Well, the gloves are coming off everywhere lately. First it was Jay Rockefeller saying about Bush:
"I don’t think he understands the world," Mr. Rockefeller said. "I don’t think he’s particularly curious about the world. I don’t think he reads like he says he does."
He added, "Every time he’s read something he tells you about it, I think."
Today, Chuck Hagel(R) got his shots in at Cheney as well.
Even though Vice President Dick Cheney says talk of resolutions undercuts the troops, Hagel said he would have welcomed similar congressional action when he was fighting in Vietnam.
"We're Article 1 of the Constitution," he said. "We are a co-equal branch of government. Are we not to participate? Are we not to say anything? Are we not to register our sense of where we're going in this country on foreign policy? Bottom line is this. Our young men and women and their families, these young men and women who are asked to fight and die deserve a policy worthy of those sacrifices."
Biden finally, was the bluntest of them all. In Washington talk, the following is basically accusing Cheney of being a blithering idiot. No matter what most of the democrats in Washington thought about Reagan for example, they were more diplomatic, and respected the office and the Presidency and felt that on some things they could work with him. Biden and others who are institutional in Washington must be pretty desperate to ignore the social niceties and lay it all out on the line.
On Sunday, Biden said despite the competing proposals, there was overwhelming bipartisan support in Congress against the war. He said Vice President Dick Cheney was absolutely wrong in suggesting that a resolution against the war would "embolden our enemy."
"Every single person out there that is of any consequence knows the vice president doesn't know what he's talking about. I can't be more blunt than that," Biden said. "He is yet to be right one single time on Iraq."
The gloves truly are off. Things have gotten so bad that "My distinguished colleague" is out. Saying that you have a constructive disagreement with the VP is gone. Things are really coming to a head now. Bush didn't listen to the voters in November, he doesn't care about the polls. He doesn't care what John Warner says, doesn't give a flip about what Jim Baker thinks, so now there is just blunt honesty.
A line has been crossed this week. Rockefeller began it by questioning Bush's intelligence, and Biden revealed the fact that Cheney was the Emperor behind the scenes jaybird naked. For those of us who were aware of these things for awhile it isn't news. What is news is that the level of desperation in official Washington about this administration gone amuck has reached such a high level, that they have taken the gloves away and started tossing anvils at the bastards.