The Mukasey nomination in jeopardy: Why appeasing Democrats gets you nowhere; Update: Bush defends Mukasey, Teddy Kennedy on the attack; Update: Democrat scalp-hunters salivate, Schumer “agitated”
Update 9:16pm Eastern. The Hill files a report tonight on the growing Democrat scalp-hunting party:
Opposition in the Senate to President Bush’s attorney general nominee continued to grow Thursday, and Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) signaled the Senate would not consider the nomination if it does not clear a crucial vote next week in the Judiciary Committee.
Sen. Edward Kennedy (Mass.), a senior Democrat on the committee, said he would oppose the choice of Michael Mukasey to succeed Alberto Gonzales. “This is a nomination I hoped to support,” Kennedy said on the floor Thursday.
Kennedy now joins three other Judiciary Committee Democrats — Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.), Dick Durbin (Ill.) and Joseph Biden (Del.) — who have announced their opposition to Mukasey. The nominee has seen his support evaporate after he declined to state whether he believes waterboarding constitutes torture, saying that he had not been briefed on U.S. interrogation techniques.
The Judiciary Committee meets next Tuesday to consider the nomination, which will need 10 votes to advance to the floor.
Kennedy’s opposition puts more pressure on Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) to decide whether to join the chorus of Democratic opposition or vote for Mukasey, whom he recommended and endorsed for the position. On Thursday, Schumer faced a barrage of questions about his intentions, but repeatedly refused to discuss how he will vote at the Nov. 6 Judiciary Committee meeting.“When I make a decision, I will let you know,” an agitated Schumer said. “I’m not going to have a public discussion on it.”
Update 3:00pm Eastern. Here are Bush’s remarks on the Mukasey nomination in Q&A this morning before a speech at the Heritage Foundation…
I’ve submitted a highly competent, smart, independent nominee in Judge Mukasey to the Senate. I am disappointed that the process is taking so long to get his name to the floor.
I believe that the questions he’s been asked are unfair; he’s not been read into a program — he has been asked to give opinions of a program or techniques of a program on which he has not been briefed. I will make the case — and I strongly believe this is true — that Judge Mukasey is not being treated fairly. He’s made the rounds on Capitol Hill, he’s answered questions, he’s been to hearings. I do thank the Senate for setting up what I hope will be an opportunity to move him out of Judiciary Committee to the floor on Tuesday. It is time to get his nomination to the floor so the Senate can vote him up or down.
Q Judge Mukasey is experienced in terrorism trials, he’s been around. Why is it wrong for him — or why will you not let him say whether he thinks that waterboarding is illegal torture?
THE PRESIDENT: He has not been read in — first of all, let me put this in perspective. The Congress did pass a law, the Detainee Detention Act [sic]*, that I signed into law. The techniques we use informed that law and members of the Senate and House — select members of the Senate and House, both parties, have been briefed on the law.
Secondly, he doesn’t know whether we use that technique or not. And thirdly, it doesn’t make any sense to tell an enemy what we’re doing. One of the fundamental questions that the American people have got to know is that in order to protect America, if we capture somebody who may have data about whether or not he’s going to — he is ordering an attack or there’s an impending attack or there’s a threat, we need to know that. And the techniques we use by highly trained professionals are within the law. That’s what’s important for America to know.
Q Mr. President, is legal liability in U.S. or foreign courts a concern when it comes to this issue of waterboarding and –
THE PRESIDENT: The main concern is, is that the American people must know that whatever techniques we use are within the law. And secondly, it doesn’t make any sense — unless, of course, you don’t think there’s an enemy that’s dangerous — it doesn’t make any sense to broadcast to the enemy what they ought to prepare for and not prepare for.
Q Are these concerns legitimate that are being raised, or is it playing politics?
THE PRESIDENT: I think it’s — I think this is — I’m just extremely disappointed that a good man with a good reputation, who has met with a lot of senators, his nomination is being held up. You can listen to the voices that are out there talking as to whether or not this is politics or not. My point is, is that it’s creating a — to have the Attorney General seat vacant for this long — there’s an Acting Attorney General, of course, but not to have a confirmed Attorney General is not good for the country.
Update 1:41pm Eastern. Rich Lowry says everything is “fine.”
Update 1:00pm Eastern. President Bush tries to salvage the Mukasey nomination. Teddy Kennedy–shocked, shocked, aren’t you–will announce his opposition. McCain and Grahamnesty will support it:
President Bush, seeking to salvage the embattled nomination of Michael Mukasey as attorney general, on Thursday defended the former judge’s refusal to say whether he considers waterboarding as illegal torture. But the nomination was headed for another setback in the Senate.
Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., planned to announce his opposition to Mukasey in a speech on the Senate floor.
On the upside for the administration, Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, announced they would support Bush’s nominee.
C-SPAN’s Mukasey resources page is here.
Andrew McCarthy on the waterboarding issue here.
***
Judge Michael Mukasey was supposed to be a “consensus” attorney general candidate. In September, he was touted as a “safe bet,” in part due to the supposedly warm feelings he engendered in rabid liberals Charles Schumer and Nan Aron.
Staunch conservative attorney and former solicitor general Ted Olson was reportedly passed up to avoid a long, bitter partisan fight. Paul Mirengoff rightly called it a “an act of preemptive surrender.”
So, what has offering a “consensus” candidate gotten the Republicans?
Nothing.
Nothing except, well, a long, bitter partisan fight. Just like I predicted.
The WaPo reports this morning:
Democratic support for attorney general nominee Michael B. Mukasey dwindled further yesterday over his refusal to comment on the legality of a harsh CIA interrogation technique, setting the stage for an unexpectedly close vote next week by the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin (Ill.) and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.) announced that they will join Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (Del.) in voting against Mukasey on the Judiciary panel, after the nominee said in a four-page letter to Senate Democrats that he does not know whether a type of simulated drowning called waterboarding constitutes illegal torture under U.S. law.
Other Democrats on the Judiciary panel have pointedly refused to disclose how they will vote during a special meeting to consider Mukasey’s nomination, which has been scheduled for Tuesday. Chairman Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) also declined to say whether he will allow the nomination go to the full Senate with a negative recommendation, which occurred with some past nominations.
White House officials said yesterday that they remain confident Mukasey will be confirmed, and Republicans again accused the Democrats of attempting to hold the nomination hostage to score political points. “No one is ready to declare it DOA,” White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.
The nomination has become a particularly thorny problem for Mukasey’s original Senate patron, Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.). He had suggested Mukasey as a consensus nominee to the White House and declared two weeks ago that he should be confirmed, but he was noncommittal yesterday.
“I’m reading the letter, I’m going over it,” Schumer told reporters. “That’s all I’m going to say.”
I repeat: With the nutroots-ifed Democrats, there’s no such thing as a “consensus candidate” and “safe bet.”
Will the Republicans ever learn?
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your right about that one bear, he just be da football at the moment ….
Because the issue is as much puffery as Kerry’s hobbies and marriage to the Ketchup Queen.
she looks more like a ketchup drag queen. ewwwwwww
Brownback is speaking now for Mukasey. shocka!
Brownback said, “right man, right time”
Geez, TB’s back at the podium for s-chip.
I need some superglue to re-attach my ears.
When I hear marriage act, I also picture the Clintons. What and act that is. Maybe they can win an oscar too.
Give em an Emmy those are for soap operas.
LOL, AJ.
H/T Rocketeer Blog
Snark this
Kennedy further said, “However, if, er, Mukasey were to state that he supports placing terrorists in the backseats of Oldsmobiles and actually driving them off bridges, instead of just simulating driving them off bridges, then he would, er, regain my, ah, support.”
Snark off/
Give em both a suppository while yer at it.
So full of it.
I just don’t get how schteppid some Americans are to the point of worshipping these cockatoos.
I wonder who a Rudy/Thompson White House would appoint as Attorney General.
Ahh yes, when we are scraping around in the ashes and trying to find something to eat that isn’t contaminated with radiation, or a place to wash our face and hands, a warm place to sleep, some of you bleeding heart, obviously delusional liberals will be wondering what happened? Saying to yourselves (if there are any of you left), we are an open minded society, why didn’t they talk to us before detonating that inhuman device? Surely they value life more than that, don’t they? NO dummies they don’t. They don’t give a flip about you and your liberal divel about this torture or that torture. Think outside the bun(s) where your heads seems to be much of the time.
Nancy San Francisco does not care about the American people. Not the children. Not the tax payers. Just her socialist agenda. Remember this congress, which she leads, has one of the worst approval ratings ever and they are STILL pushing their agenda. They have hijacked our country like terrorist hijack planes and they are hell bent on forcing it down into a blaze of socialism glory no matter what anybody else thinks or says.
The liberal minded chain of command in this war believes the rest of the world, and especially our enemies, think like we do and value what we do because, as their little kum ba yah liberal hymnal says, “we are all the same” and “it is a small world afterall”.
This will result in an inconceivably high butcher’s bill to be paid in the next 20 years of blood, gore (the red guts stuff), and treasure.
We are in the middle of a war the liberal chain of command doesn’t understand- Congress is a part of that chain.
I don’t think that our enemies will prevail. We are still a very top notch superpower with brains to defeat an 8th century enemy and our 21st century traitorous enemies within.
Whether the canaries in Congress grasp what we do or do not do to our captured enemies is not something they generally care about- because the only thing they care about is when our soldiers a) die; b) lose a limb; c) or break the law.
Protecting secrets for Americans they have confused with keeping secrets from Americans. Protecting the security of our Nation they have confused with having “good” relations with swine like the leaders of Fatah, HAMAS, Hezbollah, the House of Faud, Egypt, and the rest of the scum of the culturally retrograde Sunni, Shi”a, Arab, Persian cesspool that is called the Middle East.
This is the strategy of the 19th century crowned heads of Europe and it led to the First World War.
Traitors one and all.
For a full discussion of these boils who call themselves Americans, see Ralph Peters’ “Wars of Blood and Faith”.
Pelosi will perish as this geopolitical tsunami gains momentum on the Israel-Lebanon fault line.
Tick tock, cocked-locked-and ready to rock, no matter what Chuck Shumer thinks or says.
I think all this is just a show to cover up how well the surge is doing. Iraq? No bombings, no news. THe media will not report all the good coming out of Iraq because that egg on their face, well it just tastes so good, they keep ordering it up. They’ll have egg on their face again when Hillary ends up in the Big house and not the White House.
Pass the pepper.
Bear #114, direct hit, you sank their battle ship.
lol, What battleship?
Bear used the Iowa….
Iowa in full Glory
Kennedy is against water boarding? Wow. Could have knocked me over with a feather with that one. But I am sure he’d be OK with a technique using water where the person did not survive. Maybe if we changed the terminology from water boarding to “DDD” (Drinking, Driving and Drowning) he’d get more comfortable with it. Hell, he could even teach the class.
As to the question, “will the republicans ever learn”, I fear the answer is no.
Every time I see them try to deal with the democrats I get this Charles Shultz “Peanuts” flashback. Lucy promises to play nice, and promises that this time she’ll let Charlie Brown kick the football. And every time, good ole Charlie ends up on the ground.
It is no longer the Republican Party – the Party of Lincoln and Reagan. It is now the “Charlie Brown party”. Sad but true.
John, aj- there are alot of people in this country who know what we know about these Cheese Doodle Dhimmicrats. And I think there are those in Congress like Lieberman and Tancredo who are also keeping their eyes on the prize of victory.
Let’s build a flotilla of battleships to sink each and every liberal and Islamofascist cause.
Kennedy is clearly suffering from the advanced stages of the disease of alcoholism.
His corpulent face manifests the ravages of vitamin b deficiency. His flustered demeanor supports the thesis that his bile ducts are jammed, while his blood sugar is off the charts.
Kennedy’s liver is probably the size of a pontoon boat or an extra large canoe.
I feel for the stiff.
Ted cannot lower his face to write notes. If he tried all that lactic acid would cascade from his nose.
A diseased relic of a Camelot that never was.
He’s on his last round; politically that is.
Rick, from back here in the mailroom, just wanted to throw props your way regarding your comment on this topic…right on the money. It’s also worth pointing out that the whole torture/waterboarding issue is not necessarily a conservative vs. liberal thing. There are many conservatives of all stripes (politicians, military types, constitutional scholars, etc.) who are strongly opposed to waterboarding and all other forms of torture on the basis of various arguments made in this thread by Rusty and others.
On the AG confirmation process, the Dems opposing are acting like idiots. As an independent I have no dog in this fight per se, but I can’t believe how ridiculous the Dems have been. Mukasey is more than qualified and should be confirmed immediately. This sort of hyper-partisan activity is why many of us have no use for either party.
Man the cannons, Bear, I’ll grab the powder. We’ll cook up some Moo Hsu Pork to fling at them as well.
Hello Bear and AJ, I just posted a rant over at Newt.org as follows (sorry, didn’t have time to clean it up for typing errors)
Well Concepts, I’m feeling better today and have been biting my tongue since the Democrats’ debate the other night. We truly saw how weak Hillary is. At this point, I don’t see her even getting that long awaited walk to the throne. I have plenty of reasons to back this up but will limit it to three (China’s waking after all, and I’ve got to get my calls in before Hillary’s fundraisers tie up their lines). 1, Her denial to release the health care plans. Barak Obama scored with this “big time.” She’s running on this universal nightmare and if it’s such a good plan, why not release it for the people to take a peak to decide? Because even queen Hillary knows it’s a failure. One direction people should look at to see if Government healthcare is a good thing is FEMA! Now seriously, when a life is directly on the line, do people trust putting their life in the hands of a Government system stuck in red tape? If people fail to realize the danger, there is only one suggestion I can give them: Walk to the nearest fire extinguisher, grab the hammer next to it that reads “in case of emergency, break glass.” They should take the hammer and crack their head. It might revive their brain. 2, Where there is smoke, there is fire. That’s not Chow Mien being cooked up in the Chinese kitchens, rather it’s what I like to call “Moo Hsu Pork.” As the media is forced to do their jobs in covering the campaign finance scandals (plural for many reasons) more and more is being learned about the other donors from China Town. Well, let me re-phrase that, the more they are learning that some of the donors cannot be found, the more curious they get. And a pesky reporter is no fan of politicians with something to hide. Having displayed the most biased actions over the last 8 years, the American people will not buy “right wing media” B.S. this time around, which makes the fundraising scandals all the more likely to de-thrown the anointed queen. 3, Should the fundraising scandals not derail her train wreck waiting to happen campaign, then there was her gaffe over providing Illegal aliens with driver’s licenses. One would think she learned to drive from Patrick Kennedy cause she drove straight into a brick wall over that one. (I bet you thought I would use Teddy going over the bridge, but I’m saving that for later when I bash him for his comments over water boarding, after all, if anybody is the expert on drowning……) Did she simply forget that driving is a privilege and not a right? Even if it were a right, the fact that you are here illegal should disqualify the illegal alien. Hillary is offering the illegals representation without taxation, and taxation without representation to the majority of the American people on all sides of the political spectrum. I’ll save the rest of my rant for another rainy day but I bet these three reasons will be enough to calm our fears
I think we are missing the point on the “to torture or not” question.
Liberal? Conservative? What role did it play in WW2 when enemies were shot as they crawled out of their holes in surrender?
Take the fight to the enemy and kill them. This is what it will come to after all the fleas jump off the dog.
Fighting and killing will vanquish our enemies. Lawyering will get more of us killed than our enemies.
The debate doesn’t deal with the reality of the Islamic conflagration igniting the world.
Am I for torture or not? I’d have to say being shelled on a battlefield for 13 straight hours is probably worse than being waterboarded. Watching men die is probably worse than being waterboarded.
I believe that everything has its way. As does every man or woman fighting for their beliefs, land, their families, etc.
Some will be tortured. Some will fold for the damnedest reasons. But everybody does at some point. Everybody.
Who’s to say that any tool we can use judiciously should be outlawed based on philosophical principles that go out the window in hell-fire cataclysmic geopolitical situations.
Bottom line: no attacks on US soil. Iraq is turning around. Why take tools off the table and give our enemies psychological advantage? We don’t emulate their methods by waterboarding.
Sometimes the threat of something is better than the actual experience of it.
Why are we arguing about the virtue of our Nation while we sit back and allow a Dhimmicratic Speaker of the House to engage in treasonous behavior that is ABSOLUTELY IMMORAL?
Make waterboarding illegal if it warrants it. If no one has the stomach to risk precious political capital on taking such a stand then it behooves them to STFU.
John A: a keeper! Thanks!
My personal bottom line on this is.
Whatever works, period.
These people are killing us.
Waterboarding…. boo freaking hoo.
Tell me with a straight face the Dems really care.
Appoint Mukasey and enough with this pretense.
In #74 above I never said that we had gotten “actionable intelligence” from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. I just used him as an example of waterboarding working to break a terrorist. Have we gotten “actionable intellgence” via waterboarding? I believe that there are reports that we have, but hopefully our intelligence services are keeping most of what they have learned secret.
And then I said:
my point there was that the MSM says over and over:
“waterboarding works…but…this”
“waterboarding works…but…that”
“waterboarding works…but…the other thing”
But they couldn’t help but admit that it worked.
Aparently some commenters took me up on my challenge and then came back here and said “waterboarding works…but…something else.” Which is what I said that liberals do.
I really don’t understand the problem. The intelligence community is fighting to keep waterboarding as a tool in the fight against terrorism. Why would they do that if it didn’t work?
If I find that I have a tool that doesn’t work I throw it out, why wouldn’t they? Do liberals & the MSM think that our soldiers and intelligence operatives have a water fettish? If it didn’t work, why would they keep it?
Who is more qualified to make the judgement about weather or not waterboarding works? The intelligence community or the MSM? The people who act on the intelligence gained or the people who have to guess at what’s going on?
You wanna really get ‘em…put underwear on their head…. oooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhh the horrrrooorrr!!!
Oh, no sorry, that one was torture too.
Gimme a break!!!
Hey freebie, how about Miss Piggy underoos on their heads? Or Porky the pig? That should do the trick.
lol….
AND ITS FEEBIE…no R.
Crickey…that’s it…I am changing my stage name to Birtha or something.
(teasing) have a good night Ansell!
lol, I was waiting for that….
Oh!
and….
Go USC!!!
They don’t want Mulkasey because he didn’t believe the bs Abdel Rahman “The Blind Sheikh” was spewing about his First Amendment rights being violated when he was charged with “seditious conspiracy” (or something like that) : ) Here’s a link mentioning Mulkasey http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/terrorism.php?id=1385160
Remember boys and girls….we can’t tick off the Muslims ; )
talk about the back door! I thought we had been pretty civil about the coming clash of titans here in BerkaLand this weekend….2 has been teams, salvaging what’s left of their seasons.
You know, just two sorry as*holes that need each other! But no! Ya have to get in yer “Go USC” /smarmSARC off
I hope they do well aj. Feebz- my hope for Bear Fans is that the barbecue is worth writing home about!!!!! Foodeez rule, baby!
Give me the Blind Sheik’s coordinates. Please. And his fat lawyers while you are at it.
Sheesh.
Water boarding should be the least of anyone’s worries. Frankly, I am getting sick and tired of hearing the same whine about the humanity of it all.
For some inexplicable reason, our elected officials decided to unilaterally expand the Geneva Conventions, and to parties that are not even signatories, no less.
As they stand, the Geneva Conventions protect soldiers of a country when fighting in the uniform of that country. Those engaged in armed conflict who are not part of a particular nation’s armed forces are not covered. Those engaged in armed conflict who are not wearing the designated uniform of that country are not covered.
The “detainees” or prisoners we are pulling out of combat are neither fighting for a country nor in any uniform of a country. In short, they can be treated as spies and saboteurs, which have no rights under the Conventions. They can be summarily executed, or subjected to any available interrogation techniques.
As to what the rest of the world thinks, why should we care? The rest of the world is not the prime target in a global war. And as to the argument that we need to use caution due to the potential abuses our servicemen may be subjected to, that way of thinking borders on insane. Look at what our military and civilians are subject to now. The torture and mutilation of those soldiers captured during raids, decapitations and desecration of their corpses. I am sure our personnel would have been happy to have been boarded than sliced piece by piece while still alive.
While I do appreciate Senator McCain’s personal views on this, we are not talking about the type of torture (and it was torture) used on him.
I am all for humanely treating human beings. But these zealots we are facing bear not the remotest resemblance to anything human. Beheading others just because they are “infidels”. Blowing up civilians in the name of religion. Sitting down with a family to convince them to support your cause, and to emphasize the benefits, unveiling the special dish you have brought for the family – their cooked child on a plate.
We are facing an inhuman foe here. And in their culture and in their thoughts, every “humane” thing we do is viewed as a sign of weakness. Which only further emboldens them to engage in more heinous tactics.
Congress had the opportunity to declare techniques like water boarding as off limits. They refused to do so. And rightly so. Now, they are looking to offload their cowardice on someone who is only there to interpret the law, not make it. If they really cared about what the rest of the world thought, they should be red with embarrassment; because they look like the biggest bunch of cowardly, hypocritical fools to ever walk the earth.
The feebalator threw the first dart subtle but cause for action.
Jim m
If I was a girl I’d marry you.
geez, now I know I’ve had to much chocolate, I mentioned the M word.
more vitamin b dude
Sorry, Feebie. I’ve been under the weather, and really putting out junk and typos.
Da Bears.
Hope ya feel better john but your lucky you wernt standing close I hear venom shoots out of her eyes.
LOL.
Kennedy will be the ultimate measure of all Senatorial Stupidity. In the future, if we have one, people will say, ‘Is he dumb as Kennedy?’. And the audience will laugh.
What does an agitated Schumer do? Gnaw at the foundations of America faster?
My plan for handling the Mukassey confirmation hearing. In the debate leading up to his confirmation I would have the Sgt-At-Arms of the Senate deliver a message to the whoever is holding the gavel. On the message would be this.
We have detained a suspected Al-Queda member. Doing his initial contact with our forces he claimed that we were too late. At least a dozen bombs had been planted at various places around the USA, including at least 4 residences of members of congress as well various malls, stores and other public places around the country. The bombs are all set to explode in 4 hours. At this time we do not know the locations or the veracity of the claim.
We can imagine the actions of the congress. They would no doubt go into recess, pull out their phones call their families to get them out of the house and no doubt leave the rest of us ignorant of the threat and left to fend for ourselves.
At this point I would ask them can we waterboard the suspect. Let’s see how sincere their “moral authority” is then. If they did the above imagine the inevitable investigation when the question “What did you know and when did you know it” comes up. How many regular Americans would they be willing to sacrifice to maintain their moral high ground?
Folks when it comes to any sympathy towards the Islamo-fascists cult followers I would hand people a dictionary and tell them to look it up. It is right between shit and syphillis.
Right! So why get someone who might be “middle of the road” and deal with this crud? Her Mr. President, get someone real conservative and show the people – once again – how the dimocraps are not willing to work with the you. It should get their numbers in the sub-ten range and the Presidents back over forty.