Ruben Navarrette on Gonzales Hearings

Columnist Ruben Navarrette has a good take on the Gonzales hearings and the left's so-far feeble and futile attempt to derail him.

On the other side, and on the same page, the Washington Post runs a column from Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton titled "Questions for Gonzales . . ." The column is an example of the nuanced "be kind to terrorists" tact that Democrats are attempting to use, although in this article there is no nuance. There are, however, two noteworthy features about the article.

First, the article is written not by a member of the Senate, which has to vote on confirming Mr. Gonzales, but by a delegate member of the House. Additionally, Delegate Holmes Norton, as the representative from the District of Columbia, is in the safest of all districts. This may indicate a recognition by Democrats that a strident anti-Gonzales approach comes with more political dangers than advantages.

Secondly, despite the article's title, there is not a single question posed to Mr. Gonzales -- not one (in fact, there is not even a single question mark in the entire article). In all fairness to Delegate Holmes Norton, article titles are not created by the authors, but rather by the publication's headline writers. Nonetheless, I wonder why the Washington Post chose to use a clearly inaccurate headline for this op-ed. Maybe a more accurate headline would have once again exposed the Democrats on this issue. Or maybe, as Mr. Navarrette opined, Democrats got the message "offered up on behalf of a large portion of the Latino community: 'Hurt him, and we'll hurt you.'"