<$BlogRSDUrl$>

My personal musings about anything that gets on my radar screen--heavily dominated by politics.

2006-01-11

Holyfield vs. Tyson

Watching the spectacle that the Senate Dems decided to make out of themselves today, I was trying to think of an apt analogy. It was difficult, because it's difficult to think of another forum in public life in which one goes into an arena alone to battle in a means dictated by others.

But I think I have one.

Following their subdued performance Monday and Tuesday, one imagines more than a few Senators and staffers were called into "meetings" with Ralph Neas to be reminded whence their money flows. So today, we got a bit more fiesty of a performance.

Right up until they tried to bite his ear off.

For two rounds on Monday, a couple more on Tuesday, and a couple more today, the Dems tried to dance with the champ. They stuck and moved, jabbed and weaved, while he tirelessly danced around them and easily dismantled their defenses. Clearly, on an intellectual level they were not up to the task before them.

So they took a couple big swings. First Kennedy with the CAP follies--an attempted head butt headed off by the referee (Specter). And eventually an unmitigated smear campaign attempting to paint him as elitist and racist--a desperate clench punctuated by biting his ear off. Unfortunately for the Dems, Alito has proven to be too smart in the hearings, and his track record is too distinguished for them to make this stick.

But it doesn't change the wrongness of what they did. And that's why you get the reaction we saw from Alito's wife. I understand that reaction--my wife gets to a point where her anger needs a vent, and if she can't do it verbally, the tears flow. If it were my spouse sitting there having to endure the slurs, the lies, the insinuations, all of which I knew to be patently and baldly false, I think my anger would well up a bit, too. My guess is it would be wise for Leahy, Kennedy, and Schumer to avoid social outings at which the Alitos will be for a few years to come.

But wouldn't you love to be a fly on the wall for that meeting?
Posted by: Michael / 1/11/2006 11:47:00 PM

Weblog Commenting by HaloScan.com

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?