Why legislate...

...when you can insinuate?

Port and airport security are in the news today. For instance, there's Senator Gordon Smith (R-OR).

"The American people deserve better than this. And frankly, we expect more than this."

Is he talking about the ineffectiveness of our container inspection program? The miles and miles of unpatrolled coastland? the ineffectiveness of the airport screening procedures?

Nope, he's just trying to score political points against John Kerry.

It seems that some of the documents that Sandy Berger carried away inadvertently from the National Archives while preparing for his 9/11 Commission testimony had to do with port and airport security, and John Kerry has, not suprisingly, urged that port and airport security be improved. He's hardly the only one. Up here in the Upper Left, our own Senator Patty Murray has been all over the issue for approximately forever.

But why address the issue when you can issue inuendo?

Smith's hardly the only guilty party. For instance, there's Bill "No-Budget" Frist.

The Republican majority leader, Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, told reporters in the Capitol he did not know whether the classified documents that Mr. Berger took had been sent to the Kerry campaign. "But I think it's pretty interesting that the press is now reporting that these documents had to do with airport security and seaport security, and that those are two areas where the Kerry campaign has seemed to focus on relative to alleged deficiencies in homeland security," Mr. Frist said.

I don't know whether Dr. Frist has sexual relations with domesticated animals, but I think it's pretty interesting that Bill Frist is from Tennessee, and there are pregnant dogs in Tennessee.

The borders are a problem, folks. Fishing for political leverage isn't a solution.


Update: Josh Marshall explains why it's silly season in the Senate.

That makes no sense. As someone who runs in those circles, I can tell you that there are at least half a dozen Democratic think-tank homeland security mavens who will happily go on about port security with you until you're ready to strangle them, or even until you do strangle them.

The thought that Kerry needed Sandy Berger to pilfer one of Richard Clarke's after-reports about the millenium terror alerts to get whatever boilerplate he discussed at this particular press conference is truly ridiculous....