his downplayed judge andrew kaz merrick sexes before the senate, and he is defended justice thomas'sw, the guy who hosted judge ho's swearing. in today's senate judiciary committee held a hearing about justice thomas's acceptance of all these nice things, so we have a lot to talk. about joining us is dolly lithwick, senior editor for the slate. thank you for being here tonight. >> good to be with you. what happened in this judiciary subcommittee hearing today? >> it was fairly amazing, because you had a judge, now senior judge, who was a reagan appointee who worked for all sorts of conservative causes offense into the come forward and say i was upset and stressed out about the failure to disclose and the weirdness of clarence thomas's both gifting situation and disclosures in 2012. a >> long time ago. >> iran's up the flagpole and got nowhere with the judicial conference, which is the governing cobb body of the judiciary. he essentially said, they say to him no, nothing to see here. and so he, after much anguish, alex, comes forward and says, i don't love doing this. this doesn't fee