A2 Thursday, July 16, 2009
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News Today » Behind the Sketch
Politics & The Nation
Clinton Says U.S. Promotes ‘Multi-Partner World’ ............................A3
National Digest
Endeavour Launched on Sixth Attempt.........................................A3 Senate Panel Advances Health-Care Overhaul...................................A4 Sen. Specter Well-Prepared to Pepper Sotomayor With Questions...A6 Republicans Fail to Pin Down Nominee.............................................A6
The World
Rights Activist Slain in Chechnya ......................................................A8 South Africa Besieged By Unemployment .........................................A8
Time Zones
In Ghana, Scavenging ‘E-Waste’ for a Few Redeemables ...............A8
Foreign Digest
Plane Crash Kills 168......................................................................A9 Ex-U.S. Diplomat Talks With Hamas ...............................................A10 Detainees Protest At Afghanistan Jail..............................................A10
Economy & Business
Asian Nations Could Outpace U.S. in Developing Clean Energy ....A14 Paulson Makes No Apologies for Role in Merrill Lynch Sale...........A16 SEC Pushes For More Disclosure To Investors................................A16 President’s Financial Regulatory Plan Comes Under Attack...........A20
Michelle Singletary
It’s Time to Help Stop Scammers From Fleecing the Elderly......A18
Business Digest
FTC, 23 States Target Loan Consultants .....................................A18
WASHINGTON BUSINESS
Gannett Profit Beats Expectations Even as Revenue Falls ..............A19
The Fed Page
Federal Diary
Joe Davidson on the Broken Firing Process.................................A21
Opinion
Editorial: For Mr. Barry, Call In the Prosecutors............................A22 Buzz Aldrin: Let’s Set Our Sights on Putting People on Mars .......A23
washingtonpost.com
Most-viewed articles, as of 10:30 p.m. yesterday
Lab Analyst Decision Complicates Prosecutions The Deep Pockets Mirage Sotomayor Avoids Pointed Queries Senate Panel Advances Health-Care Overhaul
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The Washington Post
WASHINGTON SKETCH
upreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor was breezing through her third day of confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee when she was tripped up by, of all people, Al Franken, the junior senator from Minnesota.
The comedian, in his second
week on the job, noted that Sotomayor had, earlier yesterday, said she was inspired to become a prosecutor by watching “Perry Mason,” who, in all his TV episodes, lost only one case to the nefarious Hamilton Burger. The Democrat’s question was deft and devastating: “What was the one case in ‘Perry Mason’ that Burger won?” For the first time this week, the future justice was stumped. “I wish I remembered the name of the episode, but I don’t,” she confessed. “I just was always struck that there was only one case where his client was actually guilty.” “And you don’t remember that case?” pressed a skeptical Franken. “I know that I should remember the name of it,” the nominee apologized, “but I haven’t looked at the episode. I —” Franken cut her off. “Didn’t the White House prepare you for that?” he asked with incredulity.
The White House rapid-response team swung into operation as reporters demanded to know the title of the episode. Was it “The Case of the Terrified Typist”? “The Case of the Deadly Verdict”? “The Case of the Witless Witness”? Yesterday, it was more a Case of
CORRECTIONS
K A July 5 Business graphic about layoffs misstated the length of time a single unem- ployed person is able to use COBRA health insurance cov- erage. It is 18 months, not nine months.
K A June 26 A-section article re-
ferred to Gilo as a Jewish settle- ment. It is a Jewish neighbor- hood built on land captured in the 1967 Arab-Israeli War and annexed to Israel as part of Je- rusalem’s expanded municipal boundaries. The United Na- tions has not acknowledged the annexation.
corrections@washpost.com or call the main number, 202-334-6000, and ask to be connected to the desk involved — National, Foreign, Metro, Style, Sports, Business or any of the weekly sections. In addition, the ombudsman’s number is 202-334-7582.
the Witless Questioners. In this episode, Perry Mason, Della Street and Paul Drake (played by committee Democrats) defend their client (Sotomayor) from the evil Burger (committee Republicans). As with other “Perry Mason” episodes, the outcome was bound to come out in Sotomayor’s favor, because Democrats hold a lopsided majority and commanded most of the floor time. Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) talked to the nominee about baseball’s All-Star Game. Sen.
DANA MILBANK
The Case of the Stumped Jurist
baby” has spina bifida. “Would it be legal in this country to terminate that child’s life?” “I would have to look at what the state of the state’s law was on that question,” the judge replied. Not to mention the state of the state’s law on pregnant men. After dispatching the Republicans, Sotomayor loosened up with her friendly Democratic questioners. Fatefully, she spoke about “Perry Mason.” “I was influenced so greatly by a television show,” she said.
BY LINDA DAVIDSON — THE WASHINGTON POST
Sen. Al Franken tested the nominee’s knowledge of “Perry Mason.”
Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) assured the judge. But after a series of thumps overhead, he offered some reassurance: “You’ve been hearing some banging going on here. Apparently, the air conditioning went out.” The temperature, measured at 63 degrees in one of the press booths when the hearing started, rose to 79 degrees on the hearing room floor.
REUTERS
Raymond Burr, shown in 1959, played District Attorney Mason.
Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) said Sotomayor’s story “gives me goose bumps,” then translated it into the Spanish “piel de gallina.” Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) invited her to an Orioles game, then read others’ words of praise for her: “She is very good. She is bright. She’s a good judge. She is very smart. She is frighteningly smart. . . .” With so much warmth being emitted, the air conditioning in the hearing room was overwhelmed. Just after noon, Sotomayor was making a point about search-and-seizure law when the lights dimmed and the ventilation system went silent. “That was not a comment from above,” Chairman
Is this what her colleagues meant when they said Sotomayor runs a “hot bench”? More evidence: She threatened to shoot one of the committee’s Republicans, Sen. Tom Coburn (Okla.). Coburn was questioning
Sotomayor about the Second Amendment when she proposed a playful hypothetical. “If the threat was in this room, ‘I’m going to come get you,’ ” the judge said, and “if I go home, get a gun, come back and shoot you, that may not be legal.” “You’ll have lots of ’splainin’ to do,” replied Coburn, switching from Perry Mason to Ricky Ricardo for the Hispanic nominee. Even before the nominee threatened him, Coburn was having difficulty gathering his thoughts — as when he asked her about abortion. “Let’s say I’m 38 weeks pregnant,” he proposed, and “my
Cue the last questioner: Franken. “While you were watching ‘Perry Mason’ in the South Bronx . . . I was watching ‘Perry Mason’ in suburban Minneapolis,” he marveled. “And here we are today. And I’m asking you questions because you have been nominated to be a justice of the United States Supreme Court. I think that’s pretty cool.” Franken had prepared assiduously for his questioning, comparing drafts of numbered questions on double-spaced pages and consulting his pocket copy of the Constitution. But when his turn finally came, the result was half Senate Judiciary Committee, half “Saturday Night Live.” “Are the words ‘birth control’ in the Constitution?” he asked. When the judge answered no, Franken followed up: “Are you sure?” After a recess, Leahy discovered that his microphone, like the air conditioning, was broken. He hunted for another microphone, then tried to speak without one — until an amplified voice broke in. “Mine works,” Franken offered from the end of the dais. “I’ll change places with you.” He gave Leahy his seat, moved Leahy’s nameplate, then helped himself to the chairman’s seat in the center of the dais. “That’s the quickest rise of any senator in history,” said Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.).
Did he expect less from somebody who watched “Perry Mason”?
Administration Bridles at Bar on Contractors
By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
The Obama administration has objected to a provision in the 2010 defense funding bill currently be- fore the Senate that would bar the military’s use of contractors to in- terrogate detainees.
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The provision, strongly backed by Senate Armed Services Com- mittee Chairman Carl M. Levin (D- Mich.), describes interrogations as an “inherently governmental func- tion” that “cannot be transferred to contractor personnel.” It would give the Defense Department one year from the bill’s enactment to ensure that the military had the re- sources to comply with it. AWhite House policy statement
yesterday signaled “many areas of agreement” with the bill that emerged from Levin’s committee late last month but said the admin- istration has “serious concerns” about some provisions. The state- ment repeated Obama’s threat to veto the $680 billion bill unless $1.75 billion to fund an additional seven F-22 fighter aircraft is re- moved.
Obama and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates “are as serious as a heart attack on this,” Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said. Levin and Sen. John McCain (R- Ariz.), the committee’s ranking mi- nority member, have agreed that the current ceiling of 187 F-22s is sufficient, but action on an amend- ment to that effect brought to the floor yesterday was postponed when the Senate took up a contro-
334-4495
versial hate crimes amendment. The contractor interrogation is- sue is the latest challenge to the White House as it tries to fashion a policy on current and future de- tainees. It comes as the administra- tion is struggling to address de- mands by human rights organiza- tions, members of Congress and even some within its own ranks to fully investigate and make public actions taken by the Bush adminis- tration.
In executive orders issued dur- ing his first week in office, Obama ordered the CIA to end all use of what have been called enhanced in- terrogation techniques and to fol- low more restrictive regulations in the Army Field Manual that the ad- ministration has said comply with domestic and international law. The Justice Department is in-
vestigating the development and approval of now-prohibited inter- rogation methods, including sim- ulated drowning, in which contrac- tors participated. In April, CIA Di- rector Leon Panetta banned the use of contract employees to in- terrogate prisoners. Last year, the Senate dropped a
provision prohibiting the military from using contractors for interro- gations after President George W.
Bush threatened a veto unless it was removed. The provision in this year’s bill
says that “the interrogation of en- emy prisoners of war, civilian in- ternees, retained persons, other detainees, terrorists, and criminals when captured, transferred, con- fined, or detained during or in the aftermath of hostilities is an inher- ently governmental function and cannot be transferred to contractor personnel.” “We ought to have enough trained interrogators in the mili- tary to do the job,” a senior Senate aide said. “If we don’t have enough, then train more or hire civilians, but they ought to be our employ- ees.” The measure provides excep- tions for contractors used as inter- preters and technicians.
The White House statement said that in “some limited cases,” contractor skills might be neces- sary “to obtain critical informa- tion” and that the provision “could prevent U.S. Forces from conduct- ing lawful interrogations in the most effective manner. “You can’t make an artificial dis- tinction between an interrogator and a linguist who is actually going to be the one asking the ques- tions,” an administration official said. “You don’t want to inhibit the ability to extract valuable intelli- gence that could save lives by not being able to use subject matter ex- perts, linguists or other contract personnel. “We all think of interrogations as somebody taken back to the fa- cility and questioned. The reality is that people are out on patrol,” and the best person to urgently ques- tion a captive during an operation may be a contractor. “You don’t want to limit yourself,” the official said.
Morrell offered a somewhat dif- ferent explanation, saying that for the Pentagon, “it is first and fore- most an issue of resources. We don’t have enough interrogators to do the work we have.”
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