Senate Session on Judicial Nominations (c-span dos)

I'm back! I thought I was done but I was too sleepy to get any errands done. I was just lying in bed looking out the window, so i figured I might as well just get back in the saddle.

Sen. John Cornyn, R from Texas, is busy looking waspy. "We have people who come from across the planet, who pronounce their names in difference ways..." What? Who pronounce their names in different ways?

This guy is whining about the Dems Philly Busting Bush's judicial nominees. But didn't the Republican's filibuster far more of Clinton's nominees?

Now Byron Dorgan, D from North Dakota is responding. Oh I get it. Under Clinton, or part of his reign, the Republicans ran Congress so they didn't need to Philly Bust. They just never brought the nominees up for a vote. 60 nominees didn't even get voted on.

So Byron's saying the Dems have approved 201 and held up 10. So 93% have gotten passed. So how can the Republicans complain about this? Am I missing something?

The judge this is about has written articles that say he believes "women are subservient to men?" No way. Really?

What are cloture motions? I should know that.

"cloture - The only procedure by which the Senate can vote to place a time limit on consideration of a bill or other matter, and thereby overcome a filibuster. Under the cloture rule (Rule XXII), the Senate may limit consideration of a pending matter to 30 additional hours, but only by vote of three-fifths of the full Senate, normally 60 votes."

That's from a great page by the way, the US Senate glossary page.

Carl Levin, D from Mich, is now kickin it. He just brought up 93 % again. So what percentage of Clinton nominees got passed? Why don't they say that? And why is the Levster talking about Tom Daschle now?

Sen. Kit Bond (R-Missouri) is now talking about intelligence problems. Bond, Kit Bond. Niiice. Is he criticing Bush? Oh, no, he's justifying Porter Goss's changes to the CIA. "Why are we surprised?" Come on, this is easy to shoot down. People aren't complaining because Goss is making changes; people are complaining because it looks like his changes are just turning the CIA into Bush's bitch. This whole, "Well, we wanted changes, that's what Goss is doing" is pretty ridiculous.

According to that Goss could make it mandatory for everyone to wear jams shorts , and hire monkeys to replace all of the CIA's office managers. "Well we wanted change didn't we? What did you expect?"

"I hope we all agree that new blood is needed at the CIA." We don't need "new" blood, we need "competant" blood! This is just ridiculous.

Now Byron Dorgan (D North Dakota) is dropping science. He's talking about how Warren Buffet, the second richest man in the world, wrote an editorial where he talked about paying the same tax rate as his receptionist. Oh, this is about the dividend tax cut, which apparently Buffet isn't a fan of.

Oohh, here we go, this is the editorial by Buffett that the Dorgmonger is referring to.

Ha! The Dorg just said that he likes to roller-blade. That is precious. Imagine if Byron Dorgan was wearing roller blades right now, while talking at the Senate. Hahaha. That's great. Anyway, he's telling a story about how the founder of Rollerblade gave his workers a bonus and also paid the tax on the bonus for them.

This is an interesting line from the Buffet editorial: "But I was luckier in that I came wired at birth with a talent for capital allocation..." It's interesting that Buff credits his success to an accident of birth. I don't really see how people can take credit for their own success. What do they have that wasn't given to them? They were born into this world helpless, with a brain crafted by God/evolution, then raised by parents, then taught by teachers. Even if you were an orphan that never went to school there had to be people that helped you. And you can't take credit for the natural intelligence that was given to you at birth. Even work ethic is something that you got from the people around you; if you were born into another country you wouldn't necessarily be exposed to the culture of constant work that you see here in the US. I just don't see how the concept of "the self made man" can make sense.

Ok, I'm stopping now. 11.4 miles.