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Jewish World Review
Feb. 18, 2013/ 8 Adar, 5773
Lindsey Graham's no deal
By
Dana Milbank
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Lindsey Graham is turning himself into the mad dog of Capitol Hill.
First, the Republican senator from South Carolina opposed Chuck Hagel’s nomination to be defense secretary because of Hagel’s foreign policy views. Then he argued that Hagel had not produced sufficient background material. Now he’s arguing against Hagel because of the administration’s handling of the attack on U.S. diplomats in Benghazi, Libya, last September — when Hagel was a professor at Georgetown University. “I am going to fight the idea of jamming somebody through until we get answers about what the president did personally when it came to the Benghazi debacle,” he said in the Senate TV studio Wednesday, a day before his unprecedented filibuster of a nominee to a national-security Cabinet post. “How do you respond to critics who say you’re just moving the goal posts?” CNN’s Dana Bash asked. “Oh, I’m going to take every opportunity. I’m not denying it,” he answered. “You are moving the goal posts?” Bash asked. Several of us in the room chuckled. “No!” Graham said, then explained how he was indeed moving the posts. “I’m going to hit you and keep hitting you, absolutely,” he said, raising his voice. Thumping the lectern, he added, “You better believe I’m not going to let this thing go.” Fox News’s Chad Pergram pointed out that the treatment he was giving Hagel was in a “rare category.” Graham made a fist. “Am I supposed to sit on the sidelines and be a good compliant Republican and just let this administration not account for what I think is a national security breakdown of monumental proportions?” He added that “I guaran-damn-tee you” that Democrats would treat a Republican president even worse. And I guaran-damn-tee you this: Graham’s antics have as much to do with events in Columbia, S.C., as with events in Washington. His sentiments are no doubt genuine, but the ferocity with which he has been attacking the Obama administration — taking a high-profile role on Benghazi, Susan Rice, Hagel and gun control — are helping him to repel a tea party primary challenge at home. Graham acknowledged the pressure when I asked him about the influence of home-state politics on his recent actions. “You know, I’m in a red state. I know I’m always exposed in a Republican primary,” he said. But he argued, correctly, that he continues to take a leading role on immigration, which infuriates many conservatives. “I think it’s positive for me to one day beat the hell out of them and the next day see if we can do a deal,” he said. He described his role in the opposition as a balance between saying “yes for the common good of the country where you can” and saying “no because you need to.” The problem is Graham, to get through the 2014 primary, needs to say “no” more often now. And Congress can hardly afford for one of its few remaining dealmakers to take an obstreperous turn. But perhaps Graham should be given some slack. The Republican primary system has gone haywire, and this may be the only way a sensible lawmaker can survive it. Not too long ago, Graham had been in deep trouble with South Carolina conservatives because of his talk about climate-change legislation, his votes for both of Obama’s Supreme Court nominees, his criticism of the Bush administration’s wiretapping and interrogation programs, and his championing of “Grahamnesty” immigration reforms. But the gradual repositioning has apparently worked. A survey by Public Policy Polling in December found that the percentage of Republicans saying they would vote for him in a primary has climbed to 51 percent from 37 percent in January 2011. And Graham isn’t letting up. At a hearing on gun control, he unnerved a witness, a U.S. attorney, by beginning his questions with a blunt inquiry: “Do you own a gun?” At a Benghazi hearing, he got the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to admit he was “surprised” about Hillary Clinton’s ignorance of the ambassador to Libya’s request for more security shortly before he was killed. And Graham delivered a memorable hectoring of Hagel for the nominee’s prior claim that lawmakers are “intimidated” by the Israel lobby. “Name one,” Graham challenged. Hagel couldn’t. Graham, who has voted the conservative line 90 percent of the time over his career, argues that his new positions are consistent with his previous ones — and they are. But the difference is in the emphasis. In order to survive the Republicans’ backward primary system, Graham needs to de-emphasize anything that might make him appear to be reasonable.
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Previously:
• 02/12/13 A Lew-dicrous loophole
• 02/12/13 Let the bleak times roll
• 02/12/13 Senator of the evening: Bob Menendez has been selling his influence
• 02/11/13 'Trust me' is not enough on drone warfare
• 02/07/13 Chip off the Paul block: How will Rand separate from his father?
• 02/06/13 Empty talk, happy talk
• 02/05/13 John Kerry, finally where he belongs
• 02/04/13 With a friend like Jim Inhofe ...
• 01/29/13 Rubio's immigration 'reality' show
• 01/27/13 Ryan And Pence Represent Polar Opposites Of GOP
• 01/24/13 Congress's daffy duck saga
• 01/22/13 So much for unity: Obama's speech failed to rise to the moment
• 01/21/13 Less an inauguration than a tepid rerun
• 01/03/13 The GOP's savior
• 01/03/13 Boehner defined by a Sandy sidestep
• 12/21/12 Obama in focus, yet all over the map
• 12/20/12 A deal or a mutiny
• 12/13/12 Joe Lieberman's sad send-off
• 12/10/12 Post-thought think tank: Why DeMint and Heritage are a perfect pair
• 12/06/12 Republicans wave the white flag
• 12/05/12 Romney's last duty
• 12/04/12 Obama's poor efforts at transparency
• 12/03/12 The urge to purge: Rational Republicans defy purists at their own peril
• 11/30/12 The naked 'fiscal' truth: Lawmakers can't hide the lack of progress
• 11/28/12 Santorum's new cause: opposing the disabled
• 11/20/12 Norquist in defeat
• 11/19/12 Susan Rice's tarnished resume
• 11/15/12 Let those poor states secede
• 11/12/12 Whole lot of blaming going on
• 11/08/12 At Romney headquarters, the defeat of the 1 percent
• 11/07/12 Why I voted Republican
• 11/06/12 Romney's new tune
• 11/01/12 The Supreme Court's dog-day afternoon
• 10/31/12 A perfect political storm
• 10/29/12 Behind the Clinton 'bromance,' a stealth campaign
• 10/25/12 A Trumped-up bomb
• 10/24/12 Groupthink Live: How conventional wisdom congeals in 2012
• 10/23/12 The sound of worldviews not colliding
• 10/22/12 The tea party is helping Dems
• 10/18/12 Moderate Mitt wins conservatives' blessings
• 10/16/12 Reid's latest salvos are beneath the dignity of his office
• 10/08/12 Obama pays price for ducking the questions
• 10/05/12 Mitt Romney holds his own -- and then some -- in first debate
• 10/03//12 The Zinger candidacy --- all sugary platitudes, no protein
• 09/25/12 Obama makes room for 'The View'
• 08/17/12 Hateful speech on 'hate' groups: The Family Research Council is no KKK
• 08/16/12 Now Dems are employing harsh tactics
• 08/14/12 Paul Ryan on soapbox at Iowa State Fair
• 08/13/12 Romney's welfare gambit
• 08/07/12 Harry Reid's latest broadside
• 07/26/12 Romney can't have it both ways on defense spending, tax cuts
• 07/19/12 Ron Paul, fed up
• 07/17/12 The rotten results of one-party rule
• 07/11/12 The missing giants of the Senate
• 07/09/12 Representative Gaffe
• 07/02/12 The umpire strikes back
• 06/25/12 Norquist delivers the GOP's marching orders
• 06/19/12 The left, feeling left out
• 06/18/12 Skip the falsehoods, Mr. President, and give us a plan
• 06/15/12 The Wall Street Senate
• 06/13/12 Jeb Bush's heresy
• 06/12/12 Pileup at the White House
• 06/11/12 Obama's fate could be in Europe's hands
• 06/04/12 Welcome to Camp Competitive
• 05/31/12 Digging a racial grave
• 05/30/12 A new conspiracy theory: Is Romney a unicorn?
• 05/29/12 Do Republicans really want to clone one for the Gipper?
• 05/24/12 Obama's protectors are under the microscope
• 05/22/12 Obama's Old World mess: Allies are coming up short at a key moment
• 05/16/12 Where have all the candidates gone?
• 05/15/12 Barack Obama, the first female president
• 05/14/12 Irrationality wins: Voter cure for Congress's failures will likely backfire
• 05/08/12 Obama's marriage mess: His advisers scramble to clean up his 'evolution'
• 05/07/12 Taking out Dick Lugar
• 05/03/12 Gingrich may have ended campaign, but he will remain out of this world
• 05/02/12 Our do-almost-nothing Congress
• 05/01/12 President Obama, campaigner in chief
• 04/25/12 Romney's immigration Etch a Sketch
• 04/23/12 A congressional deal on immigration? Dream on
• 04/19/12 Dems battle back against Republican 'war on women'
• 04/18/12 Debauchery: An American govermental specialty
• 04/17/12 Silent witness
• 04/12/12 Rebuffing Obama's gimmicky 'Buffett Rule'
• 04/11/12 Santorum's Gettysburg surrender
• 04/09/12 The facts vs. Mitt Romney
• 04/06/12 Mitt Romney, talking to the press, keeps the press at a distance
• 04/05/12 From tracking al-Qaeda to tracking the wayward spouse
• 04/04/12 Budget cuts as back-door deregulation
• 03/26/12 My pet Mitt
• 03/22/12 Mitt Romney's latest gaffe may be etched in history
• 03/20/12 Supreme Court conceives of life after death
• 03/15/12 Conservative for Obama: The British PM as campaign prop
• 03/14/12 In Section 60, a silent search for meaning
• 03/13/12 Super Friends, unite
• 03/12/12 It's time to believe: Romney's a winner
• 03/07/12 Settling in to Washington's ways
• 03/06/12 AIPAC beats the drums of war
• 03/05/12 Did Republicans forget the women's vote?
• 02/29/12 Mitt Romney's acceptance speech, in (mostly) his own words
• 02/28/12 Common ground becomes a great divide
• 02/27/12 An expert witness for the GOP gender gap
• 02/21/12 Where Romney shines
• 02/15/12 A Republican death wish?
• 02/14/12Obama's budget games
• 02/13/12 Are GOPers playing right into Obama's hands?
• 02/08/12 Obama pumps the compressor of Joe Hudy's Extreme Marshmallow Cannon
• 02/07/12 Abramoff's atonement
• 02/01/12 Why we in the media just love Newt
• 01/31/12 The end of the road for Newt Gingrich?
• 01/25/12 Gingrich is Obama's best surrogate
• 01/24/12 Tim Pawlenty, Mitt Romney's attack dog
• 01/16/12 Mitt Romney's Al Gore problem
• 01/12/12 Kamikaze Gingrich, on the loose in South Carolina
• 01/11/12 Journalists' campaign trail secrets revealed
• 01/10/12 Mitt Romney's money problem
• 01/09/12 Newtonian exceptionalism
• 01/05/12 Mitt Romney out of control
• 01/04/12 Indecision 2012: In Iowa and the GOP
• 01/03/12 Rick Santorum's curious closing argument
• 12/28/11 A few cracks in my crystal ball
• 12/23/11 A few cracks in my crystal ball
• 12/20/11 Strange brews and views?
• 12/19/11 Cellphone ban would be a distraction
• 12/15/11 Harry Reid, Mitch McConnell and the Malfunction Minuet
• 12/14/11 The presidential auction of 2012
• 12/12/11 Newt's tactics comes back to haunt him
• 12/06/11 Can an anthem save Occupy non-movement?
• 12/05/11 The winner of the GOP campaign: Washington
• 11/30/11 Barney the bully: Congressman Frank's other legacy
• 11/23/11 Jon Kyl's search-and-destroy mission
• 11/21/11 Pay to play, brought to you by Washington
• 11/17/11 Big enough to save the supercommittee?
• 11/16/11 Why Newt Gingrich won't last
• 11/08/11 The 2012 campaign gets seedier
• 11/06/11 A Machiavellian model for Obama
• 11/03/11 The Herman Cain crack-up
• 11/01/11 Cain can --- he will survive
• 10/27/11 Stuntmen of the supercommittee
• 10/26/11 Democrats on the sidelines
• 10/24/11 Rick Perry's birther Parade
• 10/24/11 The birthers eat their own
• 10/19/11 The GOP's middle man
• 10/17/11 The waiting for nothing Congress
• 10/12/11 Sparsely occupied D.C.: Why the movement hasn't caught on
• 10/10/11 Can Obama strike an alliance with Occupy Wall Street?
• 10/06/11 Chris Christie, such a presidential tease
• 10/05/11 Obama and his foot soldiers go toe to toe
• 09/28/11 Cain could deliver
• 09/26/11 Republicans? Mr. Nice Guys?
• 09/22/11 Why Ron Paul is winning the GOP primary
• 09/21/11 I am a job creator who creates no jobs
• 09/20/11 Obama launches a revolution
• 09/19/11 Dems for Romney?
• 09/14/11 ‘Supercommittee’? More than stupor committee
• 09/07/11 Mitt Romney finds his (corporate) voice
• 09/01/11 The infallible Dick Cheney
• 08/31/11 This liberal says Perry is the ultimate conservative candidate
• 08/29/11 Wanted: More bite from Obama the Great Nibbler
• 08/10/11 How Rep. Austin Scott betrayed his Tea Party roots
• 08/09/11 The most powerful man on Earth?
• 08/08/11 The FAA shutdown and the new rules of Washington
• 08/04/11 Lt. Col. Allen West fires a round at the Tea Party
• 08/03/11 Government on autopilot
• 08/02/11 Dems mourn debt deal like death
• 07/27/11 Life imitates sport
• 07/26/11 Obama and Boehner take on Washington
• 07/21/11 Why Americans are angry at Congress
• 07/20/11 The new party of Reagan
• 07/18/11 Rob Portman, the boring Midwesterner who could bring sanity to the debt debate
• 07/13/11 John Boehner's bind
• 07/04/11 Stephen Colbert, Karl Rove and the mockery of campaign finance
• 07/01/11 President Puts Up His Dukes, As He Ought To
• 06/28/11 Rod Blagojevich verdict: All shook up
• 06/27/11 Progressives voice their anger at Obama
• 06/24/11 ‘Mission accomplished,’ Obama style
• 06/22/11 Jon Huntsman's first step toward oblivion
• 06/21/11 Scott Walker finds making bumper stickers is easier than creating jobs
• 06/20/11 A day of awkwardness with Mitt Romney
• 06/06/11 Hubris and humility: Sarah Palin and Robert Gates on tour
• 06/02/11 The Weiner roast
• 06/01/11 Congress clocks in to clock out
• 05/30/11 Hermanator II: No More Mr. Gadfly
• 05/24/11 How Obama has empowered Netanyahu
• 05/24/11 Pawlenty bends his truth-telling
• 05/20/11 Default deniers say it's all a hoax
• 05/18/11: Gingrich gives voice to moderation
• 05/17/11: Donald Trump and the House of Horrors
• 05/16/11: The medical mystery of Mitt Romney
• 05/12/11: The body impolitic: Schock photos should tempt lawmakers to cover up
• 05/10/11: Muskets in hand, tea party blasts House Republicans
• 05/09/11: The GOP debate: America -- and the party -- needs the grown-ups
• 05/05/11: Mitch Daniels, an alternative to scary
• 05/03/11: Obama's victory lap
• 05/02/11: How the journalist prom got out of control
• 04/28/11: Obama's birther day: Why did he lower himself by appearing in the briefing room?
• 04/27/11: Obama, lost in thought
• 04/24/11: Andrew Breitbart and the rifts on the right
• 04/22/11: Ten Commandments for 2012
• 04/21/11: Obama likes Facebook. Facebook likes Obama.
• 04/18/11: Without Nancy Pelosi, Obama is adrift
• 04/15/11: If progressives ran the world
• 04/14/11: Faith in political apostasy
• 04/13/11: One man's revolution is another's political expediency
• 04/11/11: Shutdown theatrics
• 04/06/11: Paul Ryan's irresponsible budget
• 04/05/11: Robots in Congress? Yes, we replicant!
• 04/04/11: Robert Gibbs, Facebook and the White House corporate placement service
• 04/01/11: Haley Barbour, the fat cats' candidate
• 03/31/11: Republican freshmen in House shut down compromise, and possibly the government
• 03/30/11: Coburn and Durbin, the dynamic duo of the debt crisis
• 03/28/11: The Obama doctrine: A gray area the size of Libya
• 03/24/11: Dems as Weiners
• 03/23/11: Obama's quick trip from tyrant to weakling
• 03/17/11: Who's afraid of Elizabeth Warren?
• 03/15/11: The underwear flap over Bradley Manning
• 03/10/11: In Senate's debt debate, talk isn't cheap
• 03/09/11: With Obama's new Gitmo policy, Administration officials had some 'splainin to do
• 03/02/11: Issa press aide scandal is like bad reality TV
• 02/25/11: Jay Carney: Mouthpiece for an inscrutable White House
• 02/14/11: The Donald trumps the pols at CPAC
• 02/09/11: Arianna Huffington's ideological transformation
© 2011, Washington Post Writers Group
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