mucktruck.jpg

Well, today's Supreme Court ruling was as depressing as it was unsurprising (hopefully the Democrats have learned A Very Valuable Lesson about the importance of Supreme Court nominees, but it's a little late now), and we're going to be haunted by the VT Va. Tech shootings for quite some time, but there has been some encouraging, or at least damaging-to-Republicans news.  Enjoy the feast of corruption, courtesy of the TPMiverse.

– Harry Reid tells Dubya to "Bring it on":

"Reid talked about a recent conversation he had with a retired general where they talked about the similarities between the current situation and Vietnam," the source relates. "He talked about how the President and Secretary of Defense [during Vietnam] knew that the war was lost but continued to press on at the cost of thousands of additional lives lost."

"The analogy to Vietnam appeared to touch a nerve with the President. He appeared a little sensitive to it," the source continued. "And he clearly didn't like to hear people in the room say that the war couldn't be won militarily."

More: "Reid made it clear to the President that he understood that the President and Vice President after the veto would come after him and Speaker Pelosi with everything they have. Reid said that he and Pelosi would respond just as aggressively…."

I wonder why Vietnam might be a sore spot for Dubya?

- Hardly surprising, but Democrats and suspected Democrats are not welcome anywhere in the Bush DoJ:

According to a group of anonymous Justice Department employees who've penned a letter to the House and Senate judiciary committees, all possible entry-level hires at the Justice Department are now being screened by the deputy attorney general's office.

(…) 

From The Politico:

(…)

[T]he career employees did some checking of their own. They reportedly detected a "common denominator" for "most of those" struck from the interview list: They had "interned for a Hill Democrat, clerked for a Democratic judge, worked for a 'liberal cause' or otherwise appeared to have 'liberal' leanings. Summa cum laude graduates at both Yale and Harvard were rejected for interviews."

Meanwhile, Regent University grads have no problem getting their foot in the DoJ's door.

Is this at all normal?  I skimmed through the comments under that post, and I didn't see anyone saying it's no big deal, Democratic DoJs never hire any Republicans either.

- Oh, and 50-year-old single guys aren't welcome either:

From The Las Vegas Review-Journal:

McNulty said he was concerned about Bogden, 50, getting a job outside government after 16 years at Justice and being able to care for his family.

When it was pointed out that Bogden was not married, McNulty withdrew his concern and the conversation ended after about 90 seconds, according to the account gathered by investigators….

Sampson couldn't say who had put Bogden on the list (even though he was the "keeper of the list") or why. He'd never looked at Bogden's performance, and neither did Alberto Gonzales. The only thing he can remember is that there was "a general feeling among senior staffers at the Justice Department that a 'stronger leader' could be put in Nevada." So he was fired. And then the Justice Department told Congress that he'd been fired for "performance" reasons.

I'm wondering if the idea of a 50-year-old guy who wasn't married triggered McNulty's gaydar or something.

- I'm sure we're all very surprised that the RNC has chosen the White House over the Judiciary Committee in the e-mail tug-of-war.  This was probably what they wanted/planned to do all along, they just needed the figleaf of an official WH request.  But if the WH can't prove that they have a right to decide which e-mails the Committee can see, then all this buys them is some extra time to prepare their spin.

- And of course, you already know about the raid on Doolittle, which was a very happy surprise.  IANAL, but I'm pretty sure it's usually bad news when the FBI raids your house (it's just his wife, honest! ).  I'm assuming that this would be at the direction of Carol Lam's replacement, Karen Hewitt?  Which I think would mean one of four possibilities:

1) The Bushies either overestimated Hewitt's pliability or underestimated her competence (Lam did hire her, though).

2) The Bushies were not trying to protect Doolittle when they fired Lam, and Hewitt is doing exactly what they expected of her (hey, it's possible).

3) The Bushies are sacrificing Doolittle to make it look like they weren't trying to protect him when they fired Lam.  In which case, they'd better be damn sure that there are no e-mails floating around that say otherwise, or they've burned Doolittle for nothing.

4) Kevin Ring just spontaneously decided to sing, thus making it impossible to slow-walk the investigation.

Whatever the reason, I'm happy to see the investigation fired up again.  I just hope it doesn't turn out to be like Memogate, where falsifying one aspect nullifies everything else.

UPDATE: The RNC is trying to use "search terms" to limit the e-mails they release to Congress.  Marcy observes that they are full of crap. (h/t to snowbird42 in the comments)

Related posts:

  1. Hey, Harry Reid, Stop Protecting Democrats Who Want to Filibuster the Public Option
  2. Late Night: Republicans to Re-Enact Famous Death Scene From “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” on the Floor of the House
  3. “Holy Jeez”
  4. Washington Post: Rove More Involved in US Attorney Firings Than He Claims
  5. Sunday Late Night: Your NN2010 Host, Harry Reid