What kind of partisan hack IS David Kirkpatrick, anyway. What the hell? Is this supposed to be a news report or a commentary. Geez louise. I'm so pissed.
The reason why, after the fold.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
Kerry Urges Alito Filibuster, but His Reception Is Cool
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
Published: January 27, 2006
WASHINGTON, Jan 26 -- Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts could not attend the Senate debate on the Supreme Court nomination of Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. on Thursday. He was in Davos, Switzerland, mingling with international business and political leaders at the World Economic Forum.
But late Thursday afternoon, Mr. Kerry began calling fellow Democratic senators in a quixotic, last-minute effort for a filibuster to stop the nomination.
Democrats cringed and Republicans jeered at the awkwardness of his gesture, which almost no one in the Senate expects to succeed.
"God bless John Kerry," said Don Stewart, a spokesman for Senator John Cornyn, a Texas Republican on the Judiciary Committee. "He just cinched this whole nomination. With Senator Kerry, it is Christmas every day."
Steve Schmidt, a White House spokesman working on the nomination, said Mr. Kerry's move "says a lot less about Alito than it does about the Iowa primary in 2008," suggesting that Mr. Kerry, who lost the presidential race in 2004, was playing to his party's liberal base in a bid to recapture its nomination.
Senator Harry Reid, the Democratic leader, sounded almost apologetic about Mr. Kerry's statements.
"No one can complain on this matter that there hasn't been sufficient time to talk about Judge Alito, pro and con," Mr. Reid said on the Senate floor. "I hope that this matter will be resolved without too much more talking."
This is the part that gets me. Kerry's been fighting for the fillibuster since Wednesday. His fellow Senators are mostly being wimpy about it. Keep your powder dry and all that.
Here. Read this:
And when the Democratic caucus met Wednesday to discuss the nomination, he gave an impassioned plea that the party should try to stage a filibuster even if it failed, people present said, speaking only if granted anonymity because the meeting was private. Some senators at the meeting said an unsuccessful filibuster would leave the party weakened for future battles.
Some said a messy and unsuccessful filibuster fight would distract from the Democratic focus on other issues like corruption in government and wiretapping by the Bush administration.
In the end the party leaders were not persuaded by Mr. Kerry's appeal.
So after that meeting he goes off to an economic conference, and this assclown makes it sound like he's at a cocktail party.
Hell, other Senators are there, I'm told. Nobody's making it sound like anyone else is jetsetting, and that anyone should apologize for their being there. And where is BUSH. Who did HE send this year. ANYONE of importance?
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Okay, rant mode off.
By the way, Kos got a mention in the article if you read it. Kirkpatrick quoted Kerry's diary here.
I'm going to go have a beer and calm down. Discuss.