Hearings

... watching Secretary of State Clinton's testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which, ever since the suffocating ascendancy of Republican opportunism, is better known as the Senate Domestic Politics Committee.

What insufferable conceit from the committee's "conservative" side. In every such demagogic instance we are reminded that had 9/11 occurred under the reign of President Gore, impeachment would have almost certainly ensued; conviction, too, quite probably--and doubtless all Democrats, forevermore, would have been draped and drenched in yet another of the GOP's bloody shirts.

***

So much for the Senate's routine farce. Next up, this afternoon, is the extraordinary farce of the House.

I just started to remark that any Republican pol with any genetic pull toward human decency would quit this contemptibility of a party. But that's preposterous. For "any Republican pol with any genetic pull toward human decency" is a self-negating phrase, since any such he or she would have quit the GOP years ago, hence there would be no humanly decent Republican left to quit.

Comments

[AnneJ]

Just listened to a replay of Rand Paul acting like the condescending man talking down to a woman. That little punk has no business in such high level of government. He has no interest in getting down to business to really find out what happened, it was all about him saying "Look at me! Look at me! I'm badgering the Mighty Hillary! Ain't I some hot shit?!" Now I'm enduring the bitterness of John McCain which seems to ooze out of every pore since he lost in 2008. These guys don't care about what happened in Lybia let alone trying to make the situation any better over there for the people there. They are so transparently just trying to push their own agenda and grand stand for their base and maybe it's because of where I'm at in my cycle right now but I feel like slapping some of them. (Apologies for the angry outburst)

[japa21]

Up until 6 months ago I naively believed that the GOP has some men or women with real integrity and the willingness to speak out against the radical rhetoric spewed not just from the RW pundits and radio folks, but also from other members of Congress.

I believed that there was a William Proxmire in their ranks somewhere. I was wrong.

[Turgidson]

I didn't get a chance to watch any of the hearing, but the twitter machine seems to be largely in agreement that Hillary handled herself fine and the GOP acted like petulent children.

Sorry gents, sounds like you did nothing to damage Hillary's 2016 standing (if she wants it).

[Robert Lipscomb]

And they have not hit bottom yet.

They are just beginning to internalize the extent of their recent losses. Throughout the campaign and continuing in the inaugural address, Obama is forcefully repudiating all the tenets of Reaganism - to much applause.

The jiggering of voting systems are subconscious admissions that cannot win on the merits of their philosophies and dogmas. Once that reaches their conscious mind, they will realize that not only have they lost power, they will not be regaining it any time soon.

But before that acceptance stage of their grief and loss process, we must endure the stage of anger.

[sueme]

I hope Hillary reminds them that this Congress cut funding for embassy security world-wide....and I'm with you AnneJ, Just want to slap the smirks off their silly right-wing faces!

[Peter G]

In the interest of accuracy in speech, why are these called hearings and not demagogings?

[Jim Milstein]

Well, I'm not a pol, but I am a proud Republican. How can anyone be, you ask. I'm a fundamentalist Republican, harking back to our party's early principles, the principles of the primitive party.

We oppose the expansion of the Slave Power (yes, that still matters!). We want to complete the stalled Reconstruction of the South (with special attention to Texas). We favor high-speed rail. The Trans-Continental Railroad was just phase one.

There's more, but I don't want to bore you.