Senator Br'er Rabbit (D-Nev.)
I like Harriet Miers. As White House Counsel, she has worked with me in a courteous and professional manner. I am also impressed with the fact that she was a trailblazer for women as managing partner of a major Dallas law firm and as the first woman president of the Texas Bar Association.
If it's for a surge, that is, for two or three months and it's part of a program to get us out of there as indicated by this time next year, then, sure, I'll go along with it.
The latter statement by the incoming Senate majority leader is getting some attention (at least whenever the cable channels can pry their feeds off the incredible story of danger-seekers who encountered danger). Is the top Democrat on the Hill really buying into the idea that we need to send more troops to Iraq? Has John McCain convinced everyone of the rightness of a Surge, through sheer force of maverickism?
I wonder why more people don't remember that Reid has a habit for endorsing terrible Republican ideas. In the Miers case, it was pretty clear he wanted to avoid the White House yanking Miers and nominating a stronger, more conservative nominee. In this case, it's possible he enjoys the idea of hanging a doomed idea—One! Last! Push!— supported by a small number of Americans around the necks of George Bush and John McCain.
There is an obvious conclusion to all this: Harry Reid is dumb. And there is a less obvious conclusion: Harry Reid is a genius.
