CNN: Senator-elect Claire McCaskill listens in on Gates confirmation hearings

Tuesday, December 05, 2006
McCaskill listens in on Gates hearings

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Incoming freshman Sen. Claire McCaskill, a Democrat from Missouri who will sit on the Armed Services Committee in the next Congress, monitored the Robert Gates confirmation hearing for about two hours Tuesday from a seat in the hearing room two rows behind the nominee.

Just before the hearing started she approached the dais and introduced herself to her new Democratic and Republican colleagues.

But one committee member who was notably absent at the time was Sen. Jim Talent, the Republican who McCaskill beat in a hard-fought election during which Iraq policy was a key campaign issue. Talent didn't show up until the hearing was well underway.

Shortly before it was Talent's turn to question Gates, McCaskill and an aide slipped out of the crowded hearing room. Asked by a reporter what she thought of Gates's answers, she said she was both "encouraged he said all options are on the table" and that it "took him almost two hours to use the phrase cut and run."...

http://www.cnn.com/POLITICS/blogs/politicalticker/2006/12/mccaskill-listens-in-on-gates-hearings.html

I love it.

she said she was both "encouraged he said all options are on the table" and that it "took him almost two hours to use the phrase cut and run."...