Elephants With Short Memories
Sorry for the hiaitus, but I´ve been on the road and offline. I was not terribly surprised, however, to learn how quickly George W. Bush got tired of the bipartisanship rap he dusted off and rehearsed several times last week. In case you missed it, Bush´s first official action after the November 7 debacle is apparently going to be to send up a big batch o´previously rejected conservative judicial nominees. Here´s how the Wall Street Journal summarized it:After calling for bipartisanship, President Bush surprised Senate Democrats with plans to renominate a controversial list of judges – some of whom may be unacceptable even to a few Republican senators. “It’s an unfortunate signal,” said one senior Democratic Senate aide.
The Senate Judiciary Committee has not received the nominations yet. As word spread about the nominations, however, the committee’s Republican Chairman Arlen Specter told reporters: “It is obvious they cannot move during the lame-duck session.” After January, he added, questions about the fate of the nominees should be “directed to someone else.”
The White House action is viewed largely as an effort to appease the party’s conservative base. An administration official says there will be a formal White House announcement on the renominations later today. The president is in Moscow, having left Washington last night.
Appease the party´s conservative base? Lord a´mighty, Bush is right where he was in the runup to the elections. This has to be the longest political learning curve in history.
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