Posted on 11/21/2002 5:09:47 AM PST by billorites
BOB’S FAREWELL. Sen. Bob Smith made his final speech on the floor of the U.S. Senate yesterday, focusing on continued space exploration, which, he said, is key to continued development of a “robust, multilayered, ballistic missile defense.” And he also renewed his 10-year-old call for a United States Space Force, which he said earned him the nickname “Spaceman” from “one of the more prominent, if you will, newspapers in my state.”
In thanking his colleagues, Smith singled out veteran West Virginia Democrat Robert Byrd for welcoming him to the Senate a dozen years ago.
Byrd last week called Smith an independent, courageous and compassionate man. And he had a special memory of the canine variety.
Byrd recalled, “Last year when our beloved dog Billy Byrd passed away, many people came to me to express their condolences. But one who really, really touched me was the big, hulking Navy combat veteran who came to my office and showed a personal compassion in that moment of sorrow.”
Smith said in an interview this week he is not ashamed of his love for animals, a trait that earned him the backing of the Humane Society of America and its political action committee.
He said a bill described in one news report as providing “retirement homes” for chimps was really a taxpayer-oriented and humane attempt to give monkeys no longer useful for government research to a sanctuary.
“I’ve never been able to understand why it’s odd to have compassion for animals,” he said. “Conservatives know that I’m the strongest defender of them in the country on the issues that matter to us, and I’ve proved that for 18 years. If you have some compassion for an animal, so what? I think it just shows a balance.”
He also said that if the Bush administration did quietly back Sununu in the primary election, he has no hard feelings.
“That’s history,” he said. “It’s over. I don’t have any bitterness at all. I don’t harbor a grudge.
“Politics is a rough and tumble game,” he said. “I’m beyond that now. But was it devastating and difficult? Of course. You’d have to be an idiot to think that it wasn’t.”
(John DiStaso is the senior political reporter of The Union Leader and New Hampshire Sunday News.)
Stop dallying, resign now. The political dustbin of history awaits.
He can't resign now. That would give his successor, John Sununu, a leg-up in Seniority in the Senate.
After all, Bob's no Phil Gramm.
So he is hoping to get a job in the Bush administration after all.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.