Dianne Feinstein’s Missteps Raise a Painful Age Question Among Senate Democrats https://www.newyorker.com/news/news...a-painful-age-question-among-senate-democrats In a hearing on November 17th, Dianne Feinstein, the senior Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, who, at eighty-seven, is the oldest member of the Senate, grilled a witness. Reading from a sheaf of prepared papers, she asked Jack Dorsey, the C.E.O. of Twitter, whether his company was doing enough to stem the spread of disinformation. Elaborating, she read in full a tweet that President Trump had disseminated on November 7th, falsely claiming to have won the Presidential election. She then asked Dorsey if Twitter’s labelling of the tweet as disputed had adequately alerted readers that it was a bald lie. It was a good question. Feinstein seemed sharp and focussed. For decades, she has been the epitome of a female trailblazer in Washington, always hyper-prepared. But this time, after Dorsey responded, Feinstein asked him the same question again, reading it word for word, along with the Trump tweet. Her inflection was eerily identical. Feinstein looked and sounded just as authoritative, seemingly registering no awareness that she was repeating herself verbatim. Dorsey graciously answered the question all over again. Social media was less polite. A conservative Web site soon posted a clip of the humiliating moment on YouTube, under the headline “Senator Feinstein just asked the same question twice and didn’t realize she did it,” adding an emoji of someone covering his face with his hand in shame, along with bright red type proclaiming “Time to Retire!!” Six days later, under growing pressure from progressive groups who were already outraged by her faltering management of Amy Coney Barrett’s Supreme Court confirmation hearing, Feinstein released a statement announcing that she would step down from the Democrats’ senior position, while continuing as a non-ranking member of the committee. Feinstein’s office declined to comment for this article. Feinstein first became nationally known for the grit she showed in 1978, when her fellow San Francisco city officials Harvey Milk and George Moscone were shot dead. She has had a distinguished twenty-eight-year tenure in the Senate, taking on a range of powerful interests, from gun-rights groups to the C.I.A. The moment marked a sad turning point for Feinstein and a reckoning for the Senate, which runs on the seniority system. The presumption has been that it’s up to voters to fire aging senators who can no longer effectively serve. But voters rarely do. As Paul Kane, who covers Congress for the Washington Post, wrote in 2017, the Senate was then the oldest in history. Its eight octogenarians were almost twice the number that had simultaneously served before. According to the Senate Historical Office, all of them held positions of vital importance to the country. And while several were regarded as wise and effective, others had disruptive health problems that clearly undermined the Senate’s ability to function. Twitter and other social-media platforms are exposing lawmakers’ infirmities to new and harsher scrutiny, violating an unspoken culture of complicity and coverup. Prior to the recent reëlection of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, the Internet was ablaze with close-up photos of his bandaged, purple hands, setting off wild speculation about the health of the seventy-eight-year-old Republican from Kentucky. The physical and mental fitness of Trump, who is seventy-four, and Joe Biden, who is seventy-eight, have also been extensively covered. “In the 24/7 news cycle we have now, you can’t really hide,” one former top aide to Feinstein told me. Some former Feinstein aides insist that rumors of her cognitive decline have been exaggerated, and that video clips taken out of context can make almost anyone look foolish. They also bridle at singling out her condition, because declining male senators, including Strom Thurmond, of South Carolina, and Robert Byrd, of West Virginia, were widely known by the end of their careers to be non-compos mentis. “For his last ten years, Strom Thurmond didn’t know if he was on foot or on horseback,” one former Senate aide told me. The former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, of Nevada, is said to have snapped at a staffer who claimed to be relaying what Byrd thought. “Knock it off,” Reid supposedly said. “Everyone knows it’s what you think.” In contrast, one former aide to Feinstein argues that, even if her faculties are diminished, “she’s still smarter and quicker than at least a third of the other members.” But many others familiar with Feinstein’s situation describe her as seriously struggling, and say it has been evident for several years. Speaking on background, and with respect for her accomplished career, they say her short-term memory has grown so poor that she often forgets she has been briefed on a topic, accusing her staff of failing to do so just after they have. They describe Feinstein as forgetting what she has said and getting upset when she can’t keep up. One aide to another senator described what he called a “Kabuki” meeting in which Feinstein’s staff tried to steer her through a proposed piece of legislation that she protested was “just words” which “make no sense.” Feinstein’s staff has said that sometimes she seems herself, and other times unreachable. “The staff is in such a bad position,” a former Senate aide who still has business in Congress said. “They have to defend her and make her seem normal.” Feinstein has always been known as a difficult taskmaster. She is said to have told someone applying for a job in her office, “I don’t get ulcers—I give them.” A stickler for detail, she demanded to see every page going out of her office with her name on it. But with her diminishing capacity, this has become increasingly difficult. The former Senate staffer who still works with Congress declared, “It’s been a disaster.” As the ranking Democrat, Feinstein ordinarily would be expected to run the Party’s strategy on issues of major national importance, including judicial nominations. Instead, the committee has been hamstrung and disorganized. “Other members were constantly trying to go around her because, as chair, she didn’t want to do anything, and she also didn’t want them doing anything,” the former Senate staffer said. A current aide to a different Democratic senator observed sadly, “She’s an incredibly effective human being, but there’s definitely been deterioration in the last year. She’s in a very different mode now.” Tensions began erupting in the summer of 2018, during Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings, when the other Democrats on the committee belatedly learned that Feinstein’s office had sat on Christine Blasey Ford’s allegation that Kavanaugh had sexually assaulted her when they were in high school, instead of immediately alerting them or the F.B.I. Ford had demanded that Feinstein keep the explosive charge confidential. But, inevitably, word of it leaked elsewhere to the media, triggering a second round of circus-like hearings that angered all sides. (Much more at above url)
Chuck Schumer had to tell Dianne Feinstein that she should step down as the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee twice because she forgot the first conversation they had, new report alleges https://www.businessinsider.com/sch...twice-after-forgot-first-conversation-2020-12 Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer reportedly told Sen. Diane Feinstein, the oldest member of the US Senate, to step aside as ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, according to a new report from the New Yorker's Jane Mayer. Feinstein whose mental capacity has been questioned recently forgot the first conversation, sources told the New Yorker. She recently announced that she'd be stepping down as the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer reportedly spoke with Sen. Diane Feinstein twice to ask her to step aside from her leadership role on the Judiciary Committee on her own, but she forgot the first conversation, sources aware of the exchange told the New Yorker's Jane Mayer. Feinstein had recently announced that she would be stepping down as the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee after she faced backlash from progressives for not being aggressive enough in the hearings to confirm Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. The US Senator from California, who is the oldest member of the Senate, was also mocked online after she asked Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey the same question twice during a hearing last month, prompting conversation on her mental capacity. Schumer wanted Feinstein to step aside from the committee on her own accord to preserve her dignity, according to Mayer's report. Feinstein forgot the initial conversation with Schumer which prompted him to speak with her on the topic again, the report said. Efforts were also made to enlist her husband, Richard Blum for help, the New Yorker reported. One source told the New Yorker that Feinstein "wasn't really all that aware of the extent to which she'd been compromised," and that "it was hurtful and distressing to have it pointed out." Other aides told the New Yorker that Feinstein was "struggling" and having a hard time retaining short term memory. Yet others said that the concerns were overblown. Neither Feinstein's nor Schumer's office responded to Business Insider's request for comment at the time of publication.
It is sad when you been a working professional your whole life and then suddenly realize you lost it or are having "incidents" such as these. But at 87 it means she was reelected over the age of 80.....cmon California.....stop phoning in your votes.
You won't find much disagreement, see? Easy. The left know when it's past time. Slow onsetting dementia is always difficult, most start to feel their mind slip as early as mid 40s but you are still capable. When to draw the line is tricky without a statutory age cap (there should be one, 70-75 max, lower perhaps). Now if the right could recognise the need to weed out their not dementia just evil shits like Graham, Gohmert and Gaetz..
Rumor has it the old guard appointed Becerra to Biden's cabinet to keep him from running for one of the California's seats
Yeah it's easy, everyone agrees there should be some age limit and the obviously senile need to go. Everyone except those in government, with all respective constituents saying to the otherside, you go first. Round and round we go.
Rolodex, she has a massive number of contacts as do all these ancient politicians. Passing this on as a legacy to a successor needs to be incentivised. These days I also think that the party whips need to be done away with entirely. Your vote for an individual to represent your community is undermined by the fact that they are the party whip's gimp. Democracy needs inefficiency, lots of voices pulling together apart, making deals so there is complex networking between parties. If its all just vote how Mitch etc. says, what does the mind of the representative matter? Get rid of the party whip America.
Yes, there should be an age cap. The current retirement age in the US is 66, although after 2020, is set to rise to 67. This might be a reasonable basis for setting an age limit. However, some aspects of mental acuity decline earlier: Yes, there should be an age cap. The current retirement age in the US is 66, although after 2020, is set to rise to 67. This might be a reasonable basis for setting an age limit. However, some aspects of mental acuity decline earlier: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4906299/
Not to familiar with him.Why don't they want him taking a Senate seat? If he has a good shot at it and as AG he probably does I would pass up the BS position Biden is offering.