Hard to believe in October 2020, just over two weeks until election day, that a prominent Democratic senator — the ranking member, who has been in office for 28 years — is so clueless about the raw power play Republicans just made in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Senator Dianne Feinstein had this to say to Chairman Lindsey Graham:

“This has been one of the best set of hearings that I have participated in. And I want to thank you for your fairness and the opportunity of going back and forth. It leaves one with a lot of hopes, a lot of questions, and even some ideas, perhaps some good bi-partisan legislation that we can put together to make this great country even better. So, thank you so much for your leadership.”

Earlier this week, I highlighted Josh Marshall’s injunction that it was foolish to embrace the pejorative language of ones opponents — especially when it creates a false narrative that “turns the entire reality of the situation on its head.”

Joe Biden hasn’t followed the injunction. I’m sure his advisors are unconcerned about their candidate’s words on what they regard (at least at this stage of the campaign) as a small-ball issue. The Biden campaign has been a smashing success with a candidate who has hardly strayed from strategic messaging on big picture issues.

In the context of the rush to confirm a conservative ideologue to replace Ruth Bader Ginzburg on the Supreme Court, however, Dianne Feinstein’s fulsome praise of Lindsey Graham — followed by a hug, without masks — is inexcusably damning.

In 2018, when Feinstein ran for reelection, two Democrats had finished first and second in the voting in California’s jungle primary, and so faced off in the general election. The California State Democratic Party endorsed Kevin de León, the former president pro tempore of the California State Senate, over the sitting U.S. Senator. De León also received my vote. Why?

In part (speaking for myself) because Dianne Feinstein was, and is, living in the past. She is an anachronism, out of sync with contemporary politics, and willfully blind to the unwavering commitment of her Republican colleagues to scorched earth opposition to all things Democratic. The refusal of the Republican majority to even hold a hearing for Merrick Garland seems to have slipped her mind, while she willingly overlooks Republicans’ deceitful hypocrisy in doing a 180 with the Barrett nomination. (“I want to thank you for your fairness.”)

California’s senior senator recalls an era when Ted Kennedy and Orin Hatch co-sponsored legislation and when John McCain and Joe Lieberman could form strong friendships — and often bipartisan agreements — across the aisle. She remembers an era when comity and senatorial courtesy were ascendant; a time, just a year before her election to the Senate, when committee chair Joe Biden could decide to preclude calling supporting witnesses for Anita Hill because he had made a pledge to a Republican colleague in the senate gym to hurry the proceedings along.

Those were the days. Whatever we think of them, though, those days are long gone. But Dianne Feinstein still clings to them.

This morning’s Los Angeles Times reports [emphasis added]: “Polls have shown that a majority of Americans believe the winner of the election should fill the seat left vacant by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Meanwhile, Republicans prominently featured Feinstein’s comments and the hug with Graham in digital ads and news releases.“

(Image: Bloomberg on YouTube.)