Senselessbrenner
There was some buzz late on Friday about Rep. Jim "Fat Bastard" Sensenbrenner's (R-WI) behavior during a hearing on the Patriot Act, so I got up early this morning and watched the whole damned thing on CSPAN.
If there is a God, I want to thank Her for CSPAN, by the way. Where else can you watch Fat Doughy Special Interest Cocksuckers Behaving Badly?
Sensenbrenner acted as if the entire proceeding was a waste of his oh-so-valuable time, and showed it by his demeanor and his rigid adherence to the time limits (even to violating etiquette and cutting off witnesses in mid-sentence). Finally he made a statement to the effect that none of the witnesses had managed to show a link between what they were saying and the Patriot Act, gaveled the meeting closed, and he and the other Republicans on the committee walked out.
The Democrats tried to carry on with the meeting, but there were a few moments when you couldn't hear them (committee staffers had shut off the microphones). All in all, a very bad display of behavior on the part of Rep. Sensenbrenner. I'm just glad he's not from MY state - and I feel sorry for those people from Cheeseland that he does represent.
Rep. Jackson-Lee referred to what one witness referred to as "legal black holes," generated by the Patriot Act, the Gonzales Memos ( you remember - the ones that said that torture was okay) and other weirdness. She pointed out (correctly, in my opinion) that the Committee Chairman's actions were indicative of what we're seeing out of Washington these days - the desire to shut out any whiff of dissent, or any hint that what they are doing Just Might Be Wrong.
Amnesty International's Pitts was there as a witness, and several of the GOP (notably Coble of North Carolina) called in the clans on him for the "American Gulag" characterization of our prison camp at Gitmo. Well, maybe it IS, in fact, an unfair characterization, but the use of the term, I think, was deliberate: It's easy to pronounce, and at two syllables it's catchy - attention-deficit Americans can remember it better.
A better characterization would be to equate Guantanamo and the Patriot Act to the German Nacht und Nebel Erlass in the 30s and 40s. Anyone who was considered a possible enemy of the state just disappeared "into night and fog."
Or, as Rep. Jackson-Lee pointed out, a legal black hole.
If there is a God, I want to thank Her for CSPAN, by the way. Where else can you watch Fat Doughy Special Interest Cocksuckers Behaving Badly?
Sensenbrenner acted as if the entire proceeding was a waste of his oh-so-valuable time, and showed it by his demeanor and his rigid adherence to the time limits (even to violating etiquette and cutting off witnesses in mid-sentence). Finally he made a statement to the effect that none of the witnesses had managed to show a link between what they were saying and the Patriot Act, gaveled the meeting closed, and he and the other Republicans on the committee walked out.
The Democrats tried to carry on with the meeting, but there were a few moments when you couldn't hear them (committee staffers had shut off the microphones). All in all, a very bad display of behavior on the part of Rep. Sensenbrenner. I'm just glad he's not from MY state - and I feel sorry for those people from Cheeseland that he does represent.
Rep. Jackson-Lee referred to what one witness referred to as "legal black holes," generated by the Patriot Act, the Gonzales Memos ( you remember - the ones that said that torture was okay) and other weirdness. She pointed out (correctly, in my opinion) that the Committee Chairman's actions were indicative of what we're seeing out of Washington these days - the desire to shut out any whiff of dissent, or any hint that what they are doing Just Might Be Wrong.
Amnesty International's Pitts was there as a witness, and several of the GOP (notably Coble of North Carolina) called in the clans on him for the "American Gulag" characterization of our prison camp at Gitmo. Well, maybe it IS, in fact, an unfair characterization, but the use of the term, I think, was deliberate: It's easy to pronounce, and at two syllables it's catchy - attention-deficit Americans can remember it better.
A better characterization would be to equate Guantanamo and the Patriot Act to the German Nacht und Nebel Erlass in the 30s and 40s. Anyone who was considered a possible enemy of the state just disappeared "into night and fog."
Or, as Rep. Jackson-Lee pointed out, a legal black hole.
posted by Walt at 7:26 AM
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