Joshua Holland gets it right in a Gadflyer piece about the Democratic challenge to the Ohio vote: the Dems need to wake from their slumber. Or, as Holland puts it, from their bitch slapping:
Go on with your bad self, Mr. Holland–now that’s an opus.
Don’t the Democrats see how the Republicans came to power? It certainly wasn’t by playing nice or being polite. The Democrats should not be shying away from Barbara Boxer and her challenge to the Ohio vote–they should be using it as an opportunity to ask the American people why we place our elections in the hands of partisan figures such as Katherine Harris and Kenneth Blackwell. How can you have a fair election when the man or woman in charge of it is the state chairperson of one candidate’s committee? Why can’t election powers be taken away from the Secretaries of State, and given to non-partisan officials? If not, why can’t Secretaries of State be barred from being associated with one candidate’s campaign?
On another note, I watched a bit of the Gonzalez confirmation hearings today. Grim stuff, this democracy. It’s all so surreal–the arcane nods to procedure, the hyperbolic compliments on the nominee’s accomplishments, the political grandstanding…
I agree with Sean Carroll (by way of Majikthise) who wrote that Senator Biden made some good points, but was “such a pompous jerk that he [did] more harm than good to his own case.”
For the record, let me refer you to the relevant page of the transcript, which shows that Biden rambled on for his entire ten minutes, stopping only briefly (ever so briefly) for Gonzalez to answer one of his questions.
Biden ended his 10 minutes on a high note; as his diatribe spun out of control, he concluded by waving his arms in the air and, like a sloppy drunk, trying to tell Gonzalez how much he loved him:
With powerful rhetoric like that, how can the Democrats NOT take back the White House in 2008?
Mind you, Biden spent all of his time talking because he knew that Gonzalez wasn’t going to answer any of his questions anyway. That’s what you call a pre-emptive ramble.
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