Let us be clear.  The bill on FISA on which the Senate is voting posits that (a) a president can authorize the breaking of the law with no consequences, and (b) the property rights of corporations are more important the the personal, supposedly constitutionally protected rights of individuals.  

[...]

...now I find I must question, I must ask why, and I must decide how far I am willing to go to support people who will not stand up for the preservation of the most basic principles of this nation, things to which we ostensibly commit ourselves.

Then there's this comment by Ken:

...I am not seeking to argue. I am expressing my sadness, perhaps even edge of despair.  This has been rattling around my mind for several days.

I have recently been approached about the possibility of doing things other than being in a school.  In the past I had no doubt that the greatest difference I could make was in the classroom with teenagers.  Now I struggle with whether anything I do makes any kind of difference.  

All I can say is, I hope you don't give up, Ken.  We need to keep fighting to make sure that "we still have a Republic and a Constitution" and to toss out "our elected officials [who] will not stand up for it on our behalf."  Thanks.

We have people who argue on the grounds that we need to get people elected, or reelected, so that we can truly control the reins of power.  But will they be willing to turn back the power that has been aggrandized by their predecessors?  Is not this part of what we asked when we inquired if our candidates would firmly go on record against the use of signing statements, for example.

Mark 8:36, KJV:

For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?

Other translations use "life" instead of "soul."  And we have all seen the Franklin quote so prevalent today, about liberty and security.  

I think we are confronting something very basic.  We are presented with a challenge of what kind of nation and society we are willing to be.  And I am afraid that we are failing that challenge by this kind of acquiescence yet again.

this just looks bad

no wonder the republicans are taunting him for being spineless

this is really F***ed up!

Post 9/11, the telecoms were just as bamboozled and bulldozed as 99% (a rhetorical statistic) of the rest of us, including our elected officials on both sides of the aisle and the mass media.

Why hold some anonymous corporation to a higher standard than an individual government official who was at the wheel of the bulldozer draped in red, white and blue bunting?

No one, not one single person, has been held to account for this tragic debacle.

Start with the FBI apparatchik who ignored the field agent's urgent reports that Arabs taking flying lessons didn't want to learn how to land.

George Tenet?  Tommy Franks?  Paul Bremer?  They all got medals, kept their pensions and got big book advances from Viacom or whoever.

One of the great ironies is that the loser-in-chief initially campaigned on, among other bs things like compassionate conservatism and returning moral respectability to the Oval Office, accountability in government.  Accountability?  Yet it's core Republican/corporate behavior that the people in charge get obscene salaries, bonuses and golden parachutes no matter what debacles happen on their watch.

We all know who is ultimately accountable for all this.  The loser-in-chief and Dick may just skate free -- unless a new administration discovers some outright tangible criminal acts that are not subject to political line by Nancy Pelosi.

Once the gears of the criminal justice system start turning, they can't be stopped.

A good place to start looking on January 21 is Dick's office.  Put a bulldog like Patrick Fitzgerald on it.

Once Obama becomes president, do not hold your breath that any of this will be further looked into. We will get a speech about letting bygones be bygones and lets move ahead together.

Democrats on the Hill probably think that the GOP will act accordingly when Obama is president, and not treat him like they did Bill Clinton. Ha.

Sometimes, Democrats are too much like those inflatable clown punching dummies that no matter how hard or how much you hit them, they always return to an upright position with an idiotic grin on their face.

Yes, it's easy to understand why they made that decision.

It's difficult to imagine though that things like the illegal eavesdropping and, say, the Plame case are isolated incidents.

What I was trying to say was that on January 21, knock on wood, it may be a whole new ball game.

Someone may stumble on evidence of an overtly criminal act that is beyond the purview of a political line call.  And once the Justice Department gets involved, no one will be able to say, oh, never mind, why stir up the pot.

Follow the smell of moral rot to its source.  No doubt, there's putrefying bodies, virtual or perhaps otherwise, buried all around Dick's suite in the West Wing.

We need to keep fighting to make sure that "we still have a Republic and a Constitution" and to toss out "our elected officials [who] will not stand up for it on our behalf."

I keep thinking about the "r" word these days!

Is America so threatened that we have to subvert the Constitution?  What is going on here?  What do Senators know that I don't know?

Sophisticated "link analysis" techniques can then be used to filter through the massive, disparate collected databases to target individuals of interest. It seems unlikely that such "individuals of interest" would be limited to legitimate foreign intelligence or terrorist targets.

As long as there are Karl Roves in this world, these databases can--and doubtless will--be used as the ultimate "oppo research" toolkit. What power-preserving leadership would not be tempted to perform "link analysis" on the data records of political opponents--and perhaps more importantly, of potential political allies? In every data closet there is likely to be a skeleton or two that can be leveraged to political advantage.

Have you ever wondered why Nancy Pelosi, Steny Hoyer, Harry Reid (with a token kabuki "nay" vote on the immunity amendment), and, yes, now Barack Obama (also with token kabuki "nays" on the failed amendments), so completely capitulated to the Bush White House on this FISA legislation? Perhaps the answer lies in the data closet: no prosecution for BushCo lawbreaking in return for no data-derived public embarrassment for Pelosi, Hoyer, Reid, and Obama. One at least has to wonder.

Sure, I'll still vote for Obama, considering the abhorrent, dim, unbalanced alternative of a cognitively impaired McCain. But I'll cast my vote without any particular hope or optimism. And I was one of those who "maxed out" to Obama in the primary season.

Today the Fourth Amendment dies. Its death will undermine the First Amendment. An Amendment here, an Amendment there, and pretty soon the Constitution becomes a quaint myth, to be praised and revered like a religious fable, but rarely to be applied in the real world.

Remember that even the Soviet Union's Constitution guaranteed freedom of speech and assembly--but in theory alone. (BTW, did you see what the police did with that woman holding the "McCain=Bush" sign outside a McCain "town hall" in Denver this week?  They gave her a ticket for "trespassing" and threatened to arrest her.)

When will they change our country's official name to Oceania?

This is a dark, dark day for our Constitution and system. And it saddens me to say that Jim Webb has proven that one of his three planks that he ran on was a farce, all talk -- that of bringing some accountability back to our constitutional system. Sad, but true.

Title I of this bill mauls the 4th Amendment. Title is probably even more egregiously unconstitutional, actively stepping in to ongoing litigation so that the Congress can choose a winner in a judicial fashion (which it is not allowed to do) and in an ex post facto style indemnifying acts which are still illegal! Luckily, it looks like the courts have found their sea legs in the fading days of this criminal administration, so this law, like the MCA before it, may not stand. The judge that ruled in the Al Haramain case recently surely will not accept this law, and it depends on Anthony Kennedy.

This is how far we've come -- one judge means stands between the idea that the President may break the law at will.

Shame on all those today that vote for this atrocity.

Sadly he's proven where he stands on this issue during this whole, long affair that started with PAA last year. He is willing to allow the government extra latitude to spy on citizens in contravention of the 4th Amendment in the name of national security. He has said as much.  

The Republicans, and most of the Democrats, are about to surrender some of our rights. Today they are set to give away the Fourth Amendment to Osama bin Laden.

Real patriots died to get us those rights. Real patriots have died throughout the years to protect those rights. Now a bunch of cowards are going to give them up because they're scared of a couple of ragtag terrorists hiding in a cave somewhere in Pakistan.

And somehow Barack Obama thought it was a good idea to go along with these surrender monkeys. He thought it was a good idea to sign a bill written by Dick Cheney right before the elections. What a terrible lack of judgment. What a sad display of weakness.

This is how Democrats lose presidential elections. They agree with every heinous thing the Republicans offer up and then wonder why they can't successfully challenge them. That's because you already agreed with them and undercut yourself and everything you claimed to stand for.

It's terrible politics to campaign from weakness. It's terrible politics to start by agreeing with the worst bills designed by the worst Republicans, and then try to distinguish yourself from them. But aside from the politics, it's a pathetic acquiescence to the wishes of Al Qaeda.

Osama bin Laden wanted us to give up our rights, he wanted us to change our form of government, he wanted us to be less free. But he couldn't do that himself. He could only set off some bombs. Only we could take away our rights. And we did. We played right into his hands.

Every time Dick Cheney says we have to give up our rights for more perceived security, he is telling you that he doesn't believe in America. He thinks our system is too weak. It's not authoritarian enough and won't be able to defeat Al Qaeda.

This system of ours defeated the Nazis, the Soviets and every other enemy it has faced. But the Bush administration argued that they can't do what Roosevelt and Truman and the rest of our presidents did without cheating and without giving away our freedoms.

The Democrats agreed. And Barack Obama agreed. This is called the politics of weakness.

Now imagine if Barack Obama had stood up and said this instead:

"Mr. President, I'm not going to let you give away our unalienable rights to Osama bin Laden because you are afraid. We are the American people and we don't surrender our rights to anybody, let alone terrorists. We are the guardians of freedom. This is the land of the free, the home of the brave. And you will not take our rights without a fight!"

That would have been the politics of strength. Instead today we will get yet another capitulation by yet another Democrat running yet another weak presidential campaign. I thought we were going to get change in this country.

------------

The Senate Watergate Committee was a special committee convened by the United States Senate to investigate the Watergate burglaries and the ensuing Watergate scandal after it was learned that the Watergate burglars had been directed to break into and wiretap the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee by the Committee to Re-elect the President, President Richard Nixon's re-election campaign fund raising organization. The formal, official name of the committee was the Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities.[1]

Majority party (Dem.) State
 Sam J. Ervin, Chairman North Carolina
 Daniel K. Inouye Hawaii
 Joseph M. Montoya New Mexico
 Herman E. Talmadge Georgia
Minority party (Rep.) State
 Howard H. Baker, Jr., Ranking Member Tennessee
 Edward J. Gurney Florida
 Lowell P. Weicker, Jr. Connecticut

Senate Losers - circ 2008

Harry - time for a shake up in the Senate leadership.

Unfortunately, both Senators from Virginia think it's okay for the government to spy on your international calls (and any communication reasonably believed to be of an international character) without a warrant exercised with judicial oversight AND both of them believe that it is fine for the US Congress to indemnify illegal conduct that infringes upon American citizens' constitutional privacy rights if the President asks them (and pays them) to do so. Oh, and same for Senator Obama (although he at least voted to strip Title II, the immunity section, from the bill, and for the other two amendments by Specter and Bingaman; Webb voted for the Specter and Bingaman amendments).

My time this fall will be spent working for the election of people like Judy Feder and Tom Perriello that understand what this is all about.

Skol!

It also makes me wonder about the "Charlie Brown versus Lucy and the football" mentality of these national Democrats. They seem to not care that they are constantly bombarded with bad faith arguments and scapegoated and pissed on. They just apparently don't have any pride when it comes to dealing with this dishonest brand of Republican elites.

Lots of housecleaning is required to right the ship in our republic -- but we've known that for a while. Still, being reminded in spectacular fashion every two or three months is quite illuminating.

Every single member of the Democratic leadership needs to be targeted in a primary election asap, imo. This situation cannot continue to stand as it does.  

That said, here are the lovers of liberty -- the nays on cloture:

Akaka
Bingaman
Boxer
Brown
Byrd
Cantwell
Cardin
Clinton
Dodd
Durbin
Feingold
Harkin
Kerry
Klobuchar
Lautenburg
Leahy
Levin
Menendez
Murray
Reed
Reid
Sanders
Schumer
Stabenow
Tester
Wyden

h/t to Firedoglake:  http://firedoglake.com/2008/07...

Note that Clinton was with the good guys.

We now have two presidential nominees who will be on the wrong side of history. And I'm not voting for either of them.  

Regarding Clinton, I think it is likely that she also would have capitulated on FISA in a similar effort to protect her right flank if she had become the nominee--especially with the likes of Mark Penn and Lanny Davis offering advice.

I understand the political calculation involved here. Obama's strategists are a lot smarter than I am. They may well have made the right bet on FISA to position themselves for victory in the fall. But part of their calculus must factor in a certain loss of enthusiasm, funding, and volunteer hours from the progressive grassroots. They appear to figure that they can more than make up the difference by catering to the Big Money Boyz. They are likely right. They know that they have the votes of people like me, and they think that they don't really need our time or money.

But having donated funds and volunteer hours on Obama's behalf during the primary, it is now easy for me to choose other places to spend my limited discretionary funds. ACLU and Amnesty International will be on the top of the list. An occasional progressive Democrat somewhere in the country may also get a few bucks. But Obama, the DNC, and the DCCC? Zilch. Nada. Nechevo. They've placed their strategic bets, and now a few grassroots nobodies like me will place our very different tactical bets. The Democratic wing of the Corporatist Party can now compete with the Republican wing for the same pool of corporatist donors.

Regarding Clinton, I think it is likely that she also would have capitulated on FISA in a similar effort to protect her right flank if she had become the nominee--especially with the likes of Mark Penn and Lanny Davis offering advice.

As far as Webb goes, months ago there was big stew about this.  So, it is not a surprise now that he voted for it.  I forget the name of the poster, but he wrote several diaries and was absolutely livid about it.  All my anger about this I got out those several months ago.

As to why this happens, it's back to a comment I made to Lowell in a post about energy (there are so many, I should look back to get the diary name =)).  The majority of people are more concerned with economic issues.  On Maslow's Hierarchy, American society is close to the bottom of the pyramid.  If people were free to think about these things, there might be action on them en masse.  But economic security and meeting basic needs are taking up a lot of people's focus.  It's just here in affluent NoVA, we have time to fret about other things.

Sorry, Jimmy, you blew it. No more votes for you. Done. fini.

Don't call for any more fundraising, volunteering or cavassing.

Which amendment is next to be repealed?

Nominations?

We know it won't be the 2nd.

How about the 6th or the 5th?