Letters to the Editor
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Fresh post...
...up at Fire Dog Lake.
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More senators should place holds and dare Reid to defy them
Perhaps the other Presidential candidates in the Senate (Obama, Clinton, Biden) can be pressured to place holds and dare Reid to defy them in addition to Dodd? And what about Russ Feingold who has shown before he can have serious cajones (voting against the Patriot Act). Edwards is not in the Senate but he could at least make some noise. By making it a "Dem on Dem" fight in criticizing Reid (in addition to Bush and the Republicans as well of course), he might get some traction with the press and actually get some coverage for a change.
This is a chance for candidates to prove themselves to the base, do the right thing, stand up to Bush and get some publicity. What's stopping them?
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@LWM
Thanks for the link, best of luck on your maintenance (wear a grounding wriststrap!), but if Bush has ever read Wilber, I'll eat my hat, or rather go buy a hat and then eat it.
I know Ph.D's who can't read his stuff. I have been working my way through Sex, Ecology, Spirituality for the better part of a year...
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In a Palace Culture, every action revolves around the King
If Reid is really doing what Glenn and others say -- but his office continues to deny it while claiming ignorance of what he is doing -- then he is doing it in orbit around his King. He is caught up in that Palace Culture that few inside the Beltway are able to shake.
If he is doing it (that is, doing what the rumors say, arcane institutional stuff to give the King what he wants while appearing not to -- though his office is ignorant of it and denying it) then he is doing it because he thinks he has no choice.
But Christy posted this at FDL -- a rough transcript of what Reid said on the floor -- and it literally makes no sense at all:
We're going to come in, probably, at 11:00 on Monday. There will be a cloture vote an hour off that on FISA. People have said, well, with some of the blogs saying, why didn't you Rule 14 to make it easier and allow people who did not like the bill to make their position known. Mr. President, I have stated here on the floor, this is the third time, the reason we're going to cloture is because Senator Feingold and Dodd want a 60-vote margin on proceeding to the bill.
http://firedoglake.com/2007/12/14/latest-tricks-fisa-the-courts-the-petulant-unilateral-executive-and-you/
What bill?
Does anybody really know? His office claims they don't know. All we have are rumors and complete, utter, total incoherence from Mr. Reid. Which could be why his office has no idea what is going on and wants us to fuck the hell off, NOW.
If Reid is actually doing what the rumors say he is doing, he is doing it because he sees no other option. He's been blinded.
If the rumors are wrong, boy does blogtopia have egg on its face.
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What if Glenn is mistaken?
Glenn writes:
...Harry Reid is apparently bringing the bill to the floor (a) in precisely the way designed to help the administration's goal of ensuring there is telecom amnesty and fewer surveillance oversight protections and (b) contrary to the way his office has been assuring everyone concerned that it would be done.
How does he know this? The response from Reid's staffers mentioned in the comments here seem to suggest Reid is not doing this. Any possibility Glenn is mistaken?
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Pressure the Republicans as well
I agree that the Democrats have been active enablers since taking charge of Congress after the 2006 election (and indeed were silent enablers prior to that because of their lack of opposition while in the minority). The problem is that there are 535 members of Congress, slightly less than half of whom are Republicans. I am not saying that given the closeness that the Democrats are hampered (unlike other people whom Glenn mentions in his post). However, pressure cannot only be brought to bear only on Democrats (whether actual or DINO). We must also let our Republican representatives know what we think.
I live in Peter Roskam's district, and he has completely adapted the Republican playbook of name calling and factual distortion, despite the fact that he narrowly won his election 51% to 49%. At the same time, his website contains no statements on FISA or the current status of the Iraq war. We must start chipping away at these Republicans as well. The next time I find out when he is going to make an appearance back in the district, I will be there front and center asking him about FISA, waterboarding, toture, and Iraq. And he better have some damn good answers:
* He had better not tell me that FISA is to complicated to understand (ala Joe Klein), because he and I went to the same law school, so if I can't understand FISA, then how in the hell would he be able to;
* He had better not try to tell me that waterboarding is not torture, because I doubt that he has more wisdom and knowledge on this matter than John McCain;
* He had better not try to tell me that the surge is working and that we need to trust the President and give him more time; would Mr. Roskam, a plaintiff's personal injury attorney, have accepted these same assurances from a large corporate defendant that was dragging its feet on producing evidence crucial to his client's case? (BTW, if you go to Roskam's website, it mentions that he graduated from law school, but completely omits the fact that he is one of the dreaded PI trial lawyer Republican boogeymen)
At this point, letter writing and telephone calls are not enough, because we never actually get through to our representatives and Senators. We must go into their offices and demand to see them face to face. We must attend their rallies or their speeches and ask them the hard questions that I see discussed and debated here. These Republicans are afraid of human contact with their constituents, and will run screaming from it like a vampire from a cross. We must get in their faces and show the world what cowards they are. Only then, I suspect, will the MSM (copyright 2007 by the Republican Party) begin to arise from its stupor and syncophany and show their veiwers how the Republican party actually works.
The Republicans have been treating politics since 1994 like a full contact sport. If our Democratic representatives in Congress will not hit back, then it is time to send them back to the bench and show the Republicans that we are not afraid!