Oh good, Bush is talking again

George Bush is back and he's got ideas and opinions and stuff! And he needs you to hear them. He just wants you to be absolutely clear: he isn't criticizing Obama. Even if he does criticize Obama after he says he isn't. It's like saying "with all due respect" before telling someone their wife is a whore. You said "with all due respect" so it's not an insult.

"I told you I'm not going to criticize my successor," he said. "I'll just tell you that there are people at Gitmo that will kill American people at a drop of a hat and I don't believe that persuasion isn't going to work. Therapy isn't going to cause terrorists to change their mind."

I might not have read everything Obama said about Gitmo and committed it to memory, but wasn't the whole plan to move the terrorists from an inland chain link prison to good old fashioned American concrete and bar prisons? To move them from outside our and the world's legal system to the inside? Not, as the Decider says, give them a session with a therapist, have them partake in a trust 'falling' exercise, and then loosing them on the streets of Dubuke.

I just think inmates of our federal corrections facilities would probably find it funny to have their maximum security surroundings described as "therapy". But then again they aren't as smart as George Bush. After all they're in prison and he's walking around free, despite being a bigger crook. I think he knows what he's talking about: federal prison is for schoolgirls and namby pamby therapist pussies. If only Obama would get that through his head.

The new face of Satan

Obama finally made his choice for the Supreme Court and it is Second Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Sonia Sotomayor. If confirmed she will be the second woman currently on the bench and the first Hispanic ever to become a justice. I know, old white men lose out again. Is there no end to the indignity they must suffer? Her stat sheet:

Administration officials say Sotomayor, with 17 years on the bench, would bring more judicial experience to the Supreme Court than any justice confirmed in the past 70 years.
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Obama had said publicly he wanted a justice who combined intellect and empathy _ the ability to understand the troubles of everyday Americans.
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A graduate of Princeton University and Yale Law School, a former prosecutor and private attorney, Sotomayor became a federal judge for the Southern District of New York in 1992. She became an appeals judge in 1998 for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit, which covers New York, Vermont and Connecticut.

As a judge, she has a bipartisan pedigree. She was first appointed by a Republican, President George H.W. Bush, and won Senate confirmation without dissent. She was named an appeals judge by President Bill Clinton in 1997.
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In one of her most memorable rulings as federal district judge, Sotomayor essentially salvaged baseball in 1995, ruling with players over owners in a labor strike that had led to the cancellation of the World Series.

17 years experience? Christ, how's she going to be able to hide her judicial opinions, style, and beliefs with a 17 year history? That was the whole point of Bush picking Roberts and Alto: plausible deniability towards judicial philosophy. Roberts had only been a judge for 30 minutes and Karl Rove decided to pick Alito, a lifetime fry cook, after he saw him buy a John Grisham book and Hannity's book at a Washington area Barnes & Noble.

If you are actually interested in knowing what she actually has decided in court cases, Scotusblog has a nice little round-up. Additionally there's a NYT profile here, and some opinions from those who know her here, here, and here. Otherwise it's all just stupid political theatre from here on out. A world where Judge Sotomayor is cast as either the "most liberal jurist ever" who'll destroy the country with her activist judicial style of rewriting laws from the bench, an assassin plotting to kill the resurrected Jesus, or as someone who is barely literate and unable to even put on her shoes correctly, let alone be qualified enough for the Supreme Court.

On the other hand, the argument for her will be something along the lines of "she's makes John Jay and Thurgood Marshall look like Judge Judy", declarative statements that she is the most qualified person in the country, and a reference to one of her appellate decisions curing cancer. It's gonna be real awesome, and we haven't even got to the part where she tries to dodge questions at a judicial hearing and the Administration pretends not to know her thinking on any kind of legal issues.

Camelot gets tired of waiting

Well New York, you attempt to replace one famous last name with another hit a critical snag. It seems Caroline Kennedy is no longer able to hold her breath and stamp her feet until that nasty old blind man gives her Uncle Bobby's seat. Oh, fiddlesticks.

Caroline Kennedy says she is dropping out of a bid to win appointment to the U.S. Senate seat once held by her slain uncle, Bobby Kennedy.

In a statement released early Thursday, she says she told Gov. David Paterson that she is abandoning her attempt to succeed Hillary Rodham Clinton for personal reasons.

Those personal reasons? According to the New York Post the most personal reason is that Patterson was simply no longer considering her for the seat. So she did what anyone would do in that situation: claim they didn't want it anyway and leak to the press that you're withdrawing. But where does this leave New York, tragically unencumbered with legacy/celebrity names vying to be the Senator-Select? Who knows, probably someone who got elected and worked in the legislature for years. It's almost enough to make you want to vomit.

But not to put to fine a point on it Patty-poo but shouldn't you, I don't know, have someone in mind by now? It's been months. The crooked fucker picked a guy in the middle of a sideshow. Delaware picked a guy. You can't figure it out? We're already into the new session of congress. Chuck Schumer isn't suddenly getting two votes now. I know it'll probably make some people mad, but this is what the people of NY elected Eliot Spitzer to do. But he likes hookers, so it's your problem.

Obama: Cabinetry

Now comes the fun part in any election: criticizing the guy you were just excited to elect for not making the choices you would. The nerve of Obama to not consult me! I voted! Disillusionment! Disillusionment! Up first is criticizing Obama's cabinet picks, because that son of a bitch decided not to go off the list I sent to him. Was it all the crayon I wrote with? Misspellings? Overuse of the phrase "this fucking guy"? Who knows? On with the most bandied about leaked names.

Chief of Staff: Rahm Emanuel, Illinois Rep. and 4th ranking Dem in the House. Since it is required by law to mention, he is the brother of Ari Emanuel the basis for the character Ari Gold on Entourage played by Jeremy Piven. Can Piven switch it up to play a Chief of Staff? The man is versatile. Rahm was also the basis for Josh Lyman in the West Wing. Impress your loved ones with that info. Picking Rahm means Obama wants to get shit done and he wants everybody on his side in line should bipartisan efforts fail when the Republicans remind Obama that their definition of bipartisanship is for Democrats to do exactly what Republicans want. A funny part of the announcement that Rahm was offered the job was on Fox, where Karl Rove, himself the Deputy Chief of Staff, criticized the move because he felt that Rahm wasn't an honest broker and wouldn't have the trust of Republicans. Gee Karl, that didn't seem to stop you. Unknown is whether the whole room died of laughter after he said it. If Rahm doesn't take the job, sources say it'll go to Tom Daschle, which would mean an increased emphasis on health care, which is Daschle's big issue.

Treasury Secretary: Larry Summers, former T-Sec under Clinton. Not quite so sure about this one. The guy is sort of a retread, though regarded as smart. His main problem is that he helped support and push for a lot of the deregulation that happened under Clinton's watch. He is a deregulator. The plus is that he warned about some of the problems we're facing before they happened. Another problem is he thought the crisis was caused by all those women in the financial industries who are bad at math. Just kidding, he thinks all women are bad at math.

EPA Head: Robert Kennedy Jr., environmental lawyer and writer and Kennedy. This would actually be a really ballsy choice, second only to putting someone like Al Gore in charge. Kennedy has been on the front lines of environmental activism, support, and creating/making solutions for almost his entire career. What's more is that he's virulently pro-environment and refers to people who oppose change as "flat earthers" and "traitors". He gave a speech at Live Earth that concluded "I will see you on the barricades." At Live Earth. It would be a pretty big signal that the country is done dicking around after the past 8 years.

So there are the first few that were bandied about yesterday. More bitching and nods of "this is what I would have done" as speculation increases and *gasp* actual choices are made.