Reaching New Levels of Hypocrisy

Reason does the heavy lifting for me. The topic: filibustering judicial nominees. The hypocrite: Sen. John Kyl (R-AZ).

In 2005, Kyl said this on the Senate floor:

“Republicans seek to right a wrong that has undermined 214 years of tradition – wise, carefully thought-out tradition… My friends argue that Republicans may want to filibuster a future Democratic President’s nominees. To that I say, I don’t think so, and even if true, I’m willing to give up that tool. It was never a power we thought we had in the past, and it is not one likely to be used in the future.”

In last month’s Phoenix Business Journal:

“Kyl … warned President-Elect Barack Obama that he would filibuster U.S. Supreme Court appointments if those nominees were too liberal… [He] said if Obama goes with empathetic judges who do not base their decisions on the rule of law and legal precedents but instead the factors in each case, he would try to block those picks via filibuster.”

*sighs* Once again: The charter flight to my new town in Ireland will begin boarding shortly. Get your tickets now!

Illinois Takes the Lead

In the corruption rankings, that is. It’s typically a tight three-way race between themselves, Louisiana, and my current home of New Jersey to see whose political officials can most pervert the political process. Other locations may try to get in on it, but let’s be honest, corruption anywhere else just comes across as cute when compared with the big leagues. While New Jersey is just chugging along steadily, the Bayou threatens to fall behind after voters shockingly failed to re-elect William “$90,000 of bribes in the freezer” Jefferson and replaced him with … wait, a Vietnamese-American Republican? Well, I guess if you live long enough, you see everything.

Meanwhile, Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, if today’s federal indictment is accurate, has clearly raised the bar: He was trying to sell the US Senate seat vacated by President-Elect Obama. Not only that, but he threatened to withhold bankruptcy assistance from the owners of the Chicago Tribune if they reported the story. Well that is très ballsy, sir. Anyway, we applaud your efforts and hope you enjoy your long, all-expenses paid trip to federal prison. Thanks for playing!