Belated Thoughts On Senator Dick Durbin
For three days I have been blissfully unaware of anything except the gentle sound of waves lapping the beach on North Shore Oahu. Ignorance is indeed bliss....especially when my ignorance consists of being completely unaware of Senator Dick Durbin's existence.
Upon my return home this afternoon, imagine my dismay in learning that, not only does a Senator Dick Durbin actually exist, but that, like John Dean, he cannot seem to say what he "really means!"
What he actually did say on the Senate floor last Tuesday night was clearly designed to slam the Bush administration. Unfortunately, his aim was wide of the mark and he wound up beating up on the United States in general and the United States military in particular. By far, the best commentary on the matter I have read today is a letter written to the US Senate by former Senator Newt Gingrich, quoted in full at Powerline. (Homerun quote: Moreover, Senator Durbin equates the terrorist detainees at Guantanamo with the millions of innocent men, women, and children exterminated by the order of evil dictators. The fact that he did so as a high ranking member of the Senate on the Senate floor makes his comparison all the more shocking.)
While I believe that Durbin's misspoken words deserve every bit of criticism he has thus far received I cannot bring myself to agree with those who are calling for a vote of censure from his Senate colleagues. On the other hand, those who have failed to criticize his words deserve to be criticized as severely as he has been.
Although I do not find anything to laugh about in Senator Durbin's comparing US military interrogators with the Nazi SS, the Soviet KGB or Pol Pot's brutal, genocidal thugs, I do find one bit of related trivia to be at least mildly amusing.
According to Hugh Hewitt's quote from an article in the Chicago Tribune, since he became Senate Minority Whip, "(Durbin's) office budget has grown by almost $1.5 million, enabling him to hire a full-time speechwriter, two floor assistants and a third press secretary."
Let me see....Durbin gets a speechwriter and then delivers a speech which embarrasses both himself and his party, enrages the Republican opposition, slanders members of the US military during a time of war and is then happily and affirmingly quoted by Al Jazeera.
I'd hate to be Senator Dick Durbin's speechwriter.
Upon my return home this afternoon, imagine my dismay in learning that, not only does a Senator Dick Durbin actually exist, but that, like John Dean, he cannot seem to say what he "really means!"
What he actually did say on the Senate floor last Tuesday night was clearly designed to slam the Bush administration. Unfortunately, his aim was wide of the mark and he wound up beating up on the United States in general and the United States military in particular. By far, the best commentary on the matter I have read today is a letter written to the US Senate by former Senator Newt Gingrich, quoted in full at Powerline. (Homerun quote: Moreover, Senator Durbin equates the terrorist detainees at Guantanamo with the millions of innocent men, women, and children exterminated by the order of evil dictators. The fact that he did so as a high ranking member of the Senate on the Senate floor makes his comparison all the more shocking.)
While I believe that Durbin's misspoken words deserve every bit of criticism he has thus far received I cannot bring myself to agree with those who are calling for a vote of censure from his Senate colleagues. On the other hand, those who have failed to criticize his words deserve to be criticized as severely as he has been.
Although I do not find anything to laugh about in Senator Durbin's comparing US military interrogators with the Nazi SS, the Soviet KGB or Pol Pot's brutal, genocidal thugs, I do find one bit of related trivia to be at least mildly amusing.
According to Hugh Hewitt's quote from an article in the Chicago Tribune, since he became Senate Minority Whip, "(Durbin's) office budget has grown by almost $1.5 million, enabling him to hire a full-time speechwriter, two floor assistants and a third press secretary."
Let me see....Durbin gets a speechwriter and then delivers a speech which embarrasses both himself and his party, enrages the Republican opposition, slanders members of the US military during a time of war and is then happily and affirmingly quoted by Al Jazeera.
I'd hate to be Senator Dick Durbin's speechwriter.
posted by Bird of Paradise at 8:21 PM
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