On the homepage today we have Part III of my “CPAC Journal.” But I’d like to comment on something that came up in Part II. I mentioned something that has been on my mind lately, particularly in light of Netanyahu’s speech before Congress. If you had been told 30 or 40 years ago that one of the two major parties would become robustly pro-Israel, while the other was rather cooler — would you have bet on the Republican party? If you had been told that either the Left or the Right would fervently embrace Israel — would you have bet on the Right?

At CPAC, I did a brief podcast interview with Judge Michael Mukasey, who served as one of George W. Bush’s attorneys general. Afterward, we talked a little about the subject I have just mentioned. He told me a story — not related to Israel, but in the ballpark nonetheless. I’d like to share the story with you (with the judge’s permission, of course).

Reagan nominated Mukasey to be a federal judge in 1987. There were just two senators present at his hearing: Strom Thurmond of South Carolina and Howard Metzenbaum of Ohio.

Thurmond, you probably remember. He was the infamous Dixiecrat who became a staunch Reagan Republican (roughly speaking). Metzenbaum was a strident, unpleasant liberal. The columnist James J. Kilpatrick used to refer to him as “Senator Obnoxious (D., Ohio).”

Anyway, Thurmond supported Mukasey warmly. And Metzenbaum gave him a hard time, in his usual obnoxious way.

Mukasey said to me, “If you had told my mother that my supporter would be Strom Thurmond, and my antagonist a co-religionist — she would never have believed it.”

If you wait around long enough, you can see all sorts of things, including in national life.