellectual dishonesty, and hypocrisy.
Senate Republicans roughing up Obama’s pick for his solicitor general, Elena Kagan, this afternoon on the Senate floor as they voted on her confirmation. She was confirmed by a vote of 61-31.
Now, this is in spite of the fact that every solicitor general since 1985- including Ken Starr– vouched for her credentials, and noted they supported her nomination. Sadly, Senate Republicans couldn’t follow that example. Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, in particular, just couldn’t stand the fact that Ms. Kagan didn’t provide enough information about her ideological views.
Funny that.
When then-Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito provided his wispy minimalist haikus in lieu of substantive answers, Specter was out on the ramparts defending him, insisting, “Alito went further than any previous judicial nominee in the thoroughness of his answers.”
I can’t stand this sort of cognitive dissonance. I don’t know if Senators are just so removed from real life they don’t get it anymore, if they’ve been playing the games in Washington for so long that this is what they’ve wrought on their integrity, or if they’re just jerks. But it’s completely unacceptable, and that’s bi-partisanly. I suppose that’s why I won’t be able to ever live in Washington, DC. Because then I’d read about the latest Congressional scandal- and then I’d be waaaaay too close to the source of things. You’d see me in the news, being hauled and charged for rectally-based assault with a shoe.
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