Jan. 8 Neal Knox Update -- Swearing-in day in Congress is usually full of platitudes about bi-partisanship and love and respect for "the distinguished ladies and gentlemen on the otherside of the aisle."

     Didn't happen yesterday.

     First rattle out of the box Senate Democrats rattled Frist, the newly installed Republican Majority Leader.

     Breaking what Frist thought had been a deal to quickly move the unemployment compensation bill, New York's Junior Senator Hillary Clinton offered an amendment to double it.

     There was a fine display of eye-gouging partisanship that set tempers on edge, and even got House Republicans irritated with Frist.

     Which made it hilarious when some of those same Senate Democrats declared themselves shocked -- Shocked! -- that President Bush would "inject partisanship" by renominating 30 mainly conservative (and suspected "strict constitutionalist") judicial candidates that the Democrat-controlled Judiciary Committee had blocked or rejected.

     The makeup of that Judiciary Committee won't change until Democrats agree to accept a "reorganization resolution" that meets their liking.  Right now Democrats are insisting on an essentially even division of committee seats and committee staff. 

     The newly elected mostly-Republican Senators will have no committee seats until the reorganization resolution passes,  And unless the Dems agree with the division of power, they can successfully filibuster it.  So we're starting off with what the old-time gunfighters called a "Mexican Standoff."

     One thing:  I'm encouraged by the President's persistence in pursuing getting those conservative judges seated -- including putting the father of staunchly pro-gun Rep. Chip Pickering on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.

     Yesterday I speculated that California Attorney General Bill Lockyer might bury the study of "ballistic imaging" he commissioned from a forensic ballistic expert in Belgium, which National Shooting Sports Foundation says rejects the Lockyer-supported program.

     I was behind the power curve.  According to a Dec. 27 California Rifle and Pistol Association news release from Chuck Michel, Lockyer was already burying it, and refusing to release it to CRPA even under a Freedom of Information Act request.

     What's embarrassing is that I had received a notice of Chuck's release in a packet of info from the www.SightM191145.com web page on New Year's Day.  But I didn't read it until this morning.

     It reports "Lockyer is refusing to release a new study, recently written by expert Jan De Kinder in Belgium especially for Lockyer, to address the earlier DOJ report. The De Kinder study was commissioned by DOJ in response to the controversy that the first DOJ report generated. The new report apparently confirms the earlier conclusion that the technology is unreliable and the database infeasible. A CRPA public records act request has been denied, as have requests from several media outlets."

     Never let it be said that Attorney General Bill Lockyer pays no attention to facts.  He just ignores anything that disagrees with his opinions.

      Read details on www.crpa.org/pressrls122702.html.

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