[Howlin]

This is HUGE. HUGE. Bush better NOT back down on this one!

[Free the USA]

bump

[Grenada]

I don't think Bush will back down. Once again the libs show their respect for the rule of law.

[Dog]

Whoa......

What did the panel say??

[jackbill]

I saw this. What an arrogant piece of garbage that Berry is.

I need to do some research to see if the President can throw her rotten A$$ off of the commission. It sure seems that this kind of act could be considered "sufficient cause".

BTW, the previous person died.

Even Mara Liasson admitted that the President was going to win on this one but I think a win should be defined as getting rid of Berry once and for all. And I wish there was some way to get that other black lawyer from Harvard off as well. They are both garbage.

[KC_Conspirator]

The US Marshalls that show up tommorrow better not be there to seat someone, but to remove some radicals that are totally out of control.

[Miss Marple]

LOL! Judging from the letter Al Gonzalez sent her, I do not think President Bush will back down. I do think, however, she will be outfoxed, and the longed for confrontation will not happen on her timetable. I do not think that President Bush is going to give her the opportunity to get her face in front of the cameras making a "stand."

I hope it turns out that she was donating money to the Holy Land Foundation. Ha!

[ken5050]

There was something about this in today's NYTimes..search the site...she's maintaining that she's entitled to full term on her own. Also, Berry was appt tofill out a term...she's up in 2004..she's saying that she's entitled toa full term, which would be up in Feb 2005, after the election...Here come Fat rev Al, and jesse

[TrueBeliever9]

Agreed! Bush had better remind this woman of the rules - which apply to all appointees to the commission.

[Saundra Duffy]

This witch is just plain evil. Go away, already! For victory & freedom!!!

[be-baw]

I'm confused. Is the new Bush appointee filling a vacancy for someone whose term has expired, or someone who has left before his term's end?

[Pokey78]

I saw this too.

This is going to be GREAT! She is definitely a crackpot. Make her the posterchild of the DemocRat party!

A wonderful political opportunity handed to Bush on a silver platter.

[blackdog]

Not a wise carreer move on the part of Berry. Makes her look like she thinks this is the continent of Africa. In this case, she is a fly who just bit the king. Not very good odds for survival.

[blam]

I've known for a while that Mary Frances Berry had a loose screw, but, she's over the edge completely now.

[oldvike]

ping

[seahawk]

The person whose term has expired was filling in the spot for someone who had DIED. The panel also said that the reason that MS. Berry was causing such a stink is because now the board has 5 rats and 3 Republicans. If Bush gets his appointment then it will be 4 to 4 and Berry can't run roughshod over the other rats and have her way.

[ambrose]

This is HUGE. HUGE. Bush better NOT back down on this one!

But he will...

[TADSLOS]

Terrorists of a different sort. Bush should can her A$$!

[the bottle let me down]

More details from yesterday's NRO here

By John J. Miller & Ramesh Ponnuru
December 4, 2001 11:55 a.m.

Victoria Wilson of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights apparently wants to be a commissioner for life. She recently announced her intention not to resign, even though her six-year term formally expired last week. She was appointed in 2000 to complete the term of the late Leon Higginbotham, but now she argues that she's entitled to a full six-year term rather than the remainder of Higginbotham's. This would keep her in office until 2006. The White House says her time is up; commission chair Mary Frances Berry accepts Wilson's self-serving interpretation of the law.

Berry and Wilson made clear their disdain for the rule of law this summer, when they (and four other liberal commissioners) released a controversial report on the 2000 presidential election in Florida. They suggested that George W. Bush carried the state because of a racist conspiracy to suppress black votes. The only suppression anyone could point to, however, was their own: They defied established practice by refusing to publish a dissent authored by the commission's two GOP-appointed members.

Wilson's argument makes no sense. It means that presidential appointees in time-limited positions could be "re-appointed" en masse right before the White House changes hands — and therefore prevent the next president from shaping the government the way he deserves.

Berry's support of Wilson has a personal dimension. Although she's been on the commission since the 1980s, Berry's current term began when she succeeded Connie Horner, whom the first President Bush had picked for the commission in the final hours of his presidency. Horner's term expired on December 5, 1998 — but President Clinton didn't get around to putting Berry in that slot until January 26, 1999. The White House clerk's office, staffed by career bureaucrats, insists that Berry's term ends in December 2004. Berry, however, says it concludes on January 26, 2005 — just a few days after the end of President George W. Bush's term.

If the Bush administration wants to exercise complete control over the federal government — control to which it is fully entitled — it will want to make sure Wilson loses her obnoxious challenge.

[clintonh8r]

Yeah. I saw this. Couldn't believe it. This woman is out of control.

(kinda uppity, too).

[RogueIsland]

Standard 'Rat thinking -- if they don't like something, they just throw a fit and demand that the rules change to suit them.