Tuesday, June 21, 2005

Some Thoughts from Lindsey Graham

Steve Clemons passes on some things he heard Lindsey Graham say at a recent screening of Seven Days in May:

Graham said that there were similarities between the political gamesmanship at play today and in what the film depicted some 40 years ago. He said that one of the reasons he worked to undermine those who wanted to trigger the so-called "nuclear option" over judicial nominations in the Senate is that he believed that one branch of government was trying to subordinate other branches.

He said that this was a time in politics -- particularly in the Congress -- in which policy decisions were tilting towards the loudest, often uninformed voices -- and that reasonable politics were being undermined.

He said that he worried that America today was vulnerable to a new generation of demagogues who would come in and "push all the buttons" on "9/11, terrorism, Guantanamo, and the like" and try and wreck the system of checks and balances that characterize America's style of democracy.