TWO FROM ZNET

Yes, it's technical rehearsal time once again, which means exhaustion and very little free time. So no sparkling commentary today. Instead, read these two cool essays.

The Masking Of A Conservative

Pride must go before he falls. This is why Samuel Alito hopped to liberal burrows on Capitol Hill to proclaim the burial of his conservative ideology. In his 1985 application to a senior post in the Reagan administration, Alito wrote:

"I am particularly proud of my contributions in recent cases in which the government has argued in the Supreme Court that racial and ethnic quotas should not be allowed and that the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion."

"I am and always have been a conservative and an adherent to the same philosophical views that I believe are central to this administration." He said, "I believe very strongly in limited government" and "the legitimacy of a government role in protecting traditional values."

"In college, I developed a deep interest in constitutional law, motivated in large part by disagreement with the Warren Court decisions."

The Warren Court of 1953-69 happened to be the one that expanded civil rights protections for millions of Americans frozen out of the Constitution until the 20th century. The revelation of the memo forced Alito to bizarrely ask liberal senators not to strictly interpret his strict interpretations.

Last week Alito visited the prochoice senator from California, Diane Feinstein. Feinstein said Alito told her, "I'm not an advocate; I don't give heed to my personal views." The whipping boy of the right, Senator Ted Kennedy, said Alito told him that the 1985 memo is just an old job application and that the nominee said he is "wiser" and has "a better grasp of understanding constitutional rights and liberties."

Click here for the rest.

Woodward Scandal

Bob Woodward probably hoped that the long holiday weekend would break the momentum of an uproar that suddenly confronted him midway through November. But three days after Thanksgiving, on NBC's "Meet the Press," a question about the famed Washington Post reporter provoked anything but the customary adulation.

"I think none of us can really understand Bob's silence for two years about his own role in the case," longtime Post journalist David Broder told viewers. "He's explained it by saying he did not want to become involved and did not want to face a subpoena, but he left his editor, our editor, blind-sided for two years and he went out and talked disparagingly about the significance of the investigation without disclosing his role in it. Those are hard things to reconcile."

An icon of the media establishment, Broder is accustomed to making excuses for deceptive machinations by the White House and other centers of power in Washington. His televised rebuke of Woodward on Nov. 27 does not augur well for current efforts to salvage Woodward's reputation as a trustworthy journalist.

The Woodward saga is a story of a reporter who, as half of the Post duo that broke open Watergate, challenged powerful insiders -- and then, as years went by, became one of them. He used confidential sources to expose wrongdoing at the top levels of the U.S. government -- and then, gradually, became cozy with high-placed sources who effectively used him.

Click here for the rest.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$