I'd like to endorse Holly's recommendation that direct calls to Senate offices be very cool communications.

Take the heat out.

There's great passion here, expressed by sharp and committed writers, people who see what the telecom amnesty issue means.

I sense that Reid, though he may be a bit dim, could be trying to find out how to make FISA work without triggering a Bush veto, which the White House says it will do if telecom immunity is not in the bill. Why would a Senate leader want to lead his charges into a veto? If Reid wanted to do that, wouldn't he be barging right ahead?

If Reid's aides, answering phone calls, say that the Senator is opposed to telecom immunity, there's no point screaming away that that is not so.

Keep all calls cool and professional. Credibility goes up that way.

We need as many Senators on Marcy's list (as reproduced by Sysprog) as we can get. Since Clinton and Obama are sitting senators they have a vote. Edwards is no longer a sitting senator, ergo, he has no vote. However, Edwards, as I understand it, does have the privilege to be present and has access to sitting senators as a kind of "lobbyist." He could offer support, and signal a stance on the issue, with his presence and by "twisting the arms" of those on the list who are sitting senators.

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.

Jim White's recommendation to call in support of Sen. Reid's present stance against Republican obstructionism on this FISA amending bill bears repeating. And as the Aussie said -- you almost can't be too complimentary when speaking to Senatorial aides. Our standing on this issue improves when we demonstrate prudent, intelligent flexibility and an awareness of the difficulties involved in making sausage....uhm, ...crafting laws.

Aides are used to whining cranks. Responsible, intelligent participants in democracy they identify by their manners & professionalism in response to positive conduct on the part of their Senator.

Ooze sweet charm when you call his office.

Do we need to pressure three or two (plus Obama and Clinton, of course)?

I'm not really scared of terrorists. I'm not really scared of bin Laden or al Qaeda or any other current crazy people with guns. They're no worse than any of the other crazy people with guns throughout history.

I am scared that the country I want to live in the rest of my life will turn into a place no longer worth living in.

I am scared that my friends and family may get comfortable with the idea that we can change people's minds by dropping bombs on women and children, or that we can protect the country by controlling citizen's personal lives.

I can see no fundamental difference between that mindset and that of al Qaeda, different words for the same things.

-- prunes

Thursday, January 24, 2008 01:58 PM

Ditto, precisely and amen. This is the core of it all. It cannot be repeated too many times.

Thanks! Do you think faxing the Senators' offices (which I can do over the weekend) is as good as calling?

If this keeps up many will find a need for Gold.

Not Maya Gold, but Acapulco Gold.

I'm already there, and would probably need both. Between a nasty sinus infection and amendments to the language of amendments my head is, quite literally, spinning.

Many thanks to Pow wow, Sysprog and all others who are not only allowing us to follow this so closely, but also understand (sorta) what's actually going on. Without your help my calls to our so-called 'elected officials' would just sound like so much angry jibberish.

I just got off the phone with Bill Nelson's Washington office. I wasn't able to get past the young man who answered the phone. I relayed to him again how happy I was that Senator Nelson stood with Senator Dodd in December, and then told him that I was confused and disappointed by the Senator's vote yesterday to table the SJC version of the bill. I urged the Senator to vote no on Monday on cloture and relayed that Senator Reid is against cloture as well.

I asked if we could know how Senator Nelson would vote and was told that there is no statement. I urged him to come out with a statement since Senator Nelson's vote is one of the most important on this issue. I said that if he would come out with a statement today that he intends to vote against cloture, then he would get a lot of positive phone calls and emails.

Now to suck it up and call Reid's office. A thank you appears to be in order. It's looking more and more to me that Mitch McConnell may finally have achieved what we couldn't. Is it really possible that Reid finally sees the degree of duplicity and cravenness by the Bushies that all of us have been begging Reid to fight all along?

I agree with the others who have advocated thanking Senator Reid and encouraging him to follow through on the course he appears to have set out. I think I will stop short of commenting to him on the PAA extension, as my preference would be to let that expire. If Reid really does kill the SIC version of the bill, he will earn even more thanks.

Keith Olbermann last night asked Howard Fineman about the FISA/telecom debate.

Fineman, in Florida covering the presidential campaigns, said the fight over FISA/telecom is the only issue on which the Republicans can try to paint the Democrats as weak on national security in the 2008 election.

As for Bush, who wants telecom amnesty or nothing, Olbermann asked, "Why is he standing in the way" of a Senate bill that won't trigger a veto?

"Well," Fineman said, "I think the question answers itself. There are things that the White House and the administration were doing that will probably raise the hair of any judge in America if he sees them, and you can't necessarily do all that (see "them") in camera - meaning in public; and the administration doesn't want all that laid out on the record."

"Chris Dodd is absolutely right on the law," Fineman said. Bush wants to "intimidate the Senate" he said.