At the time of this post, Senator Feingold is conducting what for me has been the most substantive inquiry of the session. Feingold is a skilled questioner and has a serious but respectful demeanor. Alito is responding in a calm, candid and well reasoned fashion.
Nonetheless, Feingold was able to make the recusal issue an important one, not because the witness did anything unethical, but because he testified in his Circuit Court hearing that he would recuse if Vanguard was involved and did not do so.
While I do not think this rises to the level of a "extraordinary circumstance", it will give cover to at least some folks who want to vote no to do so.
That this struck some nerves was emphasized when Senator Hatch asked for 2 minutes out of order for some rehabilitative questions. As a trial lawyer, I do not think I would have done what Senator Hatch did, because it called attention to the fact that Feingold made a good point.
But for this little flap the hearing for Judge Alito has gone pretty well. He has politely, articulately, carefully, substantively and respectfully answered questions asked him.
He is passing my 5 a**h**** rule, and I believe he will be confirmed.
And he should be.
14 comments:
FWIW, I just saw this at the Washington Prowler. (AmSpec)
1. The White House is extremely happy with the proceedings in the Senate confirmation hearing of Judge Samuel Alito.
2. Democrats are not. They are so frustrated by their members' poor performance and inability to get traction that they have indicated a willingness to Chairman Specter to cancel a third day of questioning by members (the 20-minute followup question round) and go right to the panels.
Roger A:
From an earlier comment here:
"I am taking bets on two questions:
1. At the end of the hearings who will have the five highest a--h--- quotient among the questioning Senators?
2. Will Judge Alito come close in a--h--- quotient to any of those top five vote getters?
If the answer to 2 is no, he will be confirmed."
Buffoons 'R' Us is going to close early? What a disappointment. Think of the millions of kids sitting in American Government classrooms accross the nation whp will miss out on the sterling performances by Schumer, Kennedy et al ad nauseum. How will they be able to make informed decisions as to which party actually has members in Congress capable of dressing themselves without help unless they watch these hearings?
Hewitt said Feingold verged into disrespectful territory once and Alito bit for about 8 words before catching himself.
"I've been a Judge for 15 years..."
---
Hewitt sent Flowers to Slo Joe Biden.
Here are some Biden clips from radioblogger.com
There's more dialog there.
Text below is the non-sexist, non homophobic Biden describing how much he loved Princeton.
Today, for "Judge Alioto," he told him repeatedly he DIDN'T LIKE Princeton.
Hewitt sent him flowers in thanks.
Biden,uh,uh.mp3
SloJoeBidenPuzzled.mp3
BidenPrincetonWaffle.mp3
And so I had been pushing Princeton, and this
magnificently attractive, intellectually and physically, beautiful young girl,
was a sophomore, was showing us around, and I figured we've got a lock now.
My son is going to really be interested, and I know Senators aren't supposed to say things like that, but if he hadn't been interested, I would have been worried...
What's that line from Seinfeld?
Not that there's anything wrong with that?
Biden had half an hour today with Samuel Alito, and the judge's word count, according to John Podhoretz at the Corner, was about 72 words.
I don't really get the whole Vanguard thing.
I read that Vanguard was going to have to pay, the only question was who got paid.
But Alito did recuse himself anyway..was it a question of when?
She wasn't dead when he left, Peter.
She drowned later.
Radioblogger.com J Pod interview.
HH: Did you see Teddy Kennedy lie through his teeth?
JP: Of course it was...lied. Lied, like he knows.
Teddy Kennedy doesn't have a functioning brain cell left, as far as I can tell.
Who knows?
Some robot programmed him to open his fat mouth.
HH: But doesn't anyone oblige him to at least read factual statments, like you've never held for a person of color? I mean, that's just...I even had Erwin Chemerinsky admit that...
JP: Well, it would be nice if the chairman of the committee would say something about that. Of course, you know, Arlen Specter is even worse than he is in some ways.
HH: Do you see him being confirmed without any difficulty?
JP: Oh, yeah.
---
HH: A couple of e-mails, John, during the break.
The answer to Biden's question about the unidentified elephant in the room?
It's obvious it's Ted Kennedy.
With the movie hour in mind, here's a poll question.
Will the questioning by Senators Biden, Kennedy, Schumer, Leahy, etc., be more like
A) the bathroom scene in Dumb and Dumber?
B) the campfire scene in Blazing Saddles?
or C) the voice of the Nanny.
Et cetera, et cetera.
And then, tell J-Pod to stop holding back, and tell us what he really thinks about Teddy Kennedy. So...
JP: Blazing Saddles, I think. I'm going with the campfire scene of Blazing Saddles.
HH: It's a fine, fine...
JP: Not only...the smell was coming through the television.
I think we ought to see as many Dems as possible, at all times, speaking off the cuff, thinking out loud, holding forth on issues and the history of the Goldwater presidency.
We should start a fundraiser to finance a whole network for them, and just run the DC Dem Show, our Dem lawmakers, going about their business, 24/7.
Y'know, really get to know 'em, how they think, what their hobbies are, with whom they associate, what they read, watch on TV, eat, drink, smoke.
These folks want publicity, and we should give it to 'em--give, give, give.
Flowers for SloJo? Why not fertilizer, for his hair implants?
Maybe he'll replant the flowers in a nice row along that slightly nauseating barbie hairline.
He'd be prettier than his wildest plastic surgeon's dreams!
Then he could go get that college girl!
Read her some Whitman!
Probably get a copy of "Leaves of Grass" from President Bubba's Poontang Kit!
And have his staff erase Whitman off the cover and reprint it with "By ME, Senatur Joe!"
And send the Kinkos bill to you and me!
And if he gets in trouble, just BLAME BUSH!
No problem, when you're Senator-for-Life, with a staff of hundreds burning up millions of tax dollars to keep you...Senator for Life!
\:-D
Peter's Powerline link is great--liberals for Alito (bolding mine),
"The second of these gentleman is Professor J.W. Pottenger of Yale Law School. Professor Pottenger attended both Princeton and Yale Law School with Judge Alito, and participated on the same undergraduate debate team as Judge Alito. At Yale he is a clinical professor of law; he supervises students acting as attorneys in litigation and focuses on ethical issues in the practice of law. He has known Judge Alito for 35 years. He describes himself as a liberal, but has been provoked by the fraudulence of the ethics charge against Judge Alito to rise to his defense. He harshly criticized the attack on Judge Alito as akin to the merger of law and politics that he had observed in Communist China."
WOO-HOO, did Arlen Specter ever just slap down what Teddy-the-Swimmer thought was gonna be his Big Bork Moment redux.
Arlen, i luv ya, baby!
NYTimes has been thru 'em already, Arkmay, in November, the month that we stole the election from you whupped woosies.
Arlen may've messed up, but he still blew fire on yer hero, the Wet Guy, who went to frantic paper-shuffling with shaking hands for a half hour after getting his shut-up.
The test will be if The Breaststroker gets his subpoena--which the NR guy who owns the files says ain't even needed--all NeckBrace had to do was ask with his name, rather than the 'anonymous' he used so he could trumpet "they denied my request, I needs a SUBPOENA!".
Anyway, what are we hiring, a Marxist Propaganda Boy for the Sixties, or a Supreme Court Justice for 2005?
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