Shorter Congresscritter Carolyn McCarthy:

We must ban guns with barrel shrouds . . . uh, whatever those are.

Heh. There’s video.

Allah has the video of Mr. Cho explaining to all of us why it’s our fault and not his that he killed all those people.

[Posted by WLS]

For high comedy, look no further than the esteemed Majority Leader in the United States Senate, Senator Harry Reid of Nevada.

Here  was his recorded vote on S.3 — “A bill to prohibit the procedure commonly known as partial birth abortion.”

You can find Senator Reid’s vote of “Yea” listed three different ways.

Skip ahead to the Supreme Court’s decision today affirming S.3 against a facial challange to its constitutionality.  As reported by CNN:

This was the first time the high court had heard a major abortion case in six years, and since then, its makeup has changed, with Roberts and Alito now on board.

Their presence on the bench provided the solid conservative majority needed to allow the federal ban to go into effect, with Kennedy providing the key fifth vote for a majority.

Alito replaced Sandra Day O’Connor, a key abortion rights supporter over her quarter century on the bench.

“A lot of us wish that Alito weren’t there and O’Connor were there,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, who opposed Alito’s nomination, said.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/LAW/04/18/scotus.abortion/index.html

Apparently Harry forgot that he voted in favor of the ban which the Court upheld. 

Which raises the question of whether he makes a habit of voting for bills he deems to be unconstitutional. 

h/t — The Corner at NRO.

Get all the details, including a link to the opinion, at How Appealing.

I engaged in a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth over how Kennedy would vote on this, but he came through.

I’ll have full analysis later, after I have read the opinions, which I have so far only browsed. Takeaway quotes from Ginsburg’s dissent: the majority’s “way of thinking reflects ancient notions about women’s place in the family and under the Constitution — ideas that have long been discredited” and “The Court’s hostility to the right Roe and Casey secured is not concealed.”

Note also that only Scalia joins Thomas’s concurring opinion, which says that Roe has no basis in the Constitution — and pointedly notes that no Commerce Clause challenge was raised in the current challenge. I wouldn’t infer too much from this: Roberts and Alito probably want to keep their decision on narrow grounds.

I have found a possible reason that Steven Biskupic was taken off the list of U.S. Attorneys to be fired. As a reason for Biskupic’s reprieve, it makes a lot more sense than the Georgia Thompson prosecution. It’s much closer in time, and it relates to voter fraud — the same issue that (some think) put Biskupic on the list to begin with.

Just one problem for the Democrats: if I’m right, there’s nothing particularly nefarious about it.

Recall the timing. In 2005, Wisconsin Republicans complained that Biskupic had been inadequately aggressive in pursuing voter fraud. In early 2006, Biskupic’s office indicted Georgia Thompson, and convicted her in June. (For more on that case, see WLS’s excellent post below.) Months later, according to Josh Marshall, Biskupic was added to the firing list. Marshall theorizes that this occurred on or after October 17, 2006.

I have already discussed at considerable length the reasons that it makes little sense to conclude that Biskupic was taken off the list because of the Georgia Thompson prosecution. If that prosecution was so gosh-darned important to the Bushies, why hadn’t they heard about it during the four months that had passed since her conviction? And if Biskupic was really feeling heat due to dissatisfaction over his handling of voter fraud cases, wouldn’t it make more sense for him to be more aggressive in the specific area of voter fraud?

Indeed, an ethical prosecutor — which Biskupic is, by all accounts, including those of local Democrats — might respond by aggressively working to ensure that voter fraud didn’t take place in the next election.

Which, it just so happens, is exactly what Biskupic did.

(more…)