Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley says he’s pleased he and other Republicans were able to block Monday’s attempt at a "no confidence" vote that would have been a wrist slap for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.
The vote, had it passed, would have been non-binding. Grassley says he’s not exactly a fan of the embattled Gonzales, but he saw the vote as distracting "horseplay" and nothing substantial.
"I’m not entirely satisfied with Gonzales running the department and a lot of it comes from just stupid mistakes because firing U.S. Attorneys (is) something that can be done but it’s how it was done that made it bad and opened up a lotta’ sores," Grassley says.
Grassley says the U.S. doesn’t have a parliamentary form of government like Canada or England where votes of confidence are essential to keeping a government in place, so he sees Monday’s Democrat-led effort as a big waste of time.
"We’ve got more important things to do on the floor of the U-S Senate than horsing around with a vote of no confidence that accomplishes nothing," Grassley says. "We should have finished the energy bill. We should have finished the immigration bill that we’ve been working on for two weeks that was pulled from the calendar for a bunch of horseplay like a vote of no confidence that doesn’t do anything."
Gonzales’ troubles aren’t over yet as he still faces more congressional hearings and an internal Justice Department probe.