Bush Should Never Have Surrendered on AG

Way back on September 16th I decried President Bush's decision to abandon Ted Olson for Attorney General and appoint Michael Mukasey instead. That was a surrender on Bush's part, and Mukasey was selected because he had received ringing endorsements from ultra-libs Chuckie Schumer and Nan Aron. Bush's attempted appeasement of the wacky left is coming back to bite him:

Democratic support for attorney general nominee Michael B. Mukasey dwindled further yesterday over his refusal to comment on the legality of a harsh CIA interrogation technique, setting the stage for an unexpectedly close vote next week by the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin (Ill.) and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.) announced that they will join Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (Del.) in voting against Mukasey on the Judiciary panel, after the nominee said in a four-page letter to Senate Democrats that he does not know whether a type of simulated drowning called waterboarding constitutes illegal torture under U.S. law.

Other Democrats on the Judiciary panel have pointedly refused to disclose how they will vote during a special meeting to consider Mukasey’s nomination, which has been scheduled for Tuesday. Chairman Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) also declined to say whether he will allow the nomination go to the full Senate with a negative recommendation, which occurred with some past nominations. ...

The nomination has become a particularly thorny problem for Mukasey’s original Senate patron, Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.). He had suggested Mukasey as a consensus nominee to the White House and declared two weeks ago that he should be confirmed, but he was noncommittal yesterday.

“I’m reading the letter, I’m going over it,” Schumer told reporters. “That’s all I’m going to say.”

I don't think this nomination is going to survive because not only has Mukasey failed to answer the waterboarding question to the satisfaction of the Dems, he hasn't answered it to the satisfaction of the GOP. He doesn't seem to be particularly well informed or is trying way too hard to avoid controversy by giving Hillary-like answers.

Should his nomination go down in flames there's an easy solution. Wait until the Thanksgiving recess and appoint Ted Olson. He could then serve out the remainder of Bush's term without the hassle of hearings and the circus that has become the Senate Judiciary Committee and we'd have a decent candidate in the office.