Senate testimony

Steve Benen has a characteristically thorough run down of yesterdays hearings up at The Carpetbagger Report.

But the truth is, we could have skipped the six-plus hours of the joint hearing and allowed the Bush administration to issue a three-word press release: stay the course. That was the message — the only message — Petraeus and Crocker came to the House to deliver. We’re supposed to take a leap of faith, based on practically nothing, and hope that a policy that hasn’t worked suddenly will. I’m at a loss to explain why anyone would find this persuasive.

Today's the Senate. The CW is that Democrats screwed up by not demanding Senate side testimony first. Their interrogators are more shrewd, they have better ears for national politics, they include presidential candidates, etc., and so the expectation is that the fireworks will begin just as the press has stopped paying attention. I think this is probably correct, except perhaps in one way. The Democrats now have a full day's worth of dissembling, half-truths in the Congressional Record--to use against the dynamic duo. And to the extent that the press does pay attention today it will be to the moments during which the Petraeus and Crocker are running away from their own words. That could redound quite well to the Democrats' favor... if they choose to take advantage of it.

Of course, Hillary Clinton could just as easily decide to turn this giant opportunity for the anti-war caucus into an opportunity for herself to ruin everything and make a spectacle of denouncing the MoveOn ad. We'll just have to see.