Is this any way to ratify a treaty? (In case you were wondering what it takes to get a 2/3 vote in today's Senate)

Speaking at a START-theme press conference Tuesday, AZ Sen. Jon Kyl earns a hearty smile from that much-loved though unfortunately now-deceased comic actor Henry Gibson. Oh wait, some sources are claiming that the smiler happy-go-lucky AL Sen. (and Henry Gibson look-alike) "Just Jeff" Sessions.

by Ken

This looks to me like one of those cases where the problem is the old newspaper one of a lazy and/or ax-grinding headline-writer rather than the reporting that follows.

On washingtonpost.com today reporter Mary Beth Sheridan (with credited contributions from the paper's Walter Pincus and Anne Kornblut -- some pretty high-powered helpers there!) has a piece headlined "Arms treaty approval a win for Obama, but GOP critics are gaining momentum." It just struck me as odd, and distinctly against the grain, to see reporting about "GOP critics gaining momentum" at a time when the media's traditionally horse-race-fixated vantage point (who gains? who loses?) is singing hymns of praise to the president. To what extent those hymns are deserved is an interesting but separate question. Isn't that what the Village media types are all saying? Oh, sure, the Village gadflies aren't giving up on the attack, so for example WaPo pundit Dana Milbank warns the president about getting too big for his britches. But generally the pundits are giving the prez Full Village Credit for his rip-roaring "comeback" of the last couple of weeks. That's the kind of performance that gets their attention and respect.

As far as I can tell, though, the Post headline-writer is just grinding his/her own ax with regard to those GOP critics and their momentum. What the piece turns out to be is a sort of behind-the-scenes look at What It Took to get the new START treaty ratified. And I'm sorry though not surprised to find that it wasn't pretty, and had less to do than one might have supposed with "principle." I'm thinking the making of legislative action distinctly recalls the old wisdom about the making of sausage: You don't want to know what goes into it, because if you find out, you may not be able to swallow the damned thing.

Here are the sorts of questions that are raised in the piece:

* Can Arizona GOP old-style hard-right Sen. John Kyl be bought? (A: Seriously do you have to ask?)

* How high a price would you have to pay for Senator Kyl's thumbs-up? (A: Pretty high, but apparently not unaffordable, and again maybe not the kind of price you might expect, ideologically speaking.)

* If you and Senator Kyl agree on terms for the purchase, you can trust that he'll deliver, right? (A: Ha ha!)

Now the piece does note that President Obama faced some challenge from foreign leaders regarding his status in the wake of the crushing midterm elections. Russian President Dmitri Medvedev, that noted authority on American democracy, did take the opportunity of seeing our president in Yokohama after an economic summit to ask whether the election results were likely to jeopardize ratification of the new START. And the anonymous source -- the Post now being an acknowledged world leader in its use of anonymous sources -- tipped off the reporters that the Russian's concern "had an impression" on Obama.

As far as I know, though, President Medvedev doesn't qualify as a "GOP critic" of the president.

As for Senator Kyl, well, this you're going to enjoy, I think:

There had always been what another White House official called a "healthy skepticism" about whether Kyl, the second-ranking Republican, had been negotiating in good faith. A savvy conservative steeped in arms-control issues, Kyl had helped defeat the 1999 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, dealing a blow to the Clinton administration.

But Kyl's main concern this time hadn't seemed to be the treaty's central issues, such as the number of warheads allowed, but instead modernization of the remaining nuclear weapons.

While the president was in Asia, we've learned,

the administration had secretly sent a high-level team including Gen. Kevin Chilton, head of U.S. nuclear forces, to Arizona to tell Kyl the administration would commit an extra $4.1 billion for nuclear modernization, on top of an earlier pledge of $10 billion.

Kyl seemed happy with the offer, officials said.

But three days after Obama's meeting with Medvedev, White House aides were astonished to learn from a news release by Kyl that he believed there wasn't enough time to consider the treaty during the lame-duck session.

"That was one of the lowest moments of our time in government," said the senior official.

Oops!

Officials believed that pushing the treaty into the next Congress would jeopardize its passage, since Republicans had picked up six seats in the midterm elections.

Now, the administration had to decide whether to proceed without Kyl.

The Kyl statement arrived as Biden was meeting with senior officials in the White House Situation Room to discuss Iraq. Talk turned immediately to New START. Later, senior aides huddled with Obama in the Oval Office.

"Both the president and vice president said to us, 'Look, this is too important to let die like this,' " Rhodes said.

The next day, Obama called Kyl to say he would push for New START.

The ensuing White House crusade for ratification stressed that the new START is a continuation of policies not only championed but in fact negotiated by previous Republican administrations. Still, I guess you never know what you're going to find when you start turning these rocks over. Retiring Ohio Sen. George Voinovich --

stunned the White House on Nov. 17 by declaring he couldn't support the treaty until he had assurances it wouldn't harm U.S. allies in the Baltics and Eastern Europe.

Within days, Obama used a NATO summit in Lisbon to highlight international support for the pact - including from a group of Eastern European and Baltic leaders who called for treaty passage at a news conference.

Voinovich's concerns were assuaged by the speeches, as well as by a vow by Obama to consider allowing Poles to travel visa-free to the United States.

Which is certainly good news for traveling Poles. And, apparently, a clinching reason for . . . um, for supporting a nuclear-arms-reduction treaty with Russia?

OK, sorry, I'm still not finding the part in the article about those GOP critics of the president gaining momentum. But I don't hold that against the reporter or her journalistic A-team helpers. She hasn't really gathered that much behind-the-scenes dirt, but what she has gathered makes for an interesting read. And while I try not to let those apprehensions about the stuff that goes into the making of sausage don't usually deter me from eating the end product, even this small glimpse into what it takes to ratify a treaty these days makes my gut kind of queasy.

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Will Dirty Dick Pombo Wind Up Back In Congress?

The least populated part of California's 11th congressional district-- the far eastern part of the district-- borders on the 19th CD, the district George Radanovich announced he would be giving up. Radanovich is old and tired and he didn't want to have to face a political hack playing up to teabaggers, former Fresno Mayor Jim Patterson. So he announced he'd be retiring-- like so many other House Republicans (14 so far) who just don't want the hassle of running against extremist teabaggers (South Carolina right-winger Henry Brown being the latest) in bitter primaries. But before he announced he was retiring, Radanovich stuck it to Patterson by getting termed-out state Senator Jeff Denham to agree to run. Fresno City Council Member Larry Westerlund is also interested in running and yesterday the former 7-term congressman from CA-11, defeated Dirty Dick Pombo announced that he's running and ex-Secretary of State and perennial candidate for one thing or another, Bill Jones, hinted that he would run too.

I don't think any of these people actually live in the 19th CD. Westerlund and Jones live in the wrong half of Fresno, which is split between the 19th and 20th. Pombo lives on his ranch in Tracy, nowhere near the district. Denham's senatorial district is partially in the 19th, but that isn't where Denham lives. And the teabaggers in the district, who are a powerful force inside the GOP there, are wary of all the candidates as being too establishment and too likely to sell them out.

Michael Der Manouel Jr., chairman of the Lincoln Club of Fresno County, promised that every prospective candidate will emerge "bleeding" from their interview session with the conservative Republican organization.

"We're so sick of phony Republicans that the Lincoln Club will be the toughest interview anybody has to go through," Der Manouel said. "If you're not going to go there with a pitchfork in your right hand and strong principles in your left, don't even bother to file."

Der Manouel -- who lost to Radanovich in the 1994 Republican primary-- noted that Denham, Patterson and Westerlund are either current or former elected officials. "There's got to be at least one person that runs that just brings with him a big business background and doesn't need the job," Der Manouel said.

Pombo doesn't need the job, at least not financially. Psychologically, on the other hand, he certainly has that ole craving. Funny he's not running to try to win back his old seat where everyone knows him. I guess that's the point though. Widely considered one of the most corrupt and extreme Republicans from the freewheelin' Bush-Abramoff-DeLay days, Pombo needs to go where he isn't too well known.

a brief refresher on Pombo. Elected to Congress in 1992, he routinely pounded his Dem opponents, often getting around 60 percent of the vote, despite serving in a Democratic-friendly district that was a mishmash of suburban Bay Area and Central Valley. But in 2006, he was the only incumbent Californian to lose his seat.

How? With the joint help of the liberal netroots, tons of volunteers from the Bay Area and enviro activists, Pombo was tossed from his seat in 2006 by newbie Dem Jerry McNerney. He was pilloried for his environmental record-- the League of Conservation Voters named him one of their Dirty Dozen (members of Congress) in 2006-- and the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington named him one of the "Most Corrupt Members of Congress" in 2006.

Looks like there's going to a tough GOP primary in the Valley.

Is there a chance for a Democrat? Not likely. The PVI is R+10. Obama only took 46% of the vote, while Radanovich ran unopposed last year and won with 60% in 2006. The two Democrats in the race now are Les Marsden (who sounds like he'd head right for Blue Dog country) and Loraine Goodwin (who sounds more like an actual Democrat). On paper neither looks like they'd have a chance against any of these GOP heavyweights in this prohibitively Republican district. So... just get out the popcorn and sit back and watch the mean-spirited, hypocritical Republicans rip each other to shreds.