Bush's Bipartisanship

In a gracious extension of the olive branch to the incoming Democratic majority, President Bush is renominating a bunch of previously rejected candidates for appellate court judgeships, including William "mining lobbyist" Myers, Michael "ABA unqualified" Wallace, Terrence "civil rights, snivel rights" Boyle, and William "legalize torture" Haynes. He is also pushing the Senate again to confirm John "Bully" Bolton as permanent ambassador to the United Nations.

In an even more conciliatory gesture, Bush is also appointing OB-GYN Eric Keroack to head family-planning programs at the Department of Health and Human Services, which is a bit like putting the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. in charge of the Armed Forces, except with less inspiring speeches. Keroack is the medical director for A Woman's Concern, a Christian pregnancy-counseling organization that supports sexual abstinence until marriage, opposes contraception, and does not distribute information promoting birth control. This experience should serve him exceedingly well in advising Secretary Mike Leavitt on reproductive health and adolescent pregnancy and in controlling $283 million in annual family-planning grants designed to provide access to contraceptive supplies and information to low income persons.