Letters to the Editor
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God Bless Us Everyone
And God Bless Mitch McConnell. He is teh Gift That Keeps on Giving.
Rich
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on the state of the union
if and when the president blame democrats for the failure of passage of this particular bill. the thing to do would be for senator dodd to stand and declare not true mr president and let all america attention be on him and his responce.peace
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Nipping at their heels
I have this vision of the blogoshpere as a pack of small dogs nipping at the heels of the Beltway establishment. We may not look all that formidable but we are relentless.
Of course one o+f the things that makes it easier is the fact that we are unambiguosly in the right by any measure. When its easy to state our position easily and eloquently and the opposing position requires mealy-mouthed half-truths then thiugh victory isn't assured, the dishonesty of the other position does become rather visible (if not glaring.)
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Tomwindsor etc.,...
I see here many lights. People carry a beeswax candle.
It forms into a blazing bright torch to ignite the heart of the collective body. The nation needs these sparks that are non-violent revolution.
Who ain't proud to be participating in this noble good effort and truthful expression of Liberty? I thank anybody I see who glows in the facial countenance and stands up courageously to speak in 'our' dark times.
P.S. My bathwater is getting lukewarm.
Somewhere in the black-book they say they read...
...(Mr. Reid)...
and obviously GOPS must just tuck the book under their stinky armpit...
...It says to be only "lukewarm" is still a damn heresy.
hamartia and perdition...I do admit I do sure-enough do
love the site of the candle light bearers of the beautiful 'pure' truth.
Flame does purge the defilement's in these days. O, Light.
Shed clothes now, hop in the tub, and light a candle wick!
Hang left-calf outside the bathtub. No let the flame get wet.
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RMP
Thanks for the link and comment. Dodd's speeches are great. He is a pretty liberal Democrat, however, and so may be dismissed as that by MSM and by those conservatives who are concerned about overreaching spying and telecom immunity.
I hope that by presenting "just the facts," the wiki is accessible to all. (I don't know if I've accomplished that exactly, but that is the goal.)
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walter_map
Don't you just hate being lied to?
I don't know which is worse, an obvious lie or well parsed words designed to deceive. Six of one, half a dozen of the other. I will continue to ask questions when I hear statements about "sweeping retroactive immunity".
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We Have to Stay Vigilant
I feel blessed that we still have a few politicians like Chris Dodd and bloggers like Glenn Greenwald to shine a spotlight on this FISA bill in the U.S. Senate. And I’m grateful we have an unfettered Internet that allows them to focus attention on important issues like it. Without all of it, we wouldn't be able to muster enough public outrage to slow down politics as usual. It wasn’t long ago that this bill would have sailed into law without the public knowing about it or its impact on their lives.
As Glenn and others have pointed out, we haven’t won on this issue yet – just forced a pause. This fight over the FISA bill points out that we citizens have to be vigilant and to keep the pressure on our elected representatives. We can’t be complacent, counting on the politicians and their media enablers to watch out for our interests. It’s not easy to stay informed and to take action but it’s necessary if we’re to keep our politicians accountable. This vigilance, the ability to tell our political representatives what we think and free elections are the only tools we have to keep them honest. This form of government works for us only if we use the tools we have at our disposal. If we don’t, we have only ourselves to blame for what we’ve lost.
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@Retired Military Patriot
Thanks for the link to Dodd's speech! It's got some great highlights. Dodd is proving himself to be a major workhorse on this issue, and his efforts should be commended.
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Walk out
What the dems need to do is this. When Bush is giving the State of the Union address, and starts saying how the dems failed to protect the country by not passing an eavesdropping bill. The dems need to stand up in unison, and just walk out. Don't say a word while they do it, but just turn their backs on him. Just the simple act of shunning him, would be an extraordinary defiant act.
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The thing about winning this sort of thing
and what knee-jerk cynics and defeatist don't get or won't acknowledge, is that it typically doesn't happen overnight in one big transformation. Such things take time, effort, dedication, patience and resilience, and invariably experience setbacks along the way, before they happen.
After Bush and the GOP's seemingly big wins in '04, nearly everyone (not me, though) was confidently predicting a Permanent Republican Majority (I thought that his record-thin win and a number of other factors showed that this was actually the right's peak, and that it was all downhill from there). We all know how that one turned out, of course.
Similarly, while I don't expect it to be easy, quick and smooth, we may yet win this one in the end, and anyone who declares it a fait accompli is simply being mentally lazy and substituting easy defeatism and cynicism for real thought and analysis (yeah, I know, I just don't "get it", blah blah blah--save it, please, I'm not buying).
Tokyo Rose was, in the end, quite wrong, was she not?
We may or may not win this one, but to declare it a lost cause from the start is, I think, just plain stupid and lazy, and more indicative of some peoples' mindset and character than of reality. As with the bottle, drugs, cults, new ageism, and other forms of easy escapism, cynicism is for the weak of heart and mind. At least substance abuse has medical and psychological causes. Cynicism does not. And if this pisses anyone off, good--it was meant to.