I will tell you up front I’m not fond of the tone of Sen. Tom Cotton’s critique of Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid’s leadership.
But the freshman Arkansas Republican does make a tremendous point about the hypocrisy that abounds in the U.S. Senate in general and of the hypocrisy he said that Reid has demonstrated.
Cotton made a speech this week in which he condemned Reid’s “cancerous leadership” and wondered out loud how Reid could suggest that a defense bill was being shoved down the throats of senators after he had helped push through the Affordable Care Act — also in the middle of the night.
Check out the video of Cotton’s floor speech. It’s a stem winder.
According to Cotton, Reid has said senators haven’t had time to read the bill. Cotton also noted that many senators didn’t read the ACA, either, before approving it on a “party-line vote.”
“I’m forced to listen to the bitter, vulgar, incoherent ramblings of the minority leader,” Cotton said. “Normally, like every other American, I ignore them. I can’t ignore them today. . . . When was the last time the minority leader read a bill? It was probably an electricity bill.”
I have to agree with Cotton’s assessment of Reid’s effort to resist the defense bill.
Reid, who’s retiring from the Senate at the end of the year, at times has not distinguished himself while leading the Senate’s Democratic caucus. Although the junior senator from Arkansas’s tone was overly harsh — in my humble view — he does hit the bulls-eye in calling out the hypocrisy he finds in the minority leader’s leadership.
Sen. Cotton surely won’t aim his fire with nearly the precision he needs at those within his own caucus. I’m also quite certain his opponents on the other side of the Senate chamber will provide adequate response.