Tuesday, October 25, 2005
The Idiocy of it All
As a perceptive Slate article points out, the new German coalition government is without one of Germany's most sincerely pro-American politicians, Joschka Fischer. Fischer - it should be remembered - stood to the right of Gerhard Schröder on the Iraq question - though a skeptic on the WMD question, he had no desire for a trans-Atlantic rift and none of Schröder's callow electoral motives. At considerable risk, Fischer supported the Kosovo war in 1999.
Naturally, the Bush White House has taken no notice of him.
Let no one say Germans are bereft of a sense of humor. And let no one say this White House knows how to treat its friends.
Naturally, the Bush White House has taken no notice of him.
- When President Bush came to Mainz last February to shake hands with Schröder for the cameras and pronounce a new day in German-American relations, he was introduced to a tart-looking but not-quite-familiar man.
"Hello, what's your name?" Bush said to Joschka Fischer.
"My name is Mr. Fischer," deadpanned Germany's then-foreign minister. "What's your name?"
Let no one say Germans are bereft of a sense of humor. And let no one say this White House knows how to treat its friends.
Monday, October 03, 2005
Georgie and Harriet
I don't have much to say about Harriet Miers's nomination to the Supreme Court other than it seems mystifying if one reads it as anything other than an act of cronyism. Miers does not stand out in any way from the pile of prospective justices; only if her loyalty to the Bush clan is taken into account does she become notable. It is truly a special kind of loyalty when she has proclaimed Bush to be the most intelligent man she's ever met.
This is probably a nomination worth opposing on the simple grounds that her primary qualification is a slavish loyalty to a failing president.
This is probably a nomination worth opposing on the simple grounds that her primary qualification is a slavish loyalty to a failing president.
