John Kerry must commit to filibustering the nomination of Michael Mukasey! It is not only Mr. Mukasey’s refusal to call waterboarding torture–which it is–but standing idly by while this nomination goes through the Senate sends yet another signal that the United States no longer stands for being a law abiding country.
Since we have already destroyed Habeas Corpus, the right to a civilian attorney, the right to a speedy trial and dismissed the Geneva Convention, one more signal that we now allow torture feeds right into the hands of extremists who all along have stated the United States was a hypocritical country.
As a U.S. Senator, I would be doing two things immediately. I would announce that I plan to filibuster this nomination and would have been lining up the 40 votes to support such an action.
In addition, I would file legislation to bring our country under International Criminal Court Jurisdiction and insist that if this administration bombs or otherwise uses military force against Iran, prosecution under the International Criminal Court would be an option.
This Administration has absolutely no respect for any law — international or domestic.
Mr. Mukasey’s nomination must be stopped because it is just another example of this Administration going beyond the boundaries of International Law and, in the long run, strengthens terrorism.
Ed O’Reilly,
A Massachusetts Democrat for U.S. Senate
www.edoreilly.com
“Kerry and Kennedy” or “Dems”?
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Or are you really putting the onus entirely on Kerry to stop Mukasey? If there aren’t 40 Dems willing to filibuster is that Kerry’s fault? If Biden, Dodd, Clinton and Obama all refuse to join a filibuster is that Kerry’s fault?
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Kerry has been pretty vocal about opposing Mukasey but I’m confused as to why you think that the job of stopping this nomination falls entirely to him.
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This isn’t a BMG post; this is a campaign mailer.
All these WORDS from the junior Senator on the BMG blog are fine, but let’s see some DEEDS. Just do it, Senator!
John Kerry is not a team player and it is no wonder he can’t get allies to help out. When Senators Jay Rockefeller and Carl Levin were working hard to propose an alternative to the Bush FISA legislation in August, John Kerry left the Senate early to begin his month long vacation. This type of behavior does not promote coalition building.
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I sense John Kerry’s inability to pass any major legislation in 23 years has been the result of this inability to form alliances in the Senate.
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One of the problems is that there is nothing in John Kerry’s world other than his total obsession to become President.
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According to Tuesday’s Patriot Legder John Kerry is planning to run for President in 2012. The only reason he isn’t running now is because of his poll numbers and his inability to run for both the Senate and the Presidency.
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In 2012, if he is re-elected, he could again run on taxpayers money. During the 2004 election, John Kerry only voted on 3 out of the 14 major pieces of legislation as described by the Congressional. According to some sources he missed over 70% of the Senate votes.
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I agree that the onus should not fall on John Kerry, alone. We have a huge problem in our country with political leadership.
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Ed O’Reilly
A Massacusetts Democrat
http://www.edoreilly.com
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It is patently obvious that you have never served one day in military uniform. If you put our military in peril via the UN and international military courts you would see mutinys and the collapse of the US Armed Forces. No one in our Armed Forced should be in jeopardy from the likes of Chavez, Putin, Ahjimibad, and many of the more odious nations of the UN.
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Mukasey will be confirmed by the US senate whether you, or John Kerry likes it or not. The deal has been struck and John Kerry is the odd man out. He counts for nothing in the US Senate. He is a laughing stock and a buffoon. He has done nothing in his pathetic life except garner nourishment off the public breast. The sooner this pathetic man goes away the better.
You might recall that the Republican majority in 2004 took particular pleasure in adjusting the Senate schedule to make it difficult for Kerry. To ascribe his missed votes to his ambition is just odd given what a better world it would be if he had replaced Bush in 2004.
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I don’t recall him missing a vote where his absence was decisive.
One reason I posted a head count on Mukasey is that a filibuster looks rather difficult to achieve. I certainly don’t pretend to know what might motivate Senator Feinstein, but, if we cannot even get her, somewhat moderate liberal, to oppose Mukasey, I doubt a filibuster will work.
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I also don’t think one starts a filibuster as just for the heck of it or even as a statement of principle. The reason is that the Press will describe it as childish or as a bid for attention. Kerry, in particular, is subject to the bizarre media narrative that everything he does is driven by ambition. Putting up a filibuster and losing is much worse than simply losing.
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It’s possibly correct that specifically outlawing waterboarding is the best that can be done under these circumstances.
First, it won’t overcome a Presidential veto.
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Second, even if it did, the President would ignore it – as he has hundreds of times during this administration, using signing statements that assert he doesn’t have to comply with what he views as unconstitutional aspects of laws (instead of actually vetoing them, or challenging them in court, which would be his perogative). It’s a quiet way of ignoring the real constitution, not King George’s warped version where turture is actually illegal. He really does view himself as a temporary king that’s above the law; you only have to read some of Cheney’s work while he was in Congress, defending President Sunny Sunshine Reagan from Iran-Contra, saying that the President had a monarchical right to basically ignore congress and the courts going all the way back to when we had kings and queens in England, etc. etc.
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Third, it already is illegal. That’s one of the reasons why it’s mostly happening in Guatanimo, instead of US soil. That’s how he pretends to justify it – and also prevents it from surfacing in US court. Furthermore, even if we passed a law specifically banning waterboarding on Guatanimo Bay – and even if the President decided not to ignore it, but to work with it, he’d probably just move the people held there to some faraway country where there’s even less to no oversight and the forms of turture could perhaps be even more draconian.
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The only chance waterboarding could stop is if the Democrats stick to their guns and demand an AG who would investigate and try any administration that employs waterboarding as a tactic. There’s a fat chance in hell that Bush would send ANY of those guys before the Senate to be confirmed, but the Senate ought to stick to their guns on this issue, even at the cost of having an almost leadership-less Department of Justice (because isn’t that better than a Department of Injustice?).
It’s not clear then that there are forty Democrats who will stick to their guns. That’s the fundamental problem.
That sounds like that were fewer than 60 supporters of a guy who can’t answer questions about torture until Cheney tells him what to say–not enough to end a filibuster.
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Now they can say, well, gee, I voted against him, didn’t I?
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It is difficult to view the Congressional Democrats with much other than contepmt at this point.
There were 40 nay votes.
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So 40 Senators opposed the nomination–enough to sustain a veto, but only for pretend.
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Yick.
…but aside from that, the interesting thing about this vote is that there were seven (100-(53+40=93)) senators who neglected to vote. It is unclear whether, if the Senate Dem whip (who the hell is he?) had been able to force a filibuster, that the Republicans could have gotten cloture.
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The Dems in the Senate are absolutely worthless.
are running for President
Forgot McCain.
Of course there is no veto. I meant to write “sustain a filibuster.”
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The point stands, though.
…I knew what you meant.
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The point I was trying to make was that among the seven who failed to vote at least one might have voted against cloture. The fact that Reid allowed this vote to be rammed through without the Dem presidential candidates available to vote is unforgiveable.
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Reid should be removed. He has shown himself to be a weak majority leader. But apparently, that’s what the Dems want.
I suppose KBusch is right that some of the existing 40 nay votes would have switched over and voted for cloture to kill a filibuster, which weakens Reid’s hand considerably.
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But he might have forced them to play that hand, though, so at least they would have to answer for it later, instead of being able to say, sheesh, I voted “no.”
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He forced them out on voting to cease funding for troops in the field, a point upon which his own caucus was obviously far more divided than they were this past week. Why not now?
The vote was scheduled abruptly so that Senators out campaigning couldn’t make it.
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…aeroplanes.
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That was no excuse. If they were running for their party’s candidacy for pres_ident, surely they could have put pres_sure on the Senate leadership to hold the vote open until they could get back to Washington. And obviously, they did not want to.
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Senate Dems cave again, showing less backbone than a mollusk.
I’m not sure why it was scheduled so inconveniently, but it was. I’d be very, very surprised if there were 41 votes necessary to defeat cloture.
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Making the problem one of character of all Democrats is to make the problem insoluble. Surely (wink!) a course on critical thinking might suggest that defining and attempting to solve the right problem is a useful first step. Let’s be clear. There was never a real question at all about Whitehouse, Boxer, Feingold, Kennedy, Kerry, Klobucher, Dodd, Leahy, Saunders, or Reed. There are Democrats who would certainly have voted against cloture. There just aren’t enough of them.
TPM has an extended discussion of a number of the negotiations Reid was conducting with GOP leaders.
If a candidate purports to be resolute, stakes out a position on a major issue, and then can’t trouble him or herself to show up to vote on it (as they were hired to do), then they have no business hawking themselves to the American people as leaders.
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And any attempt by any of them to shirk their responsibilities by claiming that the vote was scheduled “abruptly” is as bogus as a three dollar bill.
Regarding your point (1), it should be evident that the Dem front-runners who are in the senate did not want to have to vote on cloture which would have been the issue. If the anti-Mukaseys had one more vote (40+1) on a motion for cloture they could have at least delayed if not have killed the nomination. That’s the point.
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Regarding your point (2) and Lieberman, he might very well jump ship to the Republican caucus, but, if he does and the Dems pick up as many Senate seats in 2008 as they’re expected to pick up, he will be left to–how do they put it?–twist in the wind. If he jumps ship, he will be cutting off his nose to spite his face (sorry, a midwestern expression) with only a year or so to go in this session of congress. Moreover, if he were to jump ship and give control the the Republicans (Cheney breaking the tie), that might put some backbone into the Dem leadership to filibuster more.
You’re simply not counting votes.
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Reid is counting votes.
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Moreover, if he were to jump ship and give control the the Republicans (Cheney breaking the tie), that might put some backbone into the Dem leadership to filibuster more.
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Lieberman’s departure wouldn’t suddenly replace — presto! magico! — the “centrists” with progressives. Regularly scheduling losing filibusters might appeal to the purity trolls. They’re a small voting bloc, though.
Lieberman’s departure wouldn’t suddenly replace — presto! magico! — the “centrists” with progressives.
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If Lieberman were to shift from the Dem caucus to the Rep congress, it wouldn’t replace anyone with anything. What it would probably do is change control of the Senate from the Dems to the Reps. For about a year. If the Dems were actually organized–which, I’ll acknowledge, they aren’t–they would still have enough members of the Senate to stymie appointments via filibuster (the House would still be controlled by Dems, which could rein in the Senate–if it wanted to). And the only appointments that would really matter are the judicial ones–those in the executive branch would expire at the end of the GWBush administration.
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My point was that it was unlikely that Lieberman would jump ship to the Republican caucus. He can read tea leaves or entrails like the rest of us. If, as is expected, the Dems were to pick up enough seats in the Senate in 2008, the Dems would not need him in their caucus as of 3 Jan 2009. Any power that he might have had would be lost.
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It isn’t an issue of “centrists” vs. “progressives.” It is an interest of which party controls the Senate. The party that controls the Senate controls the agenda.
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As I’ve mentioned here before and have described in detail, as far as I’m concerned, the Mukasey nomination is a tempist in a teapot. If the Senate had not confirmed him, GW would have made him a recess appointment, and his term would end on 20 Jan 2009 regardless. What is interesting, though, is why Reid scheduled a quick vote while the Dem presidential nominees were out of town. Maybe the party’s presidential nominees did not want to have to be put on the record regarding the nomination. That is the probable reason.
I recognize the calculation Lieberman is making. When Sununu and Coleman lose their seats next year and VA and CO add two more Democrats, Joe Lieberman will definitely want to be on the blue team. Got it.
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The problem is that the Republicans are united. The Democrats are not. There really is a division and it really does, in this empirical world, affect what they can accomplish. In the minority, Pryor and Landrieu were no better.
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The only issue the Democrats were able to stop was the dismantling of Social Security. No similar unity has been scraped together on other issues. Remember too that the Republicans, with too much support from the press, threatened to end the filibuster when they had the majority. Democrats just do not play that kind of hardball.
… only takes one senator. It takes 60 to stop it. One senator can put the heat on all the rest to stand up and declare what side they are on. I remember when filibusters were real, not the fake ones, the ‘virtual’ filibusters that both parties play nowadays.
Then, he wouldn’t be a team player.
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Which is it? Do you want him to help get the caucus lined up or do you want him to go it alone? If the second, then you guys want him not to be a team player.
The guy still needs to get on the ballot, never mind lining up 40 votes in the Senate.
Ed– feel free to use this language for your new campaign literature.
“I'm Ed O'Reilly and I'm against torture. So is my opponent Senator John Kerry. But while Senator Kerry is wasting his time rallying national opposition against AG Mukasey's nomination and trying to push other Democratic senators to oppose Mukasey, I'm doing what really needs to be done: posting on BMG about what a windbag Kerry is and demanding that Kerry get out of Washington and come debate me in Massachusetts. If you want to stop torture, there's only way– demand that Senator John Kerry debates me. No debate for me means more waterboarding for all of you.”
I have noticed that there are a few people on this site that no matter what Candidate for U.S Senate, Mr. Ed O’Reilly, says they will be against it. They have their minds made up already and they don’t seem to believe in competition or open debate between O’Reilly and kerry. Which of course is supposed to be what Democrats are all about. Being OPEN minded!!!! But I admit that even most of them have given Candidate Ed O’Reilly a compliment once in a while. You, on the other hand, are on some sort of insane (in my humble opinion)mission to have a one man vendetta against him. I think you owe me and everyone a reason.If you don’t I will try my BEST to figure it out. Paco
What I’ve seen of Masshole’s critique matches mine. It’s much more sharply worded, surely, but it does not seem irrational, single-minded, or like a vendetta.
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When we need folks arguing for our positions and shoring up the votes of Senators from Florida and Arkansas, O’Reilly has been complaining about Kerry speaking too much and about him not being in Massachusetts. Masshole makes that point more memorably, but O’Reilly has never answered it when I made it.
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I’m very open to a discussion about how to fix Congress. From what I see, that’s a problem with Feinstein and Landrieu on the Democratic side and with Collins and Spector on the Republican. On this forum, the O’Reilly campaign has offered what is essentially theater criticism and comments about O’Reilly’s superior work ethic and ability to work with others.
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That’s all very nice but if conservative Democrats don’t act like Democrats and moderate Republicans don’t act moderate, we’re just stuck. I want to hear a plan for changing that and not reports on missing votes that didn’t matter anyway.
Of course, I owe you an explanation. I mean, you are an anonymous Internet poster named “Paco”. If you don't have the right to demand that I explain why I will not support Ed's campaign for the Senate, who does?
Paco, my dear, sweet Paco, were it not for you and your exclamation points I may have never written in such great detail why I don't support Ed. But you, brave Paco, you are so thoughtful, asking, nay insisting, that I come clean and so Paco, for you (and only you), I will.
I am a Kerry supporter. There I said it. Oh, how I have waited for the day when I could finally live free of the shame. But Paco, sweet, dim Paco, there's more. So much more.
Well, let's see where should I begin…so I hear that this guy is going to run against Senator Kerry. Being the political dork and Kerry supporter that I am, I hit the Interwebs, do some Googling and some Lexis-Nexusing, talk some other political dorks who live up in Ed's part of the world. And here is what I find out about Ed:
Is that enough, Paco? I have more. I'm going to save the time Ed represented a drunk driver who killed someone for around Christmas. It's a heartwarming holiday tale for the whole family. It's amazing what you can find on the Internet. I tried to find some evidence that Ed actually volunteered for the Wounded Knee Indian Legal Defense team like he said on BMG but couldn't find anything. But back then Ed wasn't Ed O'Reilly for Senate so maybe he did. I'm not sure how or when he did it since he worked throughout college and during law school but I can't imagine that Ed would lie.
There it is, Paco. It's for those reasons– and Ed's complete and total lack of qualifications for the job– that I won't be supporting his candidacy.
But you're right, Paco, I should be nicer and pay Ed a compliment. So Ed, of all the no-shot candidates running against Senator Kerry who have also helped get drunk drivers back behind the wheel and heroin dealers back on the street, you're my favorite.
if there is even the most minor scratch on my volvo within the next 10 years, i’m blaming you. got it my dear sweetie!!!!! paco
What a lot of information. It would be useful, I suppose, if links and citations from all the Googling and Lexis-Nexusing could be provided. The School Committee resignation — if true — certainly undercuts the work ethic attack on Kerry.
As a community, we outlaw bad stuff. People who need defense attorneys either have done bad stuff or appear to have done bad stuff. You can’t be a defense attorney unless, as part of your profession, you say good stuff about bad people. The category “bad people” includes heroin dealers and violent criminals. Our system of jurisprudence would not function without this band of professional rationalizers.
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Are you saying that having been a defense attorney is a disqualification for higher office?
By cloaking his professional experience as “defending the Constitution,” Ed is, at least in my eyes, clearly attempting to paint himself as some sort of ACLU firebrand, when he is, in fact, closer to how one North Shore resident described him to me: “the guy parents call when their kid's busted for drinking and driving.”
Now, it's not like this state is afraid of electing criminal defense attorneys– half the State House is criminal defense attorney– but I don't see how Ed can claim to be working on behalf of the kids of Gloucester as a School Committee member and then turn around and defend the drunk drivers and drug dealers who threaten the community's public safety.
And so when Ed rips Kerry for not being in DC for the foregone conclusion of the FISA vote so he could be in MA for the Pan-Mass Challenge, I have to start wondering how many school committee or city council meetings did Ed miss or skip out on early so he could get a jump on defending a drunk driver or drug dealer? The voters of Gloucester hired Ed to do a job, same as the voters of MA hired Kerry. Now maybe Ed never, ever missed a meeting but (1) he did step down as chairman of the school comm. because of the workload, and (2) for a guy so politically active, does it strike anyone else as strange that he only manages to serve one term on the council and school comm. and then doesn't run again? Where's the commitment?
Anyways, here are some of the links and stuff people KBusch was asking about. Oh, and it helps if you use Ed's professional name when searching- Edward J. O'Reilly.
Ed and George Sideris– http://www.officer.c… (there are more articles out there if you want extra Ed)
Ed stepping down as Gloucester School Comm. Chairman after half his term– “I gave (the chairmanship) up because it was too many calls and too much coordination. I thought somebody with more time could do a better job.” http://www.gloucestertimes.com/punews/local_story_163093919?page=2 (and I think Dave Wedge had this in the Herald too)
Ed's criminal cases– Don't have the links from Lexis but if anyone really wants to check them out, here are the names of the cases. Commonwealth vs. paul j. ciaramitaro- foursome smuggling heroin from NYC, best part– woman hiding five bags of heroin up her vagina (classy). Commonwealth vs. Emilio Fossa– repeat drunk driver, Ed tried to get second conviction thrown out, also there's a great quote from Ed explaining to the judge that he really didn't do that great a job defending Fossa (definitely what you want to hear from your defense attorney or candidate for the United States Senate).
As someone who has had the opportunity to serve in public education in both elected or appointed positions, I also question Ed’s commitment. I’ve had the rare opportunity to have been elected to several terms for school committee in two different communities in this state. I’ve also served as chairman for both committees. In between that, The Board of Education appointed me to two terms on one of their advisory councils (which I also co-chaired). And I worked fulltime also.
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Are you saying that having been a defense attorney is a disqualification for higher office?
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Even if you were a lawyer, you still wouldn’t know what International Law is.
you still wouldn’t know what International Law is.
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..nobody does.
Your comments made my day.
thanks for this Masshole. Humor, good writing and well-documented, clearly enunciated points… what more could we ask for?
Thanks for taking Kerry to task for yet another missed (or ignored) opportunity to stand up for Massachusetts Democratic principles like the rule of law.
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The usual suspects on this blog are chiming in against you with their varied and contradictory reasons why K shouldn’t be expected to do any leadership — he’s too busy being ‘progressive’ in the abstract; his vote doesn’t matter; he can’t recruit any allies; etc. — plus their typical attempts to take the spotlight off the issue you are raising and turn it to criticize you for challenging K in the first place.
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The Dems are in such sad shape. They have K as their standard-bearer in the last election who refused to fight to count the Ohio votes, and now his dutiful supporters on the blogs who chime in to support and excuse his and their timidity. Your challenge to Kerry — and progressive challenges to other do-nothing Dems in Congress — is the medicine the Dems and the country needs.
Suppose Senator Kerry does decide to lead a filibuster of the Mukasey nomination. In light of the fact that enough Senators have already commited to a vote to nominate, the chances of getting the others to agree to a filibuster are rather slim.
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So what happens when those other Senators tell Kerry ‘No way, John, we’re not going down that road’? What happens if, after hours and hours of trying to convince your colleagues Schumer, and the rest still decide to vote for the guy?
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Does he filibuster alone, a la Mr Smith goes to Washington? It doesn’t work that way.
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In August, Kennedy introduced legislation to define torture: S. 1943: A bill to establish uniform standards for interrogation techniques applicable to individuals, which Kerry cosponsored. That is the way to go. Mukasey wants to hedge his bets as to what constitutes torture? Let’s make it easier for him to define it and harder for him to find loopholes!
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Ed, you do realize that with the standards to which you hold our Junior Senator, were you to replace him, we would expect you to adhere to those same standards, right?
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So we would demand that you, and you alone, lead filibusters of undesirable legislation, nominees, and whatnot. We would expect you to be the lone wolf in the Senate, no matter what the cost might be.
who is a team player, too!
Yes, I agree that I would stand alone, if necessary, and will not back down.
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Ed
It is absolutely fair to expect both Senators Kennedy and Kerry to filibuster the nomination of Michael Mukasey as Attorney General.
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I have called the offices of both and have told them so.
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Actually, it is fair to expect EVERY Senator to filibuster this nomination. (I know, I know. But read on.)
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It’s simple. Every single Senator has taken an oath to uphold the Constitution.
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But, at his confirmation hearing, aspiring AG & thus chief U.S. law enforcement officer Michael Mukasey testified that he wouldn’t.
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Here’s Mukasey’s sworn answer, at his confirmation hearing, to this fundamental question:
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“Is the President of the United States required to obey federal statutes?”
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Mukasey’s answer would earn you an F in Constitutional Law:
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“That would have to depend, on whether what goes outside the statute nonetheless lies within the authority of the president to defend the country.”
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Sorry, Mike. The answer is “Yes, the President is required to obey federal statutes.” No exceptions.
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I was a federal prosecutor. Anything that, as Mukasey so quaintly weasels, “goes outside the statute,” breaks the law.
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NOWHERE does the Constitution authorize the President to break the law. Nor does any statute, or any judicial decision of which I am aware. (Have to hedge that last one, given G.W. Bush’s “unitary executive” judicial picks.)
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We need an AG who will require the President, like you & me & every other American, to obey the law.
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Why must Senator Kerry in particular filibuster this baneful nomination? Because Kerry is up for reelection in 2008, and he wants our votes.
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If Kerry refuses to uphold the Constitution by filibustering Mukasey, then he’s finking out on his oath –and he does not deserve our votes.
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I’d rather have a junior Senator with the guts to uphold the Constitution because he takes his oath of office seriously.
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Right now, unfortunately, we have one who has to be pushed into it, and pushed hard.
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It’s why I support Ed O’Reilly.
confirmed, but considering Schumer is supporting him a filibuster will go nowhere. I would prefer no AG to anyone Bush nominates. It will not change much. You could say that launching a doomed filibuster at least makes a statement, but it also strengthens the hand of the president to crow about having beaten it back. Mukasey in this position, unlike Alito, is only going to be in the office as long as the Repubs hold the White House. Kerry advocates on the right side of this issue. If there is a filibuster it should come from someone else–Kerry is chairing Small Business and active in the Foreign Relations committee.
The Nattering nabobs of Negativity caved—yet again!