Rough Sketch

Don't Mess With Sotomayor

Wed, 15 Jul 2009 12:41:09 -0500

It is becoming increasingly clear that you do not want to get crosswise with Sonia Sotomayor. Yesterday, the nominee to the high court showed a frightening familiarity with martial arts. This morning, she spoke of going home and getting a gun. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) made this unsettling discovery as he questioned the nominee about the second amendment and self defense. "If the threat was in this room, 'I'm going to come get you,'" the judge said, and "if I go home, get a gun, come back and shoot you, that may not be legal." "You'll have lots of 'splainin' to do," replied Coburn, channeling Ricky Ricardo as he addressed the first Hispanic nominee to the Supreme Court. "I'd be in a lot of trouble then," Sotomayor acknowledged. In fairness, she did say that "I don't want anybody to misunderstand what I'm trying to say." Perhaps. But Coburn, an almost

Sotomayor Knows Her Nunchuks

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 13:38:53 -0500

Whatever you may think about Sonia Sotomayor's judicial philosophy, give her this: The woman knows her nunchuks. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) discovered this when he questioned the Supreme Court nominee this morning. "Doesn't your decision in Maloney mean that virtually any state or local weapons ban would be permissible?" he asked. "Sir, in Maloney, we were talking about nunchuk sticks," the judge explained. "I understand," said the senator. "Those are martial arts sticks," Sotomayor added. Hatch did not want to appear to be a ninja newbie. "Two sticks bound together by rawhide or some sort of a -- " "Exactly," the nominee said. "And when the sticks are swung, which is what you do with them, if there's anybody near you, you're going to be seriously injured, because that swinging mechanism can break arms, it can bust someone's skull." "Sure," Hatch said breezily. He wasn't about to get into a

The President Packs the Press Corps

Tue, 23 Jun 2009 15:40:45 -0500

During the eight years of the Bush administration, liberal outlets such as the Huffington Post often accused the White House of planting questioners in news conferences to ask pre-planned questions. At this afternoon's news conference, President Obama fielded a pre-planned question asked by a planted questioner -- from the Huffington Post. "Since we're on Iran," the president said after the obligatory first question from the Associated Press's Jennifer Loven, "I know Nico Pitney is here from the Huffington Post." Obama knew this because Pitney had sent what he called a "solicitation" to the White House. Obama aides agreed to call on the Huffington Post writer with the understanding that he would ask a question from an Iranian. "Nico, I know that you and all across the Internet, we've been seeing a lot of reports coming directly out of Iran," the president went on. "I know that there may actually be

Etch-a-Sketch: William 'Dollar Bill' Jefferson Edition

Tue, 16 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0500

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury: This is a day the Sketchwriter has been awaiting for years. William "Dollar Bill" Jefferson, the former congressman from New Orleans, is going on trial over that "alleged" bribery scheme. I say "alleged" because that's the convention in these cases, and of course he is innocent until proven guilty. But Jefferson has a couple of tricky things to explain away: Why he was filmed by the FBI accepting a briefcase containing $100,000 from an FBI informant and putting the briefcase in the trunk of his car at the Pentagon City mall. Why $90,000 of that money was found by the FBI in the freezer of his Capitol Hill apartment, in small bundles disguised as leftovers. But Sketchreaders are a wily and crafty bunch. Your challenge today: Imagine a scenario under which one or both of the above facts can be explained as a perfectly

Sotomayor on the Hill

Tue, 02 Jun 2009 11:00:06 -0500

Note: Please upgrade your Flash plug-in to view our enhanced content. var thisObj = "flashobj060209X5v"; var so = new SWFObject("http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/mmedia/player/wpniplayer_blog.swf", thisObj, "454", "305", "8", "#ffffff"); so.addParam("allowScriptAccess", "always"); so.addParam("swfliveconnect", true); so.addVariable("thisObj", thisObj); so.addVariable("vid","060209-5v_title"); so.addVariable("playads", "yes"); so.addVariable("adserv",""); so.addVariable("autoStart", "no"); so.write("flashcontent060209X5v"); Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is keeping an open mind about Judge Sonia Sotomayor. "We have the whole package here," he announced in his office this morning with the smiling Supreme Court nominee seated to his left, her hands folded neatly in her lap. Reid, a Nevada Democrat, said he would take the judge's academic credentials into account when assessing her nomination. "Academically, I mean, I am terribly impressed. Princeton, summa cum laude. We have Yale Law School, editor of the law review. That's very impressive," Reid said, as the judge smiled, blinked, nodded her head and mouthed a "thank you." The Democratic leader hinted that he would also weigh Sotomayor's

Etch-a-Sketch: Hybrid Hummer Edition

Wed, 20 May 2009 12:30:41 -0500

The winner of yesterday's Etch-a-Sketch: "Goombay," who responded to my request to identify the new era of the Republican Party by commenting: "The new era will begin when the blanket references to Ronald Reagan cease. We get it...Great guy, great era for the party. Know who does not get it: everyone under 30 years of age." This comment, posted half an hour before the speech by Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, turned out to be prescient. Steele did, indeed, make three Reagan references in his speech about the future, a point noted in my column. Today, your Sketchwriter is planning to see Orrin Hatch roll out a 100 mpg Hummer. I'm told that this most unusual plug-in hybrid (the truck, not the Utah senator) will prove that Americans can have their cake and eat it, too -- a fuel-efficient truck that can squash a Prius without denting a bumper.

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Wed, 20 May 2009 12:30:41 -0500

Etch-a-Sketch: A New Era for the GOP

Tue, 19 May 2009 10:02:15 -0500

Thanks to those of you who submitted "enhanced interrogation" recommendations for former Bush administration lawyers yesterday, particularly "Mauckjw," whose ideas appeared in today's column on the subject. Many others were insightful, too, except for the one who called me a "dipsh@t." Today the Sketch will go to the new National Harbor development, where Disney is planning to build a resort hotel. But today the entertainment there is being provided by Michael Steele as he addresses the Republican National Committee. According to the advance text, he's going to tell us that "the era of apologizing for Republican mistakes of the past is now officially over." Also over, presumably, is the era of Michael Steel calling Rush Limbaugh "incendiary" and "ugly," labeling abortion an "individual choice," and confessing that his office is too masculine. This, naturally, leads us to today's question: With the era of apologizing over, what will the new era

Etch-a-Sketch: Punishing Bush Officials

Mon, 18 May 2009 12:01:59 -0500

Welcome back to Etch-a-Sketch, the game in which you, the reader, do my job for me while I go to lunch. Today's challenge: Torture. I attended an event this morning in which Kevin Zeese, a Naderite lawyer, filed petitions seeking to have 12 former Bush administration officials disbarred for their role in the torture memos. As it happens, that is roughly the number of "enhanced interrogation techniques" endorsed by Bush lawyers. This would seem to present the possibility of an elegant solution: forget about the attempts to disbar or prosecute these former officials, and instead subject them to the very same techniques they approved. Because they said these techniques are perfectly legal and do not cause long-term harm, they should have no objection to the techniques being applied to them. At the same time, this would satisfy the urge for vengeance on the left, while also freeing up our courts,

Etch-a-Sketch: Torture and Disney Edition

Wed, 13 May 2009 11:40:03 -0500

Congratulations to "zippypinhead1," who wrote the lead of today's Washington Sketch column: "Calling Jimmy Carter to testify about energy security is like calling Michael Vick to testify about pet care." Today's assignment is tricky. I'm in an excellent hearing right now in which the Senate Commerce Committee is attempting to rescue Disney and Vegas. But next door there's a Judiciary Committee hearing on torture. It won't be very funny, but there's word that former interrogator Ali Soufan will be testifying from behind a screen. Help me figure out how to combine the themes of the two hearings. For example: What enhanced interrogation techniques would Disney or Vegas casinos use if they were put in charge of questioning terrorism suspects?

Etch-a-Sketch: Jimmy Carter Edition

Tue, 12 May 2009 09:46:25 -0500

Thank you for all those excellent Limbaugh jokes yesterday. I loaded up today's column with them, but the editors, God bless 'em, decided every last one of them "crossed the line" and therefore had to be removed. Still, let us not be discouraged. This afternoon, Jimmy Carter will appear before John Kerry's Senate Foreign Relations committee to speak on the subject of "Energy Security: Historical Perspectives and Modern Challenges." Your mission, should you choose to accept it: Share your favorite 1970s energy memories. Gas lines? Sweaters? Killer rabbits? Okay, that last one had nothing to do with energy, but you get the idea. I'll be back to collect your thoughts for inclusion in my next column -- unless the editors have other plans. UPDATE, 2:07 p.m.: Good stuff. I've got to work in that SNL skit (below). Please help me to complete the following SAT-style analogy: Calling Jimmy Carter to

Etch-a-Sketch: Limbaugh Edition

Mon, 11 May 2009 10:51:48 -0500

Good morning. Today, let us try a new game in which I, the Sketchwriter, get you, the Sketchreader, to do my work for me while I go to the gym, eat lunch and listen to Rush Limbaugh on the radio. I call this Etch-a-Sketch. Today, your assignment is to come up with Limbaugh jokes that don't "cross the line." Or maybe cross the line just a little bit. There has been much chatter about whether Wanda Sykes "crossed the line" at the White House Correspondents' Dinner on Saturday night when she supposed that Rush was the 20th hijacker. But you don't know where the line is until you've crossed it. Let us, then, probe the line and figure out what kind of Rush humor I can get away with in tomorrow's column. Can we joke about his weight? His drug use? His megalomania? My plan is to plagiarize your material.

Going to the Mattress

Wed, 15 Apr 2009 00:00:00 -0500

The enemy is stealthy and bloodthirsty. It attacks innocent victims without warning, while they sleep. Fortunately, the federal government is on the case. In a hotel ballroom in Crystal City yesterday, the Environmental Protection Agency convened the first-ever National Bed Bug Summit -- a veritable Yalta Conference for the species Cimex lectularius. With help from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and even the Pentagon, the EPA assembled scientists, state and local officials, and a colony of exterminators to buzz about such topics as "Bed Bug Perspectives," "Bed Bug Basics" and "Government Responses to Bed Bugs." "These insects can have a life-altering impact," warned panelist Richard Cooper of Cooper Pest Solutions. "They are showing up in some of the finest hotels," contributed Saul Hernandez, an aide to the congressman who introduced H.R. 6068, "The Don't Let the Bed Bugs Bite Act

Funeral Business Feeling Six Feet Under

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 00:00:00 -0500

In case you've been dying for more bad news about the economy, here's a grave new indicator: Even the death industry is in a hole. It has long been suspected that the funeral business is immune from economic cycles, that the Grim Reaper tends not to follow the stock market. But this time, funeral homes are discovering that their clients' thrift -- sheet-metal urns instead of bronze caskets, cheese-and-cracker nibbles instead of traditional funeral luncheons -- is positively killing profits. So funeral directors did what everybody else does: They asked for a federal bailout. "We recognized that there may be a situation where a lot of folks who were displaced or unemployed might need some help in paying for their funerals," John Fitch Jr., lobbyist for the National Funeral Directors Association, explained yesterday at the group's annual gathering, at the Mayflower Hotel. "We had some preliminary discussions about providing

Obama's Unbelievable Offer!

Mon, 30 Mar 2009 13:01:43 -0500

Has Barack Obama got a deal for you! "If you buy a car from Chrysler or General Motors, you will be able to get your car serviced and repaired, just like always," the president announced from the Grand Foyer of the White House this morning. And that's not all! "Your warranty will be safe," the salesman-in-chief went on. "In fact, it will be safer than it's ever been, because, starting today, the United States government will stand behind your warranty." And check out these incentives!

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McAuliffe's Campaign Junk-et

Fri, 20 Mar 2009 00:00:00 -0500

There is really no cleaning up the fact that Terry McAuliffe practices trash politics. Campaign with him for a few hours and you feel as if you need to take a shower. In fact, the dirty little secret can now be told: McAuliffe, venture capitalist and Clinton moneyman, is the junkyard dog of the Virginia gubernatorial race. "I love trash," he said yesterday. "I love chicken litter, cow manure, garbage. . . . This is the kind of thing that gets me excited." And if his opponents were to accuse him of dirty tricks? "They would probably be right," he admitted with a grin. McAuliffe said these words -- shouted them, actually -- while standing on a steel grate overlooking a huge trash pit yesterday in Lorton. Claws dangling from cranes grabbed mounds of refuse. Dust flew everywhere. The pit was dark. The smell was bad. Read the whole