EFL. Hat tip James Taranto (opinionjournal.com)
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Kerreyâs behavior during the 9/11 hearings â hectoring witnesses, mugging for the cameras, delivering a windy monologue to Dr. Condoleezza Rice ("Dr. Clarke") and then complaining about his time being "eaten up" â has been abominable. But it was Kerreyâs shameful TV appearance on Monday night alone that should disqualify him as a commissioner on a federal panel investigating the deadliest enemy attack on American soil.
Catapulted back into the limelight thanks to the mass murder of 3,000 innocent men, women, and children, Kerrey took advantage of his terrorist-induced celebrity to appear on Comedy Centralâs The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.
Now, it would be one thing if Kerrey used his privileged position to inform Stewartâs younger audience of the gravity of the 9/11 panelâs task. But instead, Kerrey yukked it up. First, he dished with Stewart about President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheneyâs upcoming private meeting with the commission. When Stewart mocked the presidentâs "buddy system," Kerrey guffawed: "He is bringing his buddy, thatâs exactly right, for safety." Emboldened by audience applause, Kerrey riffed that it was more like "Screw you, buddy." Asked by Stewart whether people were really blaming each other over the terrorist attacks during closed hearings, Kerrey snorted: "Oh, Jee-zus, yeah." More audience approval. (Taking the Lordâs name in vain is always good for a few cheap laughs.)
Next, echoing a profanity uttered earlier in the show, Kerrey blurted out with a clownish grin: "Life is [expletive bleeped]." When Stewart proposed that Kerrey ask the vice president, "What the [expletive bleeped] is wrong with you people?" Kerrey cracked up and promised to use the question. And when Stewart called Attorney General John Ashcroft a "big [expletive bleeped]," Kerrey chortled some more. 
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