And his point was?

This line from the Stakeholder's coverage of a dustup between Dennis Hastert and Rahm Emanuel caught my eye...

The story so far: In a Monday column, Hastert took aim at Emanuel as unduly partisan...

Well, golly gee! The Chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is partisan! Even "unduly partisan," though I don't think that's a possible description of someone in an political leadership position within a partisan caucus. An important part of Emanuel's job is to be partisan and to advance the Party's 2006 election prospects at every possible occassion. I don't really want to hear anything about him reaching across the aisle. I want a Democratic majority.

Hastert's position, of course, is Constitutional, not partisan, derived from an election by the House, not by a caucus, so a measure of non - if not bi - partisanship is often appropriate to his role. It's understandable, then, that Emanuel would express appreciation for Hastert's new found cooperative nature...

"I am also pleased to learn of your new spirit of bipartisanship, which is a marked change from past policies of keeping the vote open for three hours on controversial measures, using the House rules to prevent alternate proposals and amendments from coming to the House floor, and withhold any vote on key pieces of legislation unless it could produce 'a majority of the majority,'" wrote Emanuel.

Heh.