Sam Fox is George W. Bush's nominee to serve as the new ambassador to Belgium. Mr. Fox got this nomination the way a lot of people get such nominations. He was a big donor to the campaigns of the Republican party…and let's stipulate up top that Democrats do that kind of thing too, whenever they're in a position to reward those who give cash to their electioneering.
Yesterday in his confirmation hearing, Mr. Fox was grilled by Senator John Kerry about why he'd donated $50,000 to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. The exchange was quite extraordinary for a couple of reasons, one being the pathetic quality of Fox's reponses. He went out of his way to praise Kerry as an honest veteran who'd earned his medals and shown great heroism…in other words, the exact opposite of what was claimed by those commercials he helped put on the air. Asked why he gave money to the cause, Mr. Fox mumbled something about how one side engages in dirty politics so the other side has to, and then claimed he gave to so many charitable causes that he really didn't know who'd asked him to donate in this instance.
It was a pretty pathetic defense. I'm not sure what the Ambassador to Belgium is called upon to do but I don't think Fox demonstrated he's up to the task. This site has a video clip of the exchange and it runs a little less than seventeen minutes.