The Kavanaugh hearings were a good bet to dominate the news this week, but they were overshadowed on Thursday by the death of Burt Reynolds. Recalling the highlights of Reynolds’ illustrious career — Deliverance was my all-time favorite — sure beat suffering through a day of shameless self-promoting on Capitol Hill by Cory Booker, a New Jersey Democrat who evidently sees himself as his party’s frontrunner in the next presidential election. Booker laid an egg with his promise to divulge supposedly damning confidential emails authored by Brett Kavanaugh, Trump’s choice to replace Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court.  Turns out the emails were neither confidential nor damning, but not before Booker had declaimed to the world — or at least to anyone who was listening, “This is about the closest I’ll probably ever have in my life to an ‘I am Spartacus’ moment.”  More like his “I am Ashlee Simpson” moment, assuming anyone even remembers what he said. The news media trained their cameras on him and, well, he farted. Let’s hope no other beloved actors have to die in order to drown out the hubris in Washington as the confirmation hearings run their course. Booker makes Joseph McCarthy look like a class act. If he’s the best the Democrats can come up with for 2020, Trump will get a second term.