While a large bipartisan group of senators handed President Obama a third victory in the lame-duck session of Congress Wednesday when they voted to ratify a nuclear arms treaty with Russia, Alabama’s two Republican senators voted against it, which comes as no real “surprise, surprise,” as Gomer Pyle would have said.
Perhaps reflecting the somewhat racist anti-Obama sentiment of corporate leaders and conservative Republican constituents in their home state, both of Alabama’s Republican senators, Richard Shelby of Tuscaloosa and Jeff Sessions of Mobile, mouthed off about the deal.
“I don’t believe the American people overall would feel that this administration’s number one priority, although despite what they say, is the security of this country,” Shelby told a Newhouse reporter in Washington, D.C. What informed readers might wonder is this: Does he mean the security of the country? Or the financial security of Shelby and his supporters in the military-industrial complex in Alabama?
“They want to negotiate treaties,” Shelby scoffed. “And a lot of people in the negotiating, I believe, might be a little soft on security and defense.”
Right. Or, perhaps they have a different philosophy. Maybe they see that keeping track of and reducing nuclear weapons makes for a safer world, rather than continuing to spend the trillions it takes to keep the escalating arms race economy “growing.”
Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama issued an opening statement this morning in the Supreme Court confirmation hearings of Sonia Sotomayor that is so misleading it requires serious analysis. Here are a few of the highlights with explanatory remarks.
“This hearing is important because I believe our legal system is at a dangerous crossroads,” Sessions said, a view he must share alone, since I don’t know anyone else who believes that.
“Down one path is the traditional American legal system, so admired around the world, where judges impartially apply the law to the facts without regard to their own personal views. Indeed, our legal system is based on a firm belief in an ordered universe and objective truth. The trial is the process by which the impartial and wise judge guides us to the truth.
“Down the other path lies a ‘Brave New World’ where words have no true meaning and judges are free to decide what facts they choose to see. In this world, a judge is free to push his or her own political and social agenda. I reject this view.”
On the face of it, this is a ridiculous analysis of politics and the law in America’s system of three branches of government. Sessions seems to define objectivity the same way Fox News defines it, as Fair and Balanced — as long as it is conservative and Republicans agree with it. He knows nothing of “objective truth,” only he thinks his views should be the views of mainstream America. In the Bush era, they sort of had that going on, thanks to Karl Rove’s spin. But it’s not true anymore…
Alabama’s junior Senator Jeff Sessions, who has emerged as the ranking minority member of the Senate Judiciary Committee and will be getting his 15-minutes of fame as the lead attack dog on President Barack Obama’s nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court when confirmation hearings begin July 13, tipped his hand on one of the issues that will come up this morning on Fox News.
During the Bush years, we specialized in covering the politicization of the U.S. justice system as much as any news organization. Our archives are about the most comprehensive for anyone researching the prosecution of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman, and the original case against Richard Scrushy, which Glynn Wilson covered for The New York Times.
