US Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) believes in "lowered thresholds"

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

Because DAMMIT, we can NEVER have enough Democratic Senators who are ready, willing and eager to give Bush "the benefit of the doubt."

Just roll over, Chuck. Just roll over. Let Bush have what he wants.

:grr:



http://schumer.senate.gov/

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html

For a while there, Alberto Gonzales' nomination to replace John Ashcroft as attorney general was surprisingly smooth for a lawyer with a dubious history of defending the rule of law. And by all indications, Gonzales will indeed survive the confirmation process. But with Gonzales' confirmation hearing just two days away, a growing and increasingly vocal opposition threatens to prompt actual debate about putting a guy like Gonzales in charge of the Justice Department.

The real question of the week, though, regarding the Gonzales matter, is how Senate Democrats will handle his confirmation hearing. Democrats may not have the votes in the new-and-even-more-GOP-dominated-Congress to stop Gonzales' confirmation, but will they at the very least put on a good show of opposition? Speaking to the New York Times this week, Chuck Schumer sounded unnervingly ready to accept Bush's choice of Gonzales and seemed to absolve Democrats of any real duty to oppose his confirmation on the grounds that Cabinet positions usually get less scrutiny than Supreme Court nominees: "Generally, for an executive branch position the president gets the benefit of the doubt," he said. "The general feeling on the committee is that he has probably met that lowered threshold." We have to agree with law professor and blogger Michael Froomkin, who took issue with Schumer's remark: "The bar is pretty low when that 'lowered threshold' will admit a nominee who, in commissioning and passing on the torture memos participated in a scheme to attempt to 1. put a patina of legality on war crimes and 2. totally twist the Constitution to suggest the President has powers akin to Louis XIVth's and 3. mis-state the relevant precedents to make it seem like the above have substantial judicial support when in fact the opposite is true."

"There is of course an element of political calculation here. Many chickenhearted Senators believe that they expend political capital by opposing cabinet nominations, when in fact opposing the right ones may create it. But even if I'm wrong about that, for some things -- torture, fundamental constitutional principles -- the calculations should be left aside. As far as I'm concerned, Congress was almost as much to blame for Iraq as Bush -- they wrote him a blank check, with the Gulf of Tonkin precedent sitting there in front of them. If there isn't some serious attempt in Congress to come to grips with the torture scandal in the next year, then some of the torture dirt will stick to them as well."

[soleft]

1. I've been really disappointed with Schumer since the fraudlection

[Dr.Phool]

2. Roll over, hell!

He's bending over.

Threshold is too high, he trips.

[BurtWorm]

3. I just wrote to the coward.

Senator Schumer:

Your position on the nomination of Alberto Gonzalez is disturbing, to say the very least, but then so is your tolerance for the legitimation of torture generally.

I agree with Michael Froomkin's critique of your statement that the bar for approving of this president's (or any president's) nominees has been lowered. It strikes me as cowardly, albeit clearly politically expedient.

Your leadership on resisting this administration's most extreme judicial nominees is very appreciated. It puzzles me why you cannot show this same leadership in opposing Mr. Gonzalez, unless you fear the ludicrous Republican charge of being "anti-Hispanic" or, even worse, don't find Mr. Gonzalez's sophistic justification of torture to the point of organ fauilure a good enough reason to reject his nomination to become the nation's chief legal officer.

Senator, New Yorkers may have just rewarded you with six more years as their representative, but please don't mistake this gift as carte blanche to take the path of least resistance. The times call for much more vigilance than that.

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

5. EXCELLENT letter. GREAT job.

I salute you.

:toast:

[mattclearing]

4. More like bend over, Chuck.

Unbelievable.

[BrklynLiberal]

6. Since his vote on Iraq I knew I would not vote for him again. I have not!

I've lost all respect for him..

[joanski01]

7. Don't forget that Senator Schumer and

Senator Hillary Clinton were ready to approve Bernie Kerik for Homeland Security. And both Senator Graham and Senator Bill Nelson of Florida stood up and testified about what a great man Porter Goss was. Don't any of them care about democracy anymore?