Fielding His Team
January 9th, 2007George W. Bush has fielded teams consisting of players that have been passed by time during each of the last three seasons, spanning the course of the past six years. Therefore, it should be no surprise that Harriet Miers’ replacement at the hot corner is Fred Fielding.
A veteran Washington lawyer who has been through the legal battles of Watergate and served both Presidents Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan is President George W. Bush’s choice to be his White House counsel. Fred Fielding’s appointment was likely to be made Tuesday, according to a Bush administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the move has not yet been publicly announced. Fielding will become Bush’s top legal counsel just as Democrats, once again the majority party in Congress, plan to take a more critical look at the administration. From the Iraq war to environmental policy and secret surveillance, the Democrats who now control both the House and Senate are armed with subpoena power and ready to summon panels of witnesses.
Fielding, of course, played for Ronald Reagan’s Iran-Contras and on the famed Watergate Bombers team of the 1970s. At his current age, he should probably be playing in The Old Tymer’s League (with The Geriatrics, managed by Bill Clinton, with Ace starting pitcher George H.W. Bush and featuring the occasional appearance by Jimmy Carter at first base, along with Gerald Ford in the outfield…before he died) or at the Local County Jail (if not his hometown’s AAA affiliate) but now, he’s going to the show, and it’s a waste of a roster spot, if you ask me because it means that he’ll be playing for the Washington Nationals as managed by George Walker, making a 100-loss season about inevitable. The only way to solve this, I say, is to appoint Donald Rumsfeld Assistant Skipper to Pitching Coach Robert Gates and hope that Condoleeza Rice can play every other position at all times.
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Seriously, though, Mr. President. There’s a little thing called sex, and it sometimes causes a little thing called life, and that life carried to term often brings about little babies, and those babies grow up into adults. Adults wind up becoming senior citizens, but in between, there’s a such thing as youth, which often brings vigor and insight. It’s nice to sometimes bring in a veteran who’ll swing for the fences and teach the kids how to steal (second, not loot the Treasury…), but it’s probably for the best if you don’t fill your whole team with them.
(On that note, I would like to publicly extend congratulations to Cal Ripken Jr. and Tony Gwynn, as well as condemnation for those writers who didn’t vote in Bert Blyleven or Goose Gossage. Now, if I can be serious for a moment, I’d like to say that Bush’s appointment of Fred Fielding is a shame not just because Fielding is old. That isn’t even the main reason — the real reason is that he’s a crook and a liar.)