Strom Thurmond. The centenarian should never have stayed in
office as long as he did. One good thing that Senator Graham did for us.
His record in
Washington, however, started to worry some conservatives, and certainly a
growing constituency of South Carolinians who expected their senator to represent their interests,
not those of the Washington Beltway elite. He supported Bush’s judicial
nominees, but also President Obama’s. He has joined the more centrist “Gang of
Eight”, which has pushed compromise without character in some cases. He
voted to increase the debt ceiling, and he even signaled his willingness to
renege on the Grover Norquist “No New Taxes” Pledge.
As Congressman Mick Mulvaney argued cogently shortly after
rejecting the last-minute fiscal cliff deal, there is good compromise and there
is bad compromise. When a prospective home buyer offers to purchase the home
for one dollar, a reasonable response would be to slam the door in the person’s
face. All too often, more center-leaning Republicans like Senator Graham, along
with his colleague from Arizona John McCain, have made compromise in itself the
final goal, while ignoring or eliminating the long-term consequences of
easy-breezy short-term deals. Why support liberal Supreme Court nominees just
to get through business? Why add insult to injury to a party which now more
than every needs unity, not disparity?
He
successfully resisted
the appointment of UN Ambassador Susan Rice to
Secretary of State. Her lack of knowledge about coordinated attacks and memos
demanding more support for Benghazi, and her garbled story about merely reading
talking points exposed that Ms. Rice was either immoral or incompetent,
unworthy of promotion. “Someone has got to start paying a price around
here”. Right on, Senator.
Unlike other Senators, Graham will not let go of
the Libyan terrorist attack on the US consulate at Benghazi.
He demanded information
whether the President knew about General Dempsey
acknowledged that there should have been “more boots on the ground”
to make sure that that consulate. The diplomatic corps succumbed to the attack
on September 11, 2012, even though the stationed officials asked for help. One
plane was dispatched to the area in order to save the beleaguered staff in the
area. The questions which trouble the Senator, and should concern us, stand on
what did the President know, and could he (or should he) have done more.
Bravo, Senator Graham!
For the first time in years, Senator Graham is
brandishing his judge advocate general bluster from his Congressional days.
He pointedly hammered
the former Senator from
Nebraska, whom President Obama nominated for Secretary of Defense. Hagel’s
nomination spurred nothing but dissent from leading politicians, including
Tom Coburn
and a number of
Jewish leaders
, Democrat and Republican.
In
the Armed Service Committee hearings to vet Hagel, Graham’s
first question asked for clarity about funding and the current war status of
this country. Hagel offered that the United States spends five percent of the
total budget on defense, although he waffled on that figure. As future leader
of the Pentagon, his incertitude on costs was deafening. Graham then rolled out
one of Hagel’s more disturbing statements, including his indictment of
the “Jewish Lobby intimidates a lot of people” in Washington. Graham
demanded specifics about “who is intimidated” — and Graham hammered
the provocation of the statement, including the hollowness of the invective,
since Hagel offered no evidence of such pressure from Israel on
American foreign policy.
Hagel refused to sign a letter to the
European Union which would designate that Hezbollah as a terrorist
organization. Then again, Hagel prompted former President Bill Clinton to move on behalf
of Jews in Russia. Hagel has already shown an inconsistent stance on the role of
the Senate. Iranian Revolutionary Guard
is a terrorist organization, but as a Senator he refused to sign a letter which
would designate them as such, either
Graham properly demanded
to know: ‘Do you believe that the sum total of your votes suggests statements
about Palestinians would send the worst possible signals to our friends and our
enemies?”
Hagel shared unconvincingly that he
was convinced that his record would not send a poor message. The South Carolina
Senator pressed him to recast his votes. If there was a vote on the floor of
the Senate to label the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization,
would he vote “Yea”? Hagel “bageled” again, deferring to the President, the same
President who refused to stand with Iranian protesters in 2009 and 2011.
The former Senator also
refused to sign a letter expressing solidarity with Israel and disappointment
with Yasser Arafat for his inaction during
the 2000 Intifada. The US Senate wanted to send the message that the PLO
terrorists were undermining peace, but Hagel refused to go along.
President Obama has also nominated Top
Counter-Terrorism Advisor John Brennan to be director of the CIA, the same advisor who called jihad “
Legitimate
”, the same advisor whom Graham suggested should resign because of his unserious
disconnect with Islamic terrorism.
Lindsey Graham
has pledged
to hold both Brennan and Hagel until he
gets answers from the President about the Benghazi attack on September 11,
2012.
Bravo, Senator Graham!