My Aisling

Sen. Gregg (R-NH) KO's Schumer in the 2d Round

Sen. Schumer apparently got onto the Senate floor during a debate on a pension bill and launched some diatribe about W doing nothing about terrorism, W could have prevented September 11, W not learning the lesson of history, and so on. It was a typically unhinged, unsubstantiated, easily dismantled liberal statement. And, of interest, you just know it was prepared ahead of time.

NH Senator Gregg took strong exception to it - in an unprepared, eloquent floor speech.

Some excerpts:

"Mr. President, I hadn't thought that this debate was going to enlarge itself into the issue of the testimony before the 9/11 Commission, but it appears that the other side of the aisle has decided the pension bill is not enough to debate today ...

...

"Well, I'll tell you something, this Administration did learn from lessons of the past. And lessons of the past were the lessons of the Clinton Administration, which when we were attacked, our Embassies were attacked in Africa and when our ship was attacked in Yemen, what was the response of the prior Administration? They lobbed a missile into an empty -- an empty! -- terrorist camp in Afghanistan and then lobbed another missile into the wrong factory in Sudan. And then they washed their hands of Mr. Bin Laden and said they had done their purpose of defeating terrorism.

...

"I hesitate to think where we would be today had Al Gore been elected President. I suspect we would still be negotiating with the Taliban in Afghanistan.

...

"Saddam Hussein was a significant, dramatic threat to world peace and specifically was a dictator who had used weapons of mass destruction, who was oppressive at a level which hadn't been seen since the times of Nazi Germany, and who had the capacity to use his oppressiveness and his megalomania and his criminal view of the world to our detriment. He was a threat to us because of his ability to pass on that threat, the capacity to pass on weaponry, the capacity to be a sanctuary, and the capacity to be a feeding ground for people who caused us harm."

When liberals speak as Schumer did and Gregg responds as he felt he must, I can smell that unmistakable whiff of freshly cut grass and cigarette smoke, cotton candy and oil-burning engines running carousels. It is a carnival. And there in a hat with a $1.00 cane is Chuckie Schumer, barker extraordinaire, with all of his oversized polyester stuffed pandas. "Right here, just make three shots in a row and pick your choice!" Sen. Gregg just wants this babbling idiot to shut up, so he puts his dollar down and quickly launches three shots, all in, another dollar, another three in, another dollar ...

Barker Chuckie doesn't respond because he has nothing worthwhile to say. He just waits until Sen. Gregg walks away and then starts to flap his oddly shaped lips again.