Today on Fox News Sunday, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin joined other conservatives in saying that Kentucky GOP Senate candidate Rand Paul should never have gone on Rachel Maddow’s MSNBC show because it was a “gotcha” question to ask him about his views on civil rights (which were already the hot topic of the day, before the interview). Palin criticized Maddow, saying she “perhaps had an agenda” and that he should be allowed to freely engage in “a hypothetical discussion” about the Civil Rights Act:

WALLACE: Do you see some similarities to what politicians and the press did to you in the fall of 2008?

PALIN: Yeah, absolutely. So you know, one thing that we can learn in this lesson that I have learned and Rand Paul is learning now is don’t assume that you can engage in a hypothetical discussion about constitutional impacts with a reporter or a media personality who has an agenda, who may be prejudiced before they even get into the interview in regards to what your answer may be — and then the opportunity that they seize to get you.

You know, they’re looking for that gotcha moment. And that’s what it evidently appears to be that they did with Rand Paul, but I’m thankful that he was able to clarify his answer about his support for the Civil Rights Act.

Maddow, despite Palin’s rhetoric, provided Paul a fair forum, giving him approximately 15 minutes to explain his views. Last week, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) also said that Maddow did a “gotcha” interview, claiming, “If I’m walking down the street minding my own business and somebody sticks a microphone under my nose about a law that was passed 40 years ago, without more detail — I think it probably caught him a little bit by surprise.” Of course, Maddow didn’t “stick” a microphone under Paul’s nose; he freely appeared on her show and the issue of the Civil Rights Act was brought up earlier, during an interview Louisville Courier-Journal in Kentucky. At that time, Paul had a very clear opinion on the issue.

Today on NBC’s Meet the Press, however, Cornyn admitted that asking Paul about his positions is fair game:

GREGORY: Don’t you think this is fair game? Questions about his views about the limit and scope of government?

CORNYN: Well, I do think that’s a fair topic, and I’m sure you’ll be hearing extensively from him and all the other candidates over the next six months.

Watch Palin and Cornyn:

When President Obama announced that he was nominating Solicitor General Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, issued a statement saying that Kagan had “a first-rate intellect,” but that she was “a surprising choice because she lacks judicial experience”:

There is no doubt that Ms. Kagan possesses a first-rate intellect, but she is a surprising choice from a president who has emphasized the importance of understanding ‘how the world works and how ordinary people live.’ Ms. Kagan has spent her entire professional career in Harvard Square, Hyde Park, and the DC Beltway. These are not places where one learns ‘how ordinary people live.’ Ms. Kagan is likewise a surprising choice because she lacks judicial experience. Most Americans believe that prior judicial experience is a necessary credential for a Supreme Court Justice.

Like his colleagues Sens. Mitch McConnell (KY) and Jim DeMint (SC), Cornyn’s experience attack is hypocritical, considering his past support for President Bush’s nomination of Harriet Miers (who had no prior judicial experience) to the Supreme Court in 2005. Salon’s Mike Madden notes Cornyn’s comments on Oct. 27, 2005 after Miers withdrew her nomination:

I mean, one reason I felt so strongly about Harriet Miers’s qualifications is I thought she would fill some very important gaps in the Supreme Court. Because right now you have people who’ve been federal judges, circuit judges most of their lives, or academicians. And what you see is a lack of grounding in reality and common sense that I think would be very beneficial.

Challenged about his hypocrisy in an interview on MSNBC, Cornyn defended himself by saying Miers had more “practical legal experience than Kagan.” “She, like Ms. Kagan, has not been a judge, and I don’t think that should be a disqualifier,” said Cornyn, ignoring his assertion that “most Americans believe that prior judicial experience is a necessary credential for a Supreme Court Justice.”

Roll Call reports another inconsistency in Cornyn’s rhetoric on Kagan today. Earlier this month, Cornyn was asked about the possibility of Obama nominating a woman to replace Justice John Paul Stevens and he replied that there are “a number of highly qualified [women], including Elena Kagan and Diane Wood.” A Cornyn spokesman claimed that “there was no contradiction in the Senator’s words since his earlier comments were about there being a wealth of female lawyers in the country.”

This morning, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) declared his opposition to the financial reform bill before the Senate. McConnell claimed to have principled objections to the bill, saying that it “institutionalizes” bailouts of Wall Street and that it would give the Federal Reserve “enhanced emergency lending authority that is far too open to abuse.”

What McConnell did not mention was that, last week, he traveled alongside National Republican Senatorial Committee chairman Sen. John Cornyn (TX) to New York City for a private meeting with elite hedge fund managers and other Wall Street executives. The purpose of the meeting between the top Republicans and the financial executives was to enlist “Wall Street’s help” in funding Republican campaigns in the fall and killing any tough financial reform:

As a financial reform bill starts to take shape in Washington, two key lawmakers came to New York City last week to explain what it means for Wall Street, and how financial executives might help prevent some of its least market-friendly aspects from becoming law by electing more Republicans, FOX Business Network has learned.

About 25 Wall Street executives, many of them hedge fund managers, sat down for a private meeting Thursday afternoon with two of the most powerful Republican lawmakers in Congress: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, and John Cornyn, the senior senator from Texas who runs the National Republican Senatorial Committee, one of the primary fundraising arms of the Republican Party. [...]

In order to assure [Republican electoral] gains, and add even more, McConnell and Cornyn made it clear they need Wall Street’s help.

Separately, House Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence (R-IN) met with hedge fund managers this morning and told them that “Democrats’ solution for financial reform consists of two words: government control.” He added, “America will continue to be the home of freedom and the free market; the place where liberty prevails.”

As the Wonk Room’s Pat Garofalo writes, Republicans are making “a habit” out of meeting with lobbyists to kill important reforms. In June 2009, Senate Republicans worked closely with health care lobbyists to kill the public option. In the same month they also organized a “hearing” with energy industry representatives designed around defeating cap-and-trade. In December, the House Republican leadership huddled with more than 100 financial lobbyists to debate the strategy for killing financial reform. And in February of this year, House Minority Leader Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) met with JP Morgan chief Jamie Dimon to try to convince him to funnel funds to the Republican Party after the Democrats started getting tougher on Wall Street. Boehner last month told financial lobbyists to not let “punk staffers” take advantage of them, and Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) asked bankers to donate $10,000 to Rep. Roy Blunt’s (R-MO) Senate campaign.

It should be noted that some Democrats have continued to court corporate interests as well. Earlier this year, twelve Democratic senators spent a weekend fundraising at a private retreat in Miami Beach with lobbyists from the American Bankers Association, drug companies, and defense contractors. (HT: OpenLeft)

Last year, after Supreme Court Justice David Souter announced his retirement, speculation mounted about whether President Obama could potentially appoint the first openly gay Justice. Conservatives were unsure of how to respond to that possibility. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, initially indicated that he was open to the idea, but later backtracked, declaring that an openly gay nominee would be “a big concern.” Sen. John Thune (R-SD) said such an appointment “would be a bridge too far right now.” With Justice John Paul Stevens now retiring, the question has been raised again. Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) says he has to “think about” it before deciding:

Cornyn, a former Texas Supreme Court justice, was initially reluctant when asked if he would support an openly gay nominee — as Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), the Judiciary Committee’s ranking Republican, said last year he might.

“I’d have to think about that,” he said. “As long as it doesn’t interfere with their job, it’s not a particular issue.”

Cornyn, who has advocated for a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, once prepared a speech that argued against gay marriage by comparing gay men and women to box turtles.

Yesterday, ThinkProgress highlighted a divide among Republicans about whether try to repeal part of the health care reform legislation or “the whole thing.” Hard right conservatives like Reps. Michele Bachmann (R-TN), Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) and Zach Wamp (R-TN) who say they’re “going to repeal the whole thing” and Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-GA) who told CNN he “does not want” to repeal everything in the bill. In an interview with Huffington Post’s Sam Stein yesterday, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, appeared to side with Gingrey in favor of only seeking partial repeal:

In a brief chat with the Huffington Post on Tuesday, National Republican Senatorial Committee chair John Cornyn (R-Tex.) implicitly acknowledged that Republicans are content with allowing some elements of Obama’s reform into law. And they’d generally ignore those elements when taking the fight to their Democrat opponents as November approaches.

“There is non-controversial stuff here like the preexisting conditions exclusion and those sorts of things,” the Texas Republican said. “Now we are not interested in repealing that. And that is frankly a distraction.”

What the GOP will work to repeal, Cornyn explained, are provisions that result in “tax increases on middle class families,” language that forced “an increase in the premium costs for people who have insurance now” and the “cuts to Medicare” included in the legislation.

Cornyn’s comments were called a “folly” by National Review’s Ramesh Ponnuru, who said that “without perhaps realizing it, Cornyn has come out for tinkering at the edges of Obamacare.” Cornyn was also criticized on RedState. In response, Cornyn released a statement attempting to placate the full repealers:

Some media outlets have misrepresented my position on repealing and replacing the President’s $2.6 trillion health care bill. Make no mistake about it: I fully support repealing this Washington takeover of health care and replacing it with a bipartisan bill that lowers the cost of health care.

Republicans have long pointed out that there are areas of health care reform where there is bipartisan agreement. Yet, instead of working with Republicans to solve issues of bipartisan concern such as pre-existing condition exclusions, Democrats insisted on a purely partisan bill that included massive tax hikes, trillions of dollars in new taxpayer spending, and cuts to Medicare, while failing to address rising health care costs.

Cornyn’s statement hasn’t satisfied RedState’s Erick Erickson, who wrote that Cornyn had been “forced into renouncing his own words in favor of some mendacious messaging about bipartisan cooperation.” In another post, Erickson called on his readers to “send an army of conservatives to the Senate who will push back against John Cornyn.”

This week, there has been a significant public backlash against Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY), the obstructionist who has been blocking the temporary extension of unemployment benefits. The Republican Party is also coming under fire for largely staying away from criticizing Bunning (with the exception of Sens. Susan Colllins and James Inhofe). Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) was doing damage control today, insisting that Bunning was just “one senator. This does not represent the position of the caucus.” On Friday, however, Cornyn was singing a very different tune, and actually took to the Senate floor to laud Bunning:

I admire the courage of the junior senator from Kentucky, Senator Bunning. It’s not fun to be accused of having no compassion for the people who are out of work, the people for who these benefits should be forthcoming, and I believe will be forthcoming. But somebody has to stand up, finally, and say enough is enough, no more inter-generational theft from our children and grandchildren by not meeting our responsibilities today. And that’s what I interpret him to have done.

Looks like Cornyn isn’t too interested in standing up for Bunning’s “courage” now that it’s not politically popular.