Politics: Pryor Restraint
The vote on the nomination of Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor took an interesting turn yesterday. The committee met in Executive Session under a "two-hour" rule, which keeps them from staying around too long when the full Senate is in session. Anyhow, when they got to the nomination, several democrats, led by Chuck Schumer of NY, made the point that there was an ongoing investigation into serious charges of dubious fundraising by the Pryor-founded Republican Attorneys General Association. Schumer thought maybe they should finish the investigation before they voted on Pryor. Hatch accused the democrats of stalling, which is pretty ironic considering that the last time Hatch was chairman, the Republican blocked a full 35% of Clinton's nominees. Anyhow, Hatch was all pissed about it, and threw around some huffs. Senator John Cornyn, who is implicated in the scandal for his fund-raising efforts as a member of RAGA when he was Texas AG, accused the whistleblower of breaking the law, and took special care to undertake some serious character assassination. Finally, Hatch, in what turned out to be a face-saving maneuver, somewhat acquiesced and absurdly told the committee to complete its investigation over the next nine hours. Before they re-convened, the decision was apparently made to postpone the vote to Wednesday to accomodate ranking Democrat Pat Leahy's schedule.
Lobbying groups were pushing hardest on Pennsylvania Republican Arlen Specter, who claims to be pro-choice and anti church-state separation. He seemed get-able on Pryor. It seems that his right-wing primary opponent pushed him into shoring up in favor of Pryor. This may have been a trade-off for his defection on vouchers for DC.
Shouldn't a right-minded senator be able to vote his conscience, even if it pits him against his party's president? Apparently not. (Warning: pdf)
The vote on the nomination of Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor took an interesting turn yesterday. The committee met in Executive Session under a "two-hour" rule, which keeps them from staying around too long when the full Senate is in session. Anyhow, when they got to the nomination, several democrats, led by Chuck Schumer of NY, made the point that there was an ongoing investigation into serious charges of dubious fundraising by the Pryor-founded Republican Attorneys General Association. Schumer thought maybe they should finish the investigation before they voted on Pryor. Hatch accused the democrats of stalling, which is pretty ironic considering that the last time Hatch was chairman, the Republican blocked a full 35% of Clinton's nominees. Anyhow, Hatch was all pissed about it, and threw around some huffs. Senator John Cornyn, who is implicated in the scandal for his fund-raising efforts as a member of RAGA when he was Texas AG, accused the whistleblower of breaking the law, and took special care to undertake some serious character assassination. Finally, Hatch, in what turned out to be a face-saving maneuver, somewhat acquiesced and absurdly told the committee to complete its investigation over the next nine hours. Before they re-convened, the decision was apparently made to postpone the vote to Wednesday to accomodate ranking Democrat Pat Leahy's schedule.
Lobbying groups were pushing hardest on Pennsylvania Republican Arlen Specter, who claims to be pro-choice and anti church-state separation. He seemed get-able on Pryor. It seems that his right-wing primary opponent pushed him into shoring up in favor of Pryor. This may have been a trade-off for his defection on vouchers for DC.
Shouldn't a right-minded senator be able to vote his conscience, even if it pits him against his party's president? Apparently not. (Warning: pdf)
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