The Chewers, the Stickers and the Clickers You Don’t See on TV
By Tim Funk, The Charlotte Observer, N.C.
Jan. 11–WASHINGTON — The center of the political universe this week: Room 216 of the Hart Senate Office Building.
That’s where 18 U.S. senators — including Republican Lindsey Graham of South Carolina — have been interrogating (in the case of Democrats) and promoting (in the case of Republicans) Samuel Alito — President Bush’s latest nominee to the Supreme Court.
On TV, it looked like a tennis match of talking heads — senators serving questions, Alito returning answers.
But there was more going on besides the volleys. Here’s some of what you couldn’t see at home:
Graham rocks
When posing their questions on TV, the senators look very, well, senatorial. But what do they do when it’s not their turn?I checked in the afternoon, during a series of long-winded questions from Sen. Mike DeWine, R-Ohio.
Gamecock Graham rocks, back and forth, back and forth, in his cushioned chair.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., cleans her glasses; Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa. and chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, chews on his.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah? I catch him cat-napping.
And I am pretty sure Sens. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., and Sam Brownback, R-Kansas, will be attentive — once they get back from long lunch breaks.
Battle of the stickers
Just outside Room 216, activists rush every reporter in sight.
Those against Alito — feminists, environmentalists, liberals — wear round red stickers that read, er, shout, “No! on Alito.” They’ve got blue buttons, too: “Never Go Back … Save Roe … Filibuster.”
The pro-Alito forces, including teen conservatives from all over the country, have their own stickers: “Americans for Alito,”"Coalition Alito” and “People for the Alito Way.” That last slogan is a slap at People for the American Way, which is leading the charge against Alito.
“Are you a reporter?” both sides ask. “Yes” brings a bombardment of sound bites, fact sheets, business cards.
U.S. Capitol cops try to keep order. Good luck. The activists clog the hallway. They steer reporters from the other side, introduce their spokespeople, and go on and on about why Alito would be the best — or worst — thing to ever happen to the Supreme Court, the Free World, and our pet fish.
Ralph Neas, head of People for the American Way, tells the media how “dangerous” Alito is when a pro-Alito guy interrupts and invites the gaggle of reporters to meet a “Former Alito Clerk” — it says so on her sticker.
She’s Susan Sullivan of San Francisco, a self-described liberal Democrat who supports abortion rights. Still, she’s an Alito fan and came to Washington on her own dime — she says — to speak up for him (and sit in on the show).
“In all seriousness,” she says, “this is a momentous process, and I wanted to be part of it.”
A room with a view
Room 216 is a bit of a rock star when it comes to hearings. It’s where the 9-11 Commission met. And where John Roberts, now chief justice of the United States, wowed the same Senate committee and much of America.
The senators sit up front, behind red-draped tables. The senior members — Specter, Leahy, Kennedy, Hatch, Grassley — get tall black cushy chairs. The others get shorter, less comfy seats.
But all of them get a note pad, a pencil, a water glass resting on a Senate coaster, and two pieces of hard candy to suck on — one Life Saver-like, one candy-canish.
Crouching in front of them: a hunting party of photographers. They train long lenses on Alito and click-click-click.
After the lunch break, when Alito and his entourage — wife, kids, White House handlers — return, the photographers erupt, zooming in so close you’d think Bush had nominated Angelina and Brad.
Behind Alito’s entourage sit a hundred or more members of the working — mostly — press. Well-dressed and coifed TV reporters and producers share one set of tables, serious-looking magazine reporters share a few more. Most of the tables are home to newspaper writers, who obviously don’t get a wardrobe allowance.
In the very back: the public.
Two big TV screens show C-SPAN. But the so-called “live” images are a moment behind the sounds in the room. The mouths of Alito and the senators are not in sync with what they’re saying.
They look like foreign actors in a talky movie, dubbed in English.
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Copyright (c) 2006, The Charlotte Observer, N.C.
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