Bruce Fein blows a gasket
Jun 28, 2007 Politics and Poker
“The vice president has run utterly amok and must be stopped,” writes Bruce Fein in Slate. He goes on to say that Cheney must be impeached. Impeached!
Forget about that — that’s one stupid and irrational idea that’s not going anywhere. (But hat tip to Ali Eteraz.) No, what’s noteworthy is just how much the conservative community has come to loathe this Administration, which, from its (“our,” I guess) perspective, gave us nothing, or worse, except Justice Roberts.
“Writes Bruce Fein in Slate” — parlous times, indeed.
Or is it?
Fein was, indeed, a deputy Attorney General in the Reagan Administration. But he’s been gunning for this one for years now. He wrote in Slate last week, too, on the White House email dustup. He gives interviews to Truthout. From all indications, he is sincerely exercised about this Administration, and has been for a long time. But it is not newsworthy, at this point, that he is raising the volume higher and higher, now making absurd impeachment threats and relying on a now threadbare resume from the Reagan years. (It’s notable for someone with that profile to be in something other than a major Washington firm, but I don’t know exactly what it does mean, so I just point it out.)
He’s not a shill for either “side,” is Fein — I agree with this recent article by him, for example, criticizing the preposterous claim by reporters that they are exempt from the law by virtue of some imagined First Amendment emanation the insulates them from the normal duties of citizenship. That’s a conservative position, in my view, so he is no “civil libertarian” in the left-wing sense of the phrase. He has even said he is “not anti-President Bush.”
So what, exactly, happened to Bruce Fein? Because while there is much to despise about this Administration, this article suggests he’s gone off the deep end. Any helpful links would be appreciated — I can’t find anyone who has analyzed this question.
June 28th, 2007 at 11:50 am
What happened to Bruce Fein?
Thanks to Ali’s story, I have been looking into this matter.
He’s pretty consistent, but he’s so far off the reservation with this “impeac…
June 28th, 2007 at 11:50 am
What happened to Bruce Fein?
Thanks to Ali’s story, I have been looking into this matter.
He’s pretty consistent, but he’s so far off the reservation with this “impeac…
June 28th, 2007 at 12:43 pm
This is all pretty typical Lame Duck stuff if you ask me. In the last two years of any 8 year administration, things tend to go downhill very fast. Because the President is not running for re-election he’s working on his legacy. Which also means that those in Congress who used to support him become suspicious of him because they’re facing re-election and he isn’t. Plus any problems they had with the President during the first four years that they sat on, they feel less afraid to bring up now. It gets most intense after the congressional midterms, where the part in the White House typically loses seats anyway. So the last two years tend to see the most negativity of all.
This has happened to pretty much every President who’s served two terms ever since Harry Truman by the way.
Also by the way, some of George W’s best accomplishments will probably be during these last two years, but no one will notice much until he’s been out of the White House for a year or three at least.
June 28th, 2007 at 1:29 pm
Did this happen during Clinton’s last two years? I don’t think so.
June 28th, 2007 at 3:32 pm
It’s easier to get published bashing Bush.
July 9th, 2007 at 6:38 pm
[...] by Ron Coleman on July 9th, 2007 Maybe everything’s not just Fein, after all? Another Department of Justice veteran lashes out at the Bush Administration. More [...]
November 28th, 2007 at 10:17 pm
[...] be right, but Fein isn’t the one to make the argument. From what I can tell he’s rounded the bend — and no one has demonstrated to my satisfaction that he [...]
January 17th, 2008 at 11:15 pm
Maybe he’s right?
Just sayin’.
The post doesn’t offer any substantive, you know, reasons why he’s wrong.