See Boyden Gray, with worry.

by Kagro X

Sometimes, there's no better source for entertainment news than Robert Novak:

A SENATOR'S VENGEANCE
 
Freshman Sen. Mel Martinez last week quietly blocked immediate confirmation as U.S. ambassador to the European Union of prominent Republican lawyer C. Boyden Gray, who last year withdrew his support for Martinez in the Florida Republican primary.
 
Gray was an active supporter of Martinez, who had resigned as secretary of Housing and Urban Development to run for the Senate. But three and one-half months before the Aug. 31 primary, Gray switched to former Rep. Bill McCollum. Gray said then that Martinez, a trial lawyer, had "opposed tort reform" and "taken money from the trial lawyers."
 
At last week's Senate Foreign Relations Committee meeting, Martinez asked that Gray's nomination be held. Martinez did not explain his objection to colleagues, and an aide told me it was "personal." After a meeting between Gray and Martinez, the aide said, Martinez will not continue to hold at the next committee meeting in two weeks. Because of delay, Gray will not take up his post in Brussels until well into November.

I laughed! I cried! Better than Gremlins! Better than E.T.!

Some of you will remember that I have a special place in my heart for Boyden Gray, not only for his chock-full-o'-b.s. memo in which he lied about "liberal" law professors supporting the nuclear option, but also for his boorish tactics while at the head of the newspeak-ish-ly named "Committee for Justice," wherefrom he threatened to tie red state Democratic Senators to the porn industry if any other Democrats attacked the president's nominees to the Supreme Court.

Still others of you will laugh with me when we realize that Martinez (R) has just used a parlor trick even more counter-majoritarian than the filibuster to put the brakes on a presidential nomination that requires the "advice and consent" of the Senate -- a standard that, as Martinez and his GOP cohorts (including Gray!) just lectured us, meant that an "upperdownvote" was constitutionally guaranteed.

But enough of that icky "logic," stuff. What happened to Gray?

Well, all good things must come to an end, and Martinez is set to remove his hold, as agreed.

But, wait! There's more!

Sen. Ken Salazar is holding up an ambassadorship for a longtime ally of President Bush's because of his role in a religiously tinged fight over judicial nominations.

Salazar, a Denver Democrat, has used his senator's prerogative to put a procedural hold on C. Boyden Gray's nomination to become U.S. ambassador to the European Union.

Whuzzat?

Salazar takes issue with an ad that the Committee for Justice placed about two years ago, when Democrats were holding up the nomination of Circuit Court nominee William Pryor of Alabama.

The ad said some senators were attacking Pryor for having "deeply held" Catholic beliefs. The ad showed a sign hanging from a courthouse door that read: "CATHOLICS NEED NOT APPLY."

In a letter to Gray last week, Salazar, who is Catholic, said he found the ad offensive because it implied that some U.S. senators were "anti-Catholic."

'Atta-way to stand up for yourself, Senator Salazar! Who's next? How about you, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Member Bill Nelson (D-FL)? You're on Gray's porn-o-matic target list, and your committee has jurisdiction over the nomination. How about the rest of you targeted for Gray's smear campaign? Ben Nelson? Mark Pryor? Blanche Lincoln? Robert Byrd? Tom Carper? Debbie Stabenow? Jeff Bingaman? Evan Bayh? Byron Dorgan? Mary Landrieu? Tim Johnson?

And don't think you're off the hook, Senators Lieberman, Kohl, and Conrad. In addition to most of your colleagues named above, Gray targeted you for retribution over NARAL's anti-Roberts ad campaign.

And while I have your attention, will you get a load of Gray's pot shot at NARAL?

"NARAL's press release compounds the injury by dishonestly stating, we are not suggesting Mr. Roberts condones or supports clinic violence,' when that of course is exactly what their ad does," Gray also said.

Now take a look at what Gray said by way of groveling when Salazar caught him by the short ones over the Committee for Justice's "CATHOLICS NEED NOT APPLY" ad:

In a letter to Salazar, Gray expressed regret over the presentation and wording of the ad, but said it was not intended to imply that some senators were anti-Catholic.

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. If it wasn't for the fact that the rest of the world -- and in particular, "Old Europe" -- by now expects the Bush "administration's" emissaries to be petty thugs and liars, I'd weep for America. But as things stand, I haven't any tears left.

Comments

[jonnybutter]

I haven't any tears left.

Boy, I'm with you there. As interested in what's happening to my country as I am, I can't quite hold all in my head at once how bad this presidency/government has been. There're rashers of crap you forget about for a while. Being a citizen lately is a lot like being in love with an untreated mentally ill person (not snark: really).

I guess if you're going to be a criminal, do it big. Sigh. Another Bush political advantage: being so bad that nobody can remember it all. It's laugh or die, AFAIC.

I know this isn't an OT, but newsflash via Josh M for anybody who hasn't seen it. Pope Caseus I has unloosed the golden stream of wisdom on the Miers question:

"These so-called movement conservatives don’t have much of a following, the ones that I’m aware of. And you just marvel, these are the senators, some of them who voted to confirm the general counsel of the ACLU to the Supreme Court, and she was voted in almost unanimously. And you say, ‘now they’re going to turn against a Christian who is a conservative picked by a conservative President and they’re going to vote against her for confirmation.’ Not on your sweet life, if they want to stay in office."