Senate Closes Doors, and Then Opens Them

In what is probably the biggest non-story of the day, Senate Democrats briefly closed Senate doors when they realized that nobody cared about what they said when the doors were open:

(Washington Post) With no warning in the mid-afternoon, the Senate's top Democrat invoked the little-used Rule 21, which forced aides to turn off the chamber's cameras and close its massive doors after evicting all visitors, reporters and most staffers. Plans to bring in electronic-bug-sniffing dogs were dropped when it became clear that senators would trade barbs but discuss no classified information.

Republicans condemned the Democrats' maneuver, which marked the first time in more than 25 years that one party had insisted on a closed session without consulting the other party.

So it was essentially a meaningless partisan stunt, although from the Drudge Report tried to make it look like a coup.

The usually unflappable majority leader, Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), was searching for words to express his outrage to reporters a few minutes later. The Senate "has been hijacked by the Democratic leadership," he said. "They have no convictions, they have no principles, they have no ideas." Never before had he been "slapped in the face with such an affront," he said, adding: "For the next year and a half, I can't trust Senator Reid."

So Senator Frist is only a week or so behind the President.