The Ladies' Man

I'm still trying to catch up after what was a difficult weekend--which is probably why it took me so long to head over to James Wolcott's site after having looked at the cold dish of revenge Atrios served to Judith Regan this morning.

Interestingly, Wolcott refers to other sites for all the gossipy details--he cites Steve Gilliard and Josh Marshall specifically--but he delivers nonetheless:

Then, in one of the most heartwarming holiday tales in many a year, it all unravelled and keeps unravelling even Kerik after withdrew his name from consideration. The juicy stories keep popping out of the NY tabloids and the blogs like clowns from a clown car...

I'm glad the press is having a dance party with this, because God knows the Democrats are frozen at the steering wheel. I just saw a segment on MSNBC (which has been all over the Kerik story today, bless Rick Kaplan's cyborg heart) pitting a Republican strategist against a Democratic one, and the Democratic spokesman--who goes by the name of Michael Brown--seemed to have washed down his weeny pills with warm Ovaltine. Instead of kicking Kerik and Giuliani between the uprights for three points, Brown fretted that vetting process for cabinet candidates was "going to far," and that we were in danger of discouraging people from public service. Oh no, we wouldn't want to discourage philandering, pocket-lining, deadbeat no-show bully-boys like Bernard Kerik from having the opportunity to muck around with our civil liberties in the name of "national security" and hold bigshot press conferences. I mean, if that sort of thing were to continue happening, people might start mistaking the Democrats for an opposition party and thinking that the press has an adversarial role to play, and we don't want that to happen, it might actually lead to signs of life in that mausoleum we call the nation's capital.

This Michael Brown wouldn't even criticize Alberto Gonzalez for botching the background check and vetting of Kerik. I don't understand the self-emasculation of so many Democratic strategists, what they're afraid of, why they concede so much in advance. Give them an opening, and they close it like a silk kimono, ever so demure. What are they in politics for, the professional grooming tips?

Indeed. One of the things that irks me to no end at times is the refusal by Democrats to hit back hard. Politics is a rough game--and the Rethuglicans have played it as such for years. Should we rejoice in this? No, of course not. But you don't start talking about the rules when you're in the midst of a knife fight--by then it's too late.

Kerik is no babe in the woods--and that goes for more than just his personal life, although as a public figure, his personal life is fair enough game, given that the personal lives of public, political figures have been fair game for some time (see Hart, Gary, Clinton, Bill, Kerry, John, Livingston, Bob, Gingrich, Newt, et al). Besides, there's evidence that Mr. Kerik had less than honorable intentions when he took his Green Zone vacation a year and a half ago. In fact, I'd love it if the media would focus even more on that.

Still, you've gotta get a kick out of the Regan quotes--talk about stepping right into a steaming pile of cow shit. Hell, she was schtupping Kerik while dissing Monica. Anyone ever tell her about glass houses and tossing stones?