Armed with a host of logical fallacies, John Ashcroft "defended" his tactics, which include constitutionally infirm military tribunals, the detention of hundreds of immigrants, "voluntary" interviews with over 1,000 men of Arabic descent, and eavesdropping between attorneys and their clients.
According to The Nation, most Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee gave Mr. Ashcroft a free ride during the hearings, with the exception of Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania and Mike DeWine of Ohio. Orrin Hatch (Retard-UT), making his usual dumbass proclamations, defended Ashcroft saying that the Senate should refrain from exercising "aggressive oversight." I suppose it would be better for the Senate to just let the Bush Administration do whatever they please, constitutional or not. Apparently the stupidfuck isn't familiar with "checks and balances" or "division of powers."
As for the Democrats on the Judiciary Committee, Maria Cantwell (D-WA), who was rightfully concerned with Ashcroft's advances into tracking Internet communications, asked, "Who should be watching the watchers?" to which Ashcroft, avoiding the question completely, replied with his tale of a comic. The comic depicted Santa Claus, who knows when a child is sleeping and knows when a child is awake, and a child sitting on his lap responding, "Who do you think you are, John Ashcroft?" Ashcroft and many people in the room began laughing as Cantwell responded, "I'm not sure everybody in America is laughing at that."
Not all Democrats (on or off the Judiciary Committee) are against Ashcroft's unconstitutional bullshit, however. Zell Miller (Dumbass-GA), who bends over for the Bush Administration on a regular basis, commented, "Let Attorney General Ashcroft do his job...These nitpickers need to find another nit to pick. They need to stop protecting the rights of terrorists." Mr. Miller seems like he is suffering from a case of Constitutionalis Ignoramus.
I submit that Attorney General Ashcroft is behaving like a tyrant. An ideal definition of tyrant would be a person, in a position of political or social power, who launches ad hominem (i.e. personal) attacks on those who have legitimate concerns with the actions of that person, rather than defending his actions with intelligence.
Sadly, it looks as if Ashcroft's war on civil liberties (with the exception of gun rights) is going full speed ahead.
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