Gonzo's Attorney General Confirmation Hearing

Alberto Gonzales is testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

I think Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) is scary. He would be great for playing a hit man in a Quentin Tarantino. Orrin "The Cleaner" Hatch. Catchy.

Now Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass) is chewing out Gonzales. He's really getting angry. This doesn't seem like the right setting for angry yelling like this. Especially because Gonzales has such a mild and likable demeanor, in my opinion at least. Just when you think you're sitting down to watch a friendly Attorney General confirmation hearing Ted Kennedy has to fly off the handle. Thanks Ted.

Now Sen. Joe Biden (D-Delaware) is up to bat. He's getting excited but he's reprimanding Gonzales in a more friendly way. He just used the word "malarkey." Points for that. And now this, "I love ya but you're not showing candor so far..."

It's funny because this whole hearing is like a bunch of fathers talking to a kid who just broke a lamp (i.e. Abu Ghraib). The Republicans (Orrin Hatch) are like, "Hey you're a good kid, and you know what, that lamp was bound to break sooner or later. Your mom left it on the edge of the table and it was ugly anyway. From now on when you're playing wiffle ball in the living room try to hit to the opposite field."

Ted Kennedy is the father who just loses it. "What the heck were you thinking playing wiffle ball in the living room!? And don't lie to me and say that your friend Rico did it. Where's my belt?"

Joe Biden is the father who's upset but keeps a good attitude. He's disappointed, he gives the kid a slap on the wrist, but then ends with a pep talk about doing the right thing in the future. "You know you shouldn't have done that... Come on kid you're better than that! We live two blocks from a little league field, just walk over there and play a little ball, my boy!"

Now Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina): "I think you weaken yourself as a country when you try to play cute with the law and become more like your enemy, instead of becoming more like how you want to be." (That's what he really said, that's not a continuation of the wiffle metaphor.) He's breaking the mold and being pretty critical of the Gonzales/Bush approach to torture. Gonzales just threw back an impotent refutation of Graham's point: "I respectfully disagree, we are not like our enemy at all." To which Graham just teed off: "We are not like our enemy; compared to Saddam Hussain, what we did was a good day. But we are not being like who we want to be."

Graham's approach is remarkably like Biden's, basically, "I like ya kid, but you screwed up."

So far, my opinion of Ted Kennedy has gone way down and my opinion of Lindsey Graham has gone way up.

Now Russ Feingold is up. This is a calm reprimand without anger or affection. "You screwed up kid. I'm going to Steak 'N Shake, see you in 30."

Kennedy's going nuts again.