Althouse: "Sorry, haters, God is not finished with me yet."

November 28, 2006

"Sorry, haters, God is not finished with me yet."

So said Alcee Hastings, responding to the news that he will not chair the House Intelligence Committee.

29 comments:

Doug said...: So he is blaming his problems on the dreaded "Playa haters". I guess we should all just hate the game, not the player.; 11/28/06, 7:44 PM
Eli Blake said...: I'm a strong liberal, and I was very loathe to criticize just after a victory, but on this one, I did have to be critical:

http://tiodt.blogspot.com/2006/11/chair-of-intelligence-committee.html

Let him chair some other committee, just not this one.; 11/28/06, 8:00 PM
Simon said...: Well, Alcee, He may not be. But we apparently are. Goodbye. :p; 11/28/06, 8:09 PM
Eli Blake said...: What does this have to do with gay marriage?

I was against Alcee Hastings as chair of the intel committee because someone with evil intent might try to pay him for information that would endanger American lives.

That is completely, unequivably, a different issue from gay marriage.

Which is why, even on those rare occasions when I actually agree with the right, they shortly thereafter overreach and remind me why I'm a liberal.; 11/28/06, 8:33 PM
Gahrie said...: Uhhmmm Eli...

You might just need to check your sarcasm meter..I don't think yours is working just now.; 11/28/06, 8:42 PM
The Drill SGT said...: Once upon a time, I was a custodian of nuclear codes. Not the "football" but out in the field. If the POTUS ever ordered the use of nuclear weapons, it goes out in a series of messages that need to be decoded and confirmed by 2 person teams, but I digress. The point is, I have a bit of experience being the subject of security investigations and providing oversight of others with very sensitive jobs.

I can't imagine that anyone code get a TS SCI clearance with a personal file that included:

1. trial for felony bribery and selling of a federal office
2. huge debts
3. a very complicated personal/professional situation (stories of kept women on the Congressional payroll)

I'd really like to know who does the adjudication of TS clearances for Congressmen. I suspect it would be the CIA or FBI rather than DoD. Investigations these days are done by OMB, but it's the agencies that hold classified material that adjudicate investigations and grant the clearance.; 11/28/06, 9:04 PM
Simon said...: Sarge,
I would simplify it even further. The number of Federal judges who have been impeached and removed from office over the course of two centuries can be counted on two hands, with digits to spare. The short story is that anyone on that list shouldn't be in any position of authority ever again, and Hastings should kiss the ground every day, giving thanks that a procedural mistake during the impeachment process led to failure to disable him from holding public office thereafter.

Eli,
I think it's pretty clear that ignacio was sarcastically mocking Hastings' pseudo-religious gibberish and the Democrats' knee-jerk hostility to Christianity.; 11/28/06, 9:17 PM
Anonymous said...: The CIA actually favored Hastings, as they thought he would be very cooperative.; 11/28/06, 9:29 PM
Tim said...: "Sorry haters, God is not finished with me yet."

What a mean, faith-based thing to say to Grandmama Pelosi and her advisors.; 11/28/06, 9:29 PM
ada47 said...: I suppose I should ask Reynolds himself why he said the following, but since I'm here, now, maybe some of all y'all can give me insight.

On Instapundit , I read that dropping Hastings is "bad news for the GOP, but good news for the Democrats, and the country".

Is there some reason, other than obvious partisanship, that something that is good for the Democrats and good for the country is bad for the GOP?; 11/28/06, 9:40 PM
The Drill SGT said...: downtownlad said...
The CIA actually favored Hastings, as they thought he would be very cooperative.

I'm not a big CIA fan, but neither do I see black helicopters buzzing my house either.

However, doesn't it concern one a bit if the "CIA he would be very cooperative"

that seems to smell like they have somthing one him.

PS: Simon, I think the count is 6. You have to ask yourself who the incompetent (or very competent)Democrat lead staff lawyer was who drafted the Senate bill of impeachment.; 11/28/06, 9:53 PM
Anonymous said...: Drill Sgt - I just mean that many in the administration thought he would be a good committee chairman.

He would have been a poor choice for the Democrats, due to his prior scandal, and the political hay Republicans would make with it.

But if you cared about the war - he would have been a good choice.; 11/28/06, 9:57 PM
The Drill SGT said...: I care a lot about the war

I don't think that the CIA counts as part of the adminstration in any sense of the word.

I do think that the Intel committee isn't a spot for hacks of either party, regardless of how pliable they are on issues I care about.; 11/28/06, 10:00 PM
John said...: Good for the country= probably the worst of possible candidates won't get a very sensitive and important job; good for the Democrats= they have avoided a huge mistake in judgement that would have played heavily to the Republicans' favor come 2008; and bad for the Republicans= they have been deprived of a major offensive weapon to use against the Democrats in the 2008 elections.

Glenn Reynolds has often said that he prefers having a viable Democratic party rather than an unopposably powerful Republican party. Having the Dems as a real threat to the center will (hopefully) keep the GOP honest.; 11/28/06, 10:12 PM
Eli Blake said...: Democrats' knee-jerk hostility to Christianity.

Uh, excuse me. I am a Christian (though some hard core 'Christians' would claim I never accepted Christ because they don't consider my church to be the 'right' kind of Christian.) I am also a Democrat.

I just don't buy the idea that religion means making laws designed to force other people who may not agree with me, to nevertheless have to live the same way that I choose to live voluntarily.

Let me give you an idea of where my philosophy on this lies (as do a number of liberal Christians):

About three or four years ago (this was before 9/11), I was exchanging posts on a message board with a very articulate young man from Pakistan who was an Islamic fundamentalist. This particular young man had lived in America and gone to school here, and was quite well educated (no they are not all a bunch of ignorant fanatics.) His main point was that in places like Afghanistan (which was then under control of the Taliban) there is very little 'sin,' that people all are very religious and live a very moral lifestyle. He was angry at the west for what he saw as false Christianity, in which people would go to church on Sunday morning and then watch almost naked cheerleaders on TV during Sunday afternoon football games. He was actually well versed in the Bible and would probably have really irked a lot of conservative Christians.

The problem of course is this: What if someone chooses not to live a moral lifestyle in a fundamentalist society? Well, they are punished, often severely. So they are 'moral' because of fear, not because of choice. As a matter of fact, I choose to turn off the TV on Sunday (which saved me having to watch the 'wardrobe malfunction' a few years ago) but not because I am afraid of what will happen if I turn it on (certainly not out of fear of what the civil authorities will do.) I believe that matter of choice, makes what we have here better.

And so, as a liberal and a Christian, I believe that it is best if we have a society where living any particular lifestyle is a matter of voluntary choice, not a law (nor a law prohibiting it). I don't believe that the state should be in the business of implementing religion, even if it is 'generic' religion. If I choose to pray, then I do it. But not because it is on the schedule to pray at nine fifteen every morning.

So no, Democrats are not 'knee jerk' hostile to religion. We just consider it a personal matter and don't consider that it is the business of the state or any of its institutions to do the work of proselyting for us.; 11/28/06, 10:32 PM
Ultimate_Lawyer said...: The Hastings quote is phenomenal. I hope Scalia uses it in his upcoming Carhart dissent.; 11/29/06, 1:15 AM
Anonymous said...: Is there some reason, other than obvious partisanship, that something that is good for the Democrats and good for the country is bad for the GOP?

Especially when it's hard to see how it's good for anyone - Republican, Democrat, American, the rest of the human race - that the Democrats allowed Hastings on the House Intelligence Committee at all. Cheese and crackers, I've been in psych wards with higher membership standards.; 11/29/06, 1:24 AM
reader_iam said...: I want and need Nancy Pelosi to do as good a job as possible, as we all do (as we need all of our powerful politicians to do).

So onward and upward.

But--my sweet goodness--it took her a heck of a long time to get around to seeing the obvious writing on the wall and choose a third way (we knew she, and others; couldn't stomach Harman; but there we so many others, right and left, who had problems with Hastings, and for good and, well, "reasonable" reasons.). She was equally blinded to the relatively obvious and clumsy with regard to Murtha. I wish I could say that was more surprising than it is.

I must be hopeful. But it seems to me that skepticism is required as leaven for any impulse toward optimism here. Her term hasn't even started yet, and Pelosi is--on balance--0 for 0 here.

Sigh.; 11/29/06, 1:42 AM
Anonymous said...: I am getting flat tired of people equating a political disagreement with hate. I do not believe that Alcee should be in a position of political power, nor have access to our Nation's secrets, he has proven that he cannot be trusted.
This does not mean I wish him ill, nor do I hate him. I simply do not trust him.; 11/29/06, 1:42 AM
reader_iam said...: "0 for 2"; 11/29/06, 1:43 AM
Steven said...: Is there some reason, other than obvious partisanship, that something that is good for the Democrats and good for the country is bad for the GOP?

When you're talking about the effect on a political party, as distinguished from the country on the sole grounds of party affiliation, how can the distinction be on grounds other than the partisan?

That is, why are you looking for a deeper meaning than the (to quote you) "obvious"?; 11/29/06, 2:58 AM
Steven said...: Oh -- my position is that Murtha and Hastings should have Article I, Section 5, clause 2 invoked against them -- or rather, so deserved back in 1980 and upon his first swearing-in, respectively.

In a country of 300 million people, we can do much better than a guy who didn't report a bribery attempt to the FBI, and one of the seven Federal judges in all U.S. history to by removed by impeachment. And even if their districts won't insist on it, the members of the House who are not corrupt should.

(And since they don't, yeah, that's a pretty good indication that they shouldn't have their seats, either.); 11/29/06, 3:11 AM
Bissage said...: I’m so naïve. I thought Hastings made that up all by himself. Just like Sully. When will I ever learn? When will I ever learn?; 11/29/06, 6:48 AM
Simon said...: Sarge:
"Simon, I think the count [of impeached and removed Judges] is 6."

Seven, I believe. Pickering, 1804; Humphreys, 1862; Archbald, 1913; Ritter, 1936; Claiborne, 1986, Hastings, 1988; Nixon, 1989. Hastings was the sixth judge in U.S. history to be impeached and removed, but there has been one more removed since then. Either way, of course, he is a member of one of the most select and exclusive clubs in history.

Ultimate_Lawyer said...
"The Hastings quote is phenomenal. I hope Scalia uses it in his upcoming Carhart dissent."

You are more pessimistic than am I. It remains to be seen -- that is, it depends on whether Justice Kennedy is in a Lawrence mood or a Casey mood vis-a-vis stare decisis -- whether Scalia's Carhart opinion will be a dissent or a concurrence.; 11/29/06, 7:13 AM
KCFleming said...: Hasting's full statement was quite odd. Several bland and meaningless statements, as if arising from a corporate annual report or a mayor's declaration of Multicultural Day, followed by that weird flailing stab.

I almost feel sorry for him.; 11/29/06, 7:24 AM
knox said...: Sorry haters, God is not finished with me yet.

Yikes, how cheesey. And what a baby.; 11/29/06, 7:30 AM
Dave TN said...: Drill Sgt - who is the staff lawyer that drafted the impeachment bill? I've searched but cannot find it...; 11/29/06, 8:00 AM
Beth said...: And even if their districts won't insist on it, the members of the House who are not corrupt should.

Steven, I agree. Now let's hope the Louisiana district currently represented by William Jefferson doesn't leave it up to the House to unseat him down the line when his corruption cases comes to fruition. He's running against a more liberal Democrat (pro-gay rights, pro-choice) so I'm worried some of the white conservatives won't vote at all, and the black social conservatives will weigh the social issues against a belief that "politicians are all corrupt anyway" and come out for Jefferson.; 11/29/06, 12:58 PM
Revenant said...: On Instapundit , I read that dropping Hastings is "bad news for the GOP, but good news for the Democrats, and the country". Is there some reason, other than obvious partisanship, that something that is good for the Democrats and good for the country is bad for the GOP?

You mean besides the glaringly obvious fact that politics is a zero-sum game in which it is impossible for both parties in a two-party system to simultaneously win?

No reason. Why do you ask?; 11/29/06, 7:08 PM